Lincoln Imperf #315 Is It Real?

I couldn't quite understand what you were referring to in your previous post. Can you elaborate?




The date given is for the "EDU" or "Earliest Documented Use". Scott doesn't give any information on the history of when the imperfs were printed except for "1906-1908". Now I'm curious! I'll look through some of my books to see if I can find more info. Surely someone has studied these!

Brian

think I will leave it to you experts here is the link it has 1 day left at auction for extra scans and such.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/US-USED-190...em1c41d905e9

my scott catalog gives the date 1908 no date range of 1906-1908 for the 315 they are spot on 1908. (again I am no expert just yakking with you about this stamp)

the crazy eye is what I call it see my first post at the start of this thread. it refers to the missing lines of the printing on the right eye that was due to cleaning of the printing dia and it was after the 304 was printed so the 304 does not have that cleaning or missing lines only the 315 has the missing lines and appearance of the right eye looking smaller and upward. if this stamp has missing right eye lines it is not a 304.

i got all that from my reading I am no expert.

Any single copy of a #315 is suspect and almost impossible to get certified.

The imperforates were intended for the Vending & Affixing machine companies and were only sold in sheets of 400. In the early 1900s the 5 cent rate was used for international mail and $20 was a huge sum of money to outlay. Leftover sheets eventually ended up in the public's hands and were separated with scissors but no one was thinking 100 years down the road about their collectable value and worrying about size of the margins.

So the anwser is maybe it is, most likely it's not. This Scott# is best bought as a pair.

Expert services will not certify a used #315 unless it measures 21.5mm wide (or more) AND 25mm high (or more) and does NOT have a centerline. Regardless whether or not it has the "lazy eye" (also known as "sleepy eye" or other descriptive of the left eye (right eye when viewed from front). Those measurements are the minimum size which is calculated by measuring the size of the design + the margins to the adjacent stamps then dividing the margin size in half to arrive at that measurement. If a centerline is present, that means there was often more room on that side to make a fake margin if it was cut off the line when cutting apart the 304 panes. At one time, it was believed that if the "lazy eye" was present, then it HAD to be a genuine 315, but I've seen copies of 304 that also show it. But that being said, 90% of the #315s that I've seen that are either certified or are in pairs, etc, DO have the lazy eye.

wow cool thanks for the info 304s can have lazy eye too good to know- that is three things learned in two days. thanks again.

http://pfsearch.org/pfsearch/pf_grd...tFirst=First;

Note that there are only 15 used singles certified by the PF for the years they have posted online so far - which I think is back to c.1980 or so, which is 34 years. It is interesting too, to see the number of FAKES with seemingly-large margins which would be convincing to most. Also interesting to see how many they "decline opinion" whether or not the CANCEL is genuine or not. Also note the FAKES that do have the "lazy eye"!

Also interestingly I just yesterday certified a too-small used single copy as being genuine, only because it came from a certified PAIR which was cut up so that the one copy, which had very large margins could be sold at a big price. It only measured 20X23mm, generally WAY too small to be considered genuine, but because it was cut from a pair, it is indisputably good. I would guess there are less than 50 certified genuine used #315 singles in existence, so buying an uncertified copy is going to virtually always be a waste of time, energy, and possibly money.

It's less "wavy cuts" as "several cuts" on each margin. Genuine imperfs would normally be cut in one motion, or occasionally two if it was cut from a large multiple and the first cut of the scissors stopped in the middle of a stamp. However trimmed stamps are usually cut in several very small cuts in an attempt to have as much margin remaining when the perfs are removed. I see this all the time on fake imperf and part perf first issue revenues. My opinion is that this example is a fake, trimmed from a perforated stamp.