Small Queen Copper 3¢ ?

Does the "Copper Red" color look Brown ?



My first thought is always color change. But this one looks pretty evenly colored.

This might help, or only confuse things. The PF has certified some 37d's. I like to search their website for reference copies. http://pfsearch.org/pfsearch/pf_grd...lledfrom=lkp
Yours does not seem to have the yellowish tint these have.

All three look a touch oxidized or sulfated.

This means the reddish inks (with sulpher / sulfer as a componant) have had a chance to inyeract with chemicals in the atmosphere and change the pigment's colour.

A quick (5 seconds) dunk or bath in hydrogen peroxide (forget the percentage) will release most of the remainders of the left over chemical reaction.

The Philatelic Foundation site shows plenty of copper red, but how could the one with certificate #187547 be considered copper red? No mention of oxidation.

What is the difference between copper red and Indian red? Are they the same?

I am not sure completely.

When I looked on ebay before there were stamps described as Copper or Indian and then others that looked completely different in colour(s) that were described as the same catalogue number, often by the smae seller but at different times.

I go by the idea that Copper is similar to the metal burnished copper with a cast of redish tint to it and Indian Red is more leaning towards the brownish shades.

I do welcome correction please. Different lights can fool even the trained eyes, which mine are not.

You can see by the top corners of your 3c that there is a lighter shade under there . Personally I think what you show looks Indian red and expect like puzzler said true copper would have that reddish tint but a bit more yellowish. The certified copies of 37d I've looked at were no where near what I expected. The perfs on a 37d are different looking as well. Yours has guide dot so definite 37 but a quick peroxide bath will only show what is truly there. It is a nice looking stamp as is but such is another hurdle on these.

I was just reading a SQ book I bought recently and the authors say that there is very little between the copper red and Indian red. If there is one, it is very, very slight. They both occur in the early (1870-71) first Ottawa printings at the same time.

Based on the samples I have of the early printings, the stamps you have are definitely not the copper red/Indian red of the early printings. For one thing, they should be much lighter in tone.

As far as what you see for sale, unfortunately, many sellers mis-label small queens; often they are really just guessing, and of course will lean toward the more expensive items when they do so.

The best solution is to buy some good reference items from a reputable seller that specializes in this issue.

I will eventually be doing so in my ebay store to help those collectors that are going through the same struggles with identification.

I mentioned in a different thread, that I have been working on this myself for over a year. It is a complicated issue, often made more confusing by sellers that don't really know what they are selling.

I was just hoping someone would chime in with "it was printed in Brown, but very rare"



Welcome to the small Queens :)

Actually stallzer you are pretty close- The copper /Indian really do look like a yellow brown sorta kinda shade. Like that helped! As mentioned yours is oxidized and is from an early printing - check the perfs and then give her a bath and see what is hiding. If it were to be a 12.5 all sides DON"T bath it but like I mentioned those perfs were quite different. Here is a certified pair 37d's

Nice pic nitrolures.
Note the date is MY20/70 - the exact time frame for this very rare printing.
Makes a good reference picture.
Where does it come from?

Shouldn't the right stamp have a guide dot? Or is it to small to see on that resolution?

That pic was sent tom me from a small queen specialist in montreal - I believe it was from an auction, possibly maresch. I contacted him when I had a perf 12.5 x 12.2 and assumed the only chance of a 12.5 was 37d. His response was abnormalities are common which just didn't sit well and said I was perffing wrong. Same stamp was perffed by me on computer and BEESEE with his CAD program so I knew it was correct. I posted before on the big thread about the 3c queens and that was a key point about the guide dot. If the quide dot was a rule and presumably this would be fresh from first printings I thought it should be there. Left hand is understandable as I have a pair with left margin that didn't have guide dot as expected and right one does. This is another example of how every rule has an exception with these darn things.

Did the autocad perfing idea ever get fine tuned?

It's a good idea, however, perfing should always be used in conjunction with the other clues (colour and paper type being the best - guide dots not so much as we have seen).

Your friend in Montreal is correct. There are a few perf anomalies, the later (2nd Ottawa - poorer quality paper) printings had perf 12.25x12.25 (or slight variations there-of).

(BTW: the 12.25x12.25 is a scarce printing in and of itself, as most of these were 12x12.25 or 12.25x12) So it's still a nice , scarcer sample.

The 37d is a very rare stamp (some believe that at most a few hundred exist). It was a very short-run printing (possibly as a stop-gap using an older perforating machine until the primary one could be set up).
The paper is very distinctive (high quality wove) and the perfs must measure a true 12.5 on all sides.

I truly believe BEESEE's auto cad method to be the truest readings possible and have been tested over and over. Simple explanation perfs are math and cad uses it to the finest point. I use an E perf gauge that also works exceptionally well but is reliant on 600dpi scans. On the particular stamp mentioned we both came up with same measurements so it was/is an oddball situation. Found other odd perfs on large queens but just can't justify sending them for expertization. Its rather annoying when you find a stamp that doesn't fit the basic catalog molds but are dismissed as odd or it happens sort of explanations. I would imagine there are many exceptions out there to any and all small queen rules.