Not Sure If This Is An Error

i'm a serious collector too, and I have many funny oddities with no real value to anyone except fun... I can post some of them later.

to the OP, when you ask a question here you're acknowledging this forum to house collectors with more knowledge than you, to ask, and then dismiss their thoughts is strange.

So then, you can always send this in to an expert group for certification. The APS is reliable and would be faster than anyone in the UK. Note that you need to submit a form with payment and send via registered mail.

We would like to hear the results.

Yes, we rarely (if ever) hear the results from certification. I, for one, would love to hear a good success story ...

There is no point sending your stamp into any organization for a certificate. Save your money.

There are three main ways for color-missing stamps to occur:
true printing errors, light fading, and chemical fading.

Light fading tends to react with the reds and yellows first. Note the link on the previous page, which goes to the example of the Lady's Slipper stamp, which has the yellow faded out by exposure to sunlight. This is also demonstrated by yellow fading from green stamps to give a blue appearance (yellow + blue = green) Fade-out the yellow from a green stamp and turn it blue.

Chemical fading: Since the green disappeared rather than the yellow, it appears that a chemical has caused the color change to the stamp posted at the beginning if this thread - and noting the green remaining in the lower right corner. At first glance it appeared that the stamp was held by that lower right corner and dipped into a liquid - an acid, a base, a bleach, etc., which changed the color.

As an experiment, I took several damaged copies of this same stamp and attempted to duplicate the effect with different household chemicals. Here is the example before/after soaking overnight in sodium hydroxide.





Perhaps soaked a bit too long or too strong or in a different chemical to exactly match the original, but the point is that color changelings are quick and easy to create. Not a production error, but damage/change well after being sold.

Excellent John! I think that pretty well sums up the situation, and I would agree that it appears be the held by the corner while it was dipped into that solution

Sorry Gents, was called out of town.
To Answer a few questions. I acquired this collection From Mendel because I followed his career in underwater archaeological dives and rescues. I knew him for many years and always commented I would love to collect stamps.I purchased many lots from Mendel through out the years. Well to my amazement he left his collection to me when he passed away his daughter Vicky called me with the news of his passing and that their was a letter for me With a noted poem.

Mendel L. Peterson may he rest in peace.

I think I should have it checked with APS just to be safe. I'm sure he had it in his collection for a specific reason. This was gents his youth collection as others mentioned. Something his career took the time from, if given the time I am sure it would have been a wonderful collection like his works with the Smithsonian

"They have never been exposed to light I am the first one to touch these in over 30 years out of the box."



Stage one is to disregard any advice or theory that does not fit in with a pre-conceived notion.

Stage two is the "box". There are a few "box syndrome" threads to be found.
https://goscf.com/t/47047#404222

Stage three is "shown it to an expert who can verify it is an error of the highest magnitude". However, it is most likely that any "expert" is just someone on another forum. We live in the age of the internet and it is not hard to find someone with similar opinions, theories etc who will agree with any nonsense put to them. The Internet is also the home of the people with tin-foil helmets and it is always comforting to have someone, anyone, share that same views as yourself.

Again, please post your answer from the APS. We ask to see successful responses, but never get any answers. We would love to be proven wrong.

I've wasted my time with this thread.

I found your demonstration very interesting. Even if the person who started this was not impressed with your post, it was helpful to others who were reading it too.

John,

Yes, but only as far as the original poster is concerned.

I found your analysis & experiment extremely enlightening & valuable - and I'm extremely grateful! I certainly appreciate the time & effort you put into this thread. As I am sure others are as well...

Unfortunately, I am not a chemical engineer. (I'm guessing you have some background in this field?!) The inks used to produce these stamps - 100 years ago & more - were unstable & in many cases, of very poor quality. Any knowledge we can gain about how the stamps react & deal with environmental issues is invaluable!

Let the OP support the APS - also beneficial!

So all things equal...nowhere near a waste of time!

After much digging inside in the area of where those were located. Many and I mean many were completely faded or just a maze of colors,,what could cause this? I am so disappointed. I know he valued his collection dearly someone mentioned box ghosts could this have been an acidic box they were in?

I have counted over forty now Just ruined simply just ruined. Maybe its my fault I left them in the box for several years thinking I was protecting them, when I was destroying them. Man im upset.

mdroth wrote:


There are chemists and chem engineers around who won't collect modern missing color errors because they feel all can be done by some chemical means. The larger lesson is to store your stamps carefully.

MrQuestion, it probably was not your doing, more likely Mendel's acuumulation of others' chemical shenanigans or bad storage. No notes with any of these to provide a clue? It may even have been his own experiments after receiving details on what fakers were doing.

This was a trick from way back when:

and so perhaps was changing stamp colors with other household and industrial chemicals. I remember reports that 17c Woodrow Wilson stamps (Sc#623) could be shrunk down similarly; being black, the color would not be affected.