The Chicago Exchange Preferred Cancel?

Does anybody have any clue what this cancel might mean?

Seems to read "Chicago Exchange Preferred."

Jim

Hi Jim, have your tried to google it?

Stampmaster

What is this "google"?

Not familiar with the term.



Jim

John Oliver says you should use Bing.

Of course, "bing it" doesn't seem to have the same ring to it as "google it".

Nuts.

Three relatively common words, but when searched on ol' Google, the only real result... is this post.

Jim

The phrase appeared a few times in the April-May 1909 newspaper in South Dakota ...
Pierre weekly free press., April 29, 1909

Here's the one different result for "preferred Chicago exchange":
https://archive.org/stream/movpicwo...ovi_djvu.txt
exact text is buried who knows where, the Google search is more useful with an address at 808 Wabash Avenue. But as this is all pertaining to the movie business in 1923, I doubt that there's a connection.

I did look for "Chicago exchange preferred" and "preferred Chicago exchange" in the 1910 Chicago city directory, with no luck in both alpha and (guessed) business category listings. https://www.sassyjanegenealogy.com/...ries-online/ under "Chicago Ancestors" only has a 1923 directory as the next later. You probably want something in between 1910 and 1923.

"Chicago" might be West or North Chicago (separate cities) or perhaps just a name.

Thanks for the ideas, I appreciate it.

I'm pretty sure that the cancel begins with "Chicago" and ends with "Preferred" though, based on this angled gap between these two words:



That being said, I have no idea how narcotic tax stamps could be in any way associated with a stock exchange board, in Chicago (or anywhere else for that matter).

The cancel looks too indifferently applied to be the work of someone trying to create a "collectible," but who knows.

Jim

I hate to flog a potentially dead horse here, but is it possible that these narcotic stamps were used provisionally or accidentally as stock transfer stamps?

Jim

How could they possibly have gotten hold of them to do so? These were used on large size packages of narcotics or on individual bottles or boxes of narcotics. They were made available to the manufacturers who needed them as they were ordered. And I am reasonably sure that the government was very careful about maintaining control of them since the additional laws requiring them were new to the Harrison Act of 1914. It's possible that someone at the company using these noticed that the cancel was weak and did not cover all the stamps and simply picked up whatever rubber stamp was close at hand and struck them.

I'm just speculating that, since all of these documentary and proprietary and future transfer and silver tax etc. revenue stamps were available at local IRS district offices, why would it not be impossible for a pane of narcotic stamps to somehow get mixed up in the stock transfer stamps folder one day?

And then some of the stamps were subsequently cancelled by a stock trading board?

There is otherwise no mention at all of a manufacturer or importer of narcotic products that had this particular name. But the name is clearly a stock trading exchange.

I would consider this mix-up to at least be a possibility.

Jim

I can't see it, especially in an office as large as the Chicago office must have been. They would have had a specific stamp room or window and specific employees to work it. Plus it would take a special kind of ignorant collector to soak narcotic stamps off of a stock document or certificate.

Well, you may have an opportunity to examine it in person, and render an official opinion one way or the other, as I've asked the owner to submit it for a certificate.



Jim

A collision in a busy office, employees drop work orders?

Out of curiosity, how many Chicago pharmaceutical firms have we identified by their cancels on narcotic tax stamps? In my collection I count none.

Ron,

Abbott Laboratories, Eli Lilly, G. D. Searle and Company, Halsey Brothers Company, H. E. Bucklen and Company, P. H. Mallen Company, and Sharp and Dohme all were based in, or had depots in, Chicago.

I'm sure that you have examples of at least some of these firms in your collection, now that you know what the initials in the cancels stand for.



Abbott Laboratories, formerly the Abbott Alkaloidal Company, only used their registration number as their cancel. That number was 1332. I'm sure you've got one of these:



Jim