How Not To Identify A Stamp

This no-nonsense, logical approach to stamp identification will not make our new members happy.

I much prefer the easier 3-step approach:

1) Find stamp
2) Discover rarity worth hundreds of thousands of $$ on the internet!
3) Assume my stamp is said rarity!!

With this in mind I recently formulated a decision tree for identifying the types of the 1851-57 One-Cent Franklin that would lead users to the common types first (as opposed to looking through the Scott catalog in numerical order, for example). It's in PowerPoint, however, a file type which I do not believe can be uploaded here.

Mdroth, that's Step 1.
Step 2 will always be:
...I learn it from my personal journey

Dudley, you can save each slide as an image and then upload them to a new post.

Dudley,
Sounds good, if you would like to send it to me I can take a look at what might done to code this logic into an online tool. It would make a nice addition to the new Stamp Smarter 1¢ 1851-57 Plating Initiative.
http://stampsmarter.com/features/SQ..._Plates.html
This new community database (Admin is fellow SCF member Richard Nance) is just getting underway and allows folks to search on Type, Relief and Scott number.
Don

Or as a certain Internet meme would have it:

1) Find stamp
2) ????
3) PROFIT!!!!

Don, thanks, will do.

Aug, thanks, will give that a try.

Unfortunately there is a class of dealers whose sorting algorithm is based solely on the highest possible price.

An interesting example is Denmark Scott 122/122a. There is a 9 times difference in catalog value for these 2 shades. So it follows that Scott 122 is MUCH more common, yet in the search for "Denmark 122" in stamps most listings are for 122a (including Anthony's). Go figure.

https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fr...em212ec34d0d

I was listing some 3c 1861 covers last night and was going to throw one cover into a small batch of low value covers. Markings on the cover indicated that the stamp had an F-grill. I decided to check it anyway despite that very reasonable assumption/guess/identification. I immediately noticed that it wasn't an F and I couldn't decide exactly how many columns of points there were. I decided to take it off the cover and low and behold, the stamp has a D-grill and is a Scott #85, a slight improvement over a #94!

Hi

When I worked in my friend's stamp store, there were many who came in to sell stamps. Of course, all were "rare". One day I was in the store with the other person who was a part-timer also. Someone came in to sell a "rare error" stamp. He was shown a stockbook full of said "error". He commented that the catalog in the library said it was worth hundreds and we did not know what we were doing and stormed out of the store.

A friend that was associated with an expertizing service once told me, if you cannot identify a stamp definitively, assume you have the lowest value stamp.

Jerry B

In all fairness, some stamps are confusing. There are multiple printings with minimal difference between the printings and they only show the picture of the stamp in associated with the rarest first printing which the catalog does not always make obvious. That can be an honest mistake.

Yet there seem to be some people who cannot or refuse to admit to the possibility that they may be wrong. That is a fatal failure in philately and in life.