Toned Stamps

Toning is a process of aging. Unfortunately it occurs with stamps. Is there any remedy to get rid of the tint on stamps that are already toned?

This is Mexico Scott 323a with watermark. There are 5 or 6 known and this is the only copy with the watermark. Unfortunately it is partially toned.

If you have a certificate, I would let the buyer worry about the toning.

I don't mean to question your abilities, as your previous posts already show you are quite knowledgeable. But how confident are you that your stamp is genuine? I assume you can see the embossing. But can you confirm your green seal is genuine and not a fake made from unfinished (i.e., "unsealed") remainders?

I've never had the pleasure of having one of the green seal varieties physically in my possession to examine, so I'm quite curious on how to determine a genuine green seal. Thanks in advance for any replies.

I wouldn't spend thousands of dollars without an expert's opinion on them. Nick Follansbee's service is fast so the seller don't have to wait more than 2 months for a MEPSI cert. and he is the expert. This is not one of those ordinary Green Seal issues, which are plentiful. If you want the ordinaries, I will give you a few.

khj, I will inform you further about the genuine seal on these rarities whenI return from my Mexico home. I live at the border and have to go there to take care of the dogs.

Who let the dogs out! If you have a stamp and there is only several known why would you do anything to it? It is what it is. If you want to sell it then the price can only go down because you changed the stamp.

Hi folks. It took me half hour to explain the green seals. When I click on "Submit Reply", guess what I got?! SCF gave me a "you used a wrong pass word...." and I lost all the message I wrote in the reply. Boy, this has never happened before. I will write again. tonight.

That's great that you got a certificate! Very nice stamp to have. The reason I asked was because I wasn't sure if you had found the stamp accidentally while searching a batch of stamps, or if you had specifically purchased that stamp.

Since you have the certificate, I wouldn't do anything to the stamp. It would invalidate the certificate.

Sorry you lost your post. I'm sure it was great reading. In the future, if you submit a post and run into problems, try using the back arrow. More often than not, you will get back to your textbox with your post still in it. Again, thanks in advance for the info, and also for picture of the cert.

k

Mexico Scott 322a, 323a, 324a, 325a and 327a are 322~327 stamps with the Green Seals added. 322~327 stamps, known as the White issues, also have the word "CONSTITUCIONAL" embossed in them and they were issued in June 1913 and the 5c (336) were issued even earlier in May 1913. These "a" sub-numbers are of the greatest rarities in philately. A few left over sheets, as few as one or two sheets of ten, were added to the bunch when the counter-forgery measure of embossing changed to overprint the green seals, Scott 336~339. If you collect Mexico, have you ever wondered what happened to Scott 330~335? These numbers are missing in the current Scott. In actuality, these numbers were occupied by these "a" sub numbers before and Scott later decided to move them under the numbers of the White issues. Not all green seals are the same. This is the biggest misconception for the Mexico collectors. We take the assumption that these left over embossed sheets were added to the overprinting as soon as they started the job on the green seals, which were issued as early as July 1, 1913. These Green Seals are in deep green color. Actually, these left over sheets were found close to the end of the green seal issues in late September and added to the overprinting. These later printing are in a very distinctive pale bluish green color. So, these rarities were overprinted with seals in pale bluish green, with the embossing as well, of course. One 324a on cover was sold for more than $11,000 about two years ago. I have never seen a 324a off cover yet. The picture shows the difference in the green color, using 3c as an example.

Excellent, thank you!

Yes, I had noticed the green color was very different. As I mentioned, I've never had the pleasure of physically examining one of the "a" stamps. So the marked color difference did pique my curiosity.

Thanks for the additional info as well as the pic!

k

fotofila
I'm not a Mexico stamps collector and it's not often I read posts about them. Thank you for your explanations. I first read your initial post last night and me too I wasn't sure you have a genuine copy because I couldn't see the embossing and the watermark. Forget about the actual toning, just prevent from anymore. I suppose you have a great Mexico stamps collection.

Thank you, Timbres667, The best collection I have ever built was "Imperial China Postal History" collection that went to the Champion of the Champions in 1979 Boston APS Exhibition. I have a tendency to get my hands in anything that is beautiful. So, I collect too many countries, but concentrating in Guatemala and Mexico.