Covers Postmarked On Sunday

I have been going through my "common" covers and putting them in lots to sell on ebay. Just for fun I decided to check to see if any were cancelled on a Sunday. So far in a stack of about 600 covers I came up with three. I was looking for information on Sunday cancellations and I could not come up with much. Does anyone know how rare or uncommon this may be? I found a couple listings on ebay, but they were way too high to be true, and they were not getting much attention at all. I don't know if the prices are keeping people away or if nobody seems to care but me. I have thousands of covers to sort through and was wondering if I was wasting my time looking for Sunday cancellations.
By the way in case anyone wants to know, my very scientific survey of about 600 covers so far has Monday and Saturday as the busiest days, but that is what I would have guessed.

You've seen my listings on ebay and you know I put the month, day and year of any cover I can read the postmark or message (except some of the bulk lots), but I never try to determine which day of the week it is. I don't think it's really that important myself as even today you can still get Sunday postmarks from select post offices. Colonie Mall in Albany, New York is one such post office. I'm sure there are others.

Historically, I believe post offices were open more frequently on Sundays, but religious groups did not like it and compelled most post offices to close that day. Someone might know more details when that happened.

What is harder to find are Leap Year dates. I don't think I've seen one yet amongst the many thousands I've been through. December 25, January 1 and July 4 covers are easier dates to find compared to February 29 covers.

Will,
I collect January 1, February 29, April 2, July 4 and December 25. I also collect year changes from back when things were backstamped, example(Dec 31, 1899 on the front and Jan 1 1900 on the back. I do have 100's of February 29. My oldest is 1848, stampless.

Wow!
I have not find one February 29th cover so far. I've seen all the other dates you've mentioned including year changes. I even find inverted date slugs and the like too. I'll just have to keep looking.

Will,
Keep looking, they are out there. The only one I paid more than a couple bucks for was the stampless one, and I will deny how much I paid for that if my wife is reading this. I find most in dealers bargain boxes or friends save them for me. Last leap year I got nearly 100 from one friend alone that saves me mail from his office. I have been saving those dates for over 40 years. I have saved those before I knew there was such a thing as postal history and back when I primarily collected just stamps. It is amazing what one can accumulate in time. Of course if you don't have time you only need deep pockets.
It is almost harder to find my birthday (April 2) as most online sellers do not put dates in the listings like you do unless it is a significant date like in the case of leap year.

Here it is ... right out of the Postal Bulletin ... it first happened in 1912 (first and second class offices) and as this article indicates in 1922 the Postmaster General at the time encouraged it to extend to third and fourth class offices, as well.

I've got nothing posted on leap year and I have a lot of covers

This reminds me of some early Belgium stamps with a Sunday label tab on them saying "Do Not Deliver on Sunday" so that if it was left on then it wasn't delivered on Sunday, but if it was taken off then it could be delivered on Sunday.

If you *really* want Sunday postmarks, start collecting covers from SouthWest Asia (known to the EuroCentric as The Middle East), where Sunday is a regular work day.

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

ikeyPikey,
I am just interested in us covers on Sunday at this point and what their scarcity may be.

To be clear I am interested in common commercially cancelled covers cancelled on a Sunday in the US and how scarce they may be. I am not looking for favor cancels or special events.
Here are a few;


The above is dated Nov 13 1955 from De Funiak Springs, FLA



This one is Apr 23 1950 from East Tawa, Mich



Finally Oct 29 1950 from Cherokee, Iowa

I have many 1000's to sort through. I starts on my 50's boxes. This will take a while.

Will and Tom,
I decided to post a few Leap Year covers for you to enjoy. I started a new thread for them instead of putting them here.
Pat

Thanks, guys. You just gave me another project. At a recent auction, I bought a carton of covers, mostly because there were a large number of used modern commemorative issues. I quickly pulled a few out of the box when I read this thread, and they were from February 2000. I didn't see any from the 29th, but I only checked about 10 (there are a few hundred in the box). If I ever find any, I'll let you know.

While I'm at it, I'll look for Sunday cancellations, too. I know that Feb 29 2000 was a Tuesday, but I wonder if there are any Sunday Feb 29 cancels out there - I bet that's an odd combination!

My wife loves to tell the story about the time I had to go to the post office at the Airport on Feb 29th to mail myself letters. It's about a 45 minute drive each way. I'm not sure you can even do that since 911. It was the only post office I knew of that was open on Sunday. I don't remember the year. Now you gave me a project. I'm sure I still have those covers someplace. My wife thought I was completely insane at the time.

Here's an article that may be of interest because it covers dominical labels:

http://www.stampsofdistinction.com/...-labels.html

I worked for the post office in the late 1950s, early 1960s and we regularly worked on Sundays and holidays, picked up, canceled, and sorted mail, so Sunday and holiday cancels should not be scarce, at least from medium and large cities. I don't know when the POD stopped processing mail on Sundays and holidays, probably in the 1970s after the transition to corporation status. Now its doubtful that a letter mailed after the last pickup Friday will even leave the town of posting on a weekend.

Don