Please Identify - Airplane Cancels

Hello first time posting. Have had this cover for a long time and have been unable to find out what the cancels are?

Hello and welcome paperboy. What a great first thread. I have never seen that cancel. Looks like something custom made. The cancellations on the back are the real dated strikes bu the front looks amazing. Someone I am sure will chime in and give you the information that you are looking for. Again welcome and thanks for the neat scan! - jeff

Wow!
Great air mail cancels!

Nice cover with great cancels I haven't seen before. I did look up the return address, though, of one Donald E. Dickason of Wooster, Ohio, and found that he was the editor/author of this work, which would certainly relate to his interest in such covers:

wt1 does it again! :)
well done,
so where does this leave the cover?
can someone cancel stamps with his own canceller?
although philatelically contrived, it looks as if it has passed through
the post.

Any idea on whom Howard McAfee is? I bet the gentleman from Wooster Ohio was in good with the postmaster. Beautiful cover!

The above was posted in a listing of "Important Dates in Precancel History." Further research is required but in view of the above, private mailers may also have been authorized to cancel stamps.

And seeing how the sender was a philatelist, he likely had a good relationship with the postmaster in Wooster.

Mailer's postmark permits are currently authorized but I don't know how long that authority has been in effect -- an interesting research project when time permits.

*Bump* and I say *BUMP* again in responding to a post many years old by a member probably long gone.

For the record:
There's nothing to do with precancels or MPPs here.

This is part of a phenomenon roundabout 1928-1934 where fancy cancels were being used in some towns on registered mail. The rules were vague saying that "standard" cancels like 4-bar cancels were not to be used on the front of registered mail. This was to make clerks check the back for postmarks to insure sealing and overcanceling of the flap as a check against tampering. Washington did not specify what to use for cancelling stamps on the front, although today's Marker Monkeys would know. The higher-ups probably assumed something like the mute double ovals would be used. But improvised fancy killers were already being used for years before this.

Enter a few enterprising collectors several of whom collected 19th Century fancy cancels. They provided and even designed cancels for a number of postmasters of small offices and some clerks to use. So you may be on the right track with addressee Howard McAfee or sender Dickason, though the names aren't among the most familiar ones.

This airplane one, used at Station no. 2, was in use for 9 days (12/20/1930-12/29/1930). The end date probably might have been due to orders by the clerk's supervisor or postmaster to stop use. This cover is obviously philatelic; a lot of stamps maximizes the number of cancel strikes. If the stamps are removed from the cover, there's a lot of cancels to trade. So years later someone might find this cancel SOTN on a loose stamp and not know where it came from or if it was genuine. And philatelic it may be, but it was accepted in the mails and postally used.

Bill Weiss wrote about these:
http://www.stampsmarter.com/Learnin...lations.html
and you can use the link below to the database at Stamp Smarter and do a search by year date and see what's been added so far.

The requirement for the front of a registered cover being mute as to postmark information came into effect January 1, 1911. Until at least 1930ish the double oval killer (obligator) containing the post office name and state between the ovals appear widely used on registered mail even at the philatelic agency in D.C. itself.

I have an example of the mute double oval from 1923 but it is NOT on a registered item. Can anyone provide additional pre 1930 examples of the use of the mute double oval killer on any class or type of mail?