1908 Pacific Steamship Cover

I recently acquired this item. Return address is Nome, Alaska, marked Pacific Coast Steamship Co. Steamer SENATOR on 2 October 1908. Double struck Seattle, Washington; in the first strike the date slugs apparently had not been inserted, which was corrected on the second strike to show Nov 2 1908. There is no evidence of a stamp anywhere on the cover and the smudge in the upper right is not consistent with removal as part of the machine cancel would have to be missing.

The back shows setoff of similar machine cancels, plus a receiving stamp for Waldo Oregon.

Based on this, my theory is that the sender, though from Nome, boarded somewhere else in Alaska (PCSC did not serve Nome), and the steamship company bulk paid for this cover and others at Seattle, permitting its customers not to use stamps as a courtesy. The rear setoff indicates that a stack of covers was machine canceled at once in Seattle and the USPO had accepted postage payment in some other manner from PCSC.

Can anyone confirm or debunk this theory?

thanks,
Chris

Sounds plausible, though its also possible another party carried the letter for the sender to the port serviced by the steamer (see the article below). Maybe payment was in gold dust? Found this article. It mentions a Helen Allan. Although the article gives a date of 1910 for the family in Nome; perhaps the wife and children were there by 1908? This may be the sender, doubt there were too many Helen Allan's in Nome at the time. The penmanship looks more like a child's to me. There were some hits on Peter Peacock when I googled him. You may want to check them if you're interested.

http://www.litsite.org/index.cfm?se...ntentId=2558

Great tips, thank you. It appears the parties knew each other in Oregon prior to 1908. The cover is large for the time, so perhaps it contained a greeting card, which a child might be asked to send.

Another quandary of the cover is the date discrepancy: the steamship marking is October 2 and the Seattle marking is November 2. PCSC ships were fast for the day and it could not have taken a month to make the trip, so I presume that the Seattle office was completely messed up that day and inserted the November slug rather than October. It would be reasonable for the Senator to move from Juneau to Seattle within the same day, for example.

The Steamship mark has a weak second digit to the day, thus late October. So there is little time elapsing before it got to Seattle, not a month. Look closely.
There is no unpaid courtesy or bulk mailing which would not have been marked as paid - otherwise how would the post office in Waldo know is was paid or not?

It appears this was mailed (accidentally?) without a stamp and managed to pass through the system without being caught.

@Al E Gator

Love the link to mushing in Alaska. I hope I can teach/show my elementary kids how the big box of FDCs and stamps in the closet is actually a time machine to explore history.

Good Find

Correcting an error above, I recently acquired a 1905 sailing schedule and route map showing that the regular route of the Senator was Seattle-Nome-St. Michael, so the cover could have boarded ship in Nome.

Chris, some info. on Mrs. Mary Ann (Adams)Peacock, sister of Helen Allan's mother, Mary Ellen.. Interesting lady.


https://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/...Rid=36046890