Another Weird Cancel On A Narcotic Stamp

The H. K. Mulford Company in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania operated from the late 1880s until they were acquired by the Sharp and Dohme Corporation in late 1929. They made a variety of products containing narcotics.

This is their more commonly seen cancellation:



This cancel at first seems to read "H. K. Co."



However, when other stamps with the same cancel were found, it was clear that the H. K. Mulford Company also used a much, much larger cancel than their more common cancel.




It was almost as if someone was over-compensating for their first, tiny cancel, that somebody in upper management had complained was too hard to read, by making a ridiculously large cancel.

Or maybe it was the other way around, and the guy that made the first huge cancel was told to make it smaller, so he shrunk it way down to a teeny, tiny size?

Jim

Hi, I'm confused, why are the different cancels weird?

Please help me understand!

Stampmaster

From the dates shown, the large cancel came first chronologically, consider ... The large cancel(s) are clearly in 2 parts, the company name and the date - and are dated April 1919. I believe this is using two older rubber stamps already on hand for filling out other company forms - a primitive stop-gap measure. Then they got a cancel properly sized to fit the stamps and containing the proper dates and numbers.

John,

That makes sense.

The small cancel was used on the later violet strip stamps, so the giant cancel must have been used first.

Jim

That's my theory - just reading the dates - the tax came into effect and the company had to do something to marginally comply using existing rubber stamps until they got a new device with smaller text.

It may or may not have been marginally, depending on the products and packages involved.

Harry Kendall Mulford was the treasurer of the company. Apparently Milton Campbell, the president, was out of town when it was time to file the incorporation papers and the name of the company had not been discussed. Apparently, Milton Campbell was not offended because Mulford continued as treasurer until the company was sold to Sharp & Dohme just after the 1929 market crash. How do I know this? My wife's great-uncle was Milton Campbell. Somewhere there is a company history written by the general manager, Charlie Hayward, another of my wife's relatives.

A third variation to the Mulford cancel.

Looks like the second one grew up a little.

Sorry about the image quality.

Jim