Has Anyone Seem A Cracked Plate Example Of A SC #179?

Picked this up the other day on a whim as it looks like "Old Rough and Ready" was roughed up a bit ... and looked to me like a potential cracked plate example. I was wondering if anyone here has seen one before, and of course your opinions on this one.

I haven't had much luck with examples of this stamp, they've all been really poor quality. Regardless of whatever is going on here, this is the best version of #179 I've ever had the fortune of seeing. Interested to see what others have to say.

Caper123

How does the back of the stamp look? Any evidence of a paper fold?

Looks like an inksmear to me, not really a cracked plate


Peter

Gettinold, the back looks great (aside from the hinge). No sign of any fold.

Petert4522 - You opinion is certainly valid. I would just add that at the upper and lower part of the 'line' it is not as sharp as I would expect a crack to show up but at the center it becomes rather fine as I would expect a cracked plate to appear.

Caper, I guess my computer screen is not showing that. Could you post a close-up of the middle part? I have lots of plate cracks and smears in my collection, and sometimes cracks can look a lot like a smear,

Peter

This is the best I can do for now...
I was referring to the area between the arrows.



When I think of a smeary type crack I think of this Sc #26 example...

Brookman lists cracked plate as a variety for Scott 179. He describes the following but does not specify this to be the only known variety.

"There is a very prominent cracked plate variety on this stamp that extends vertically thru four stamps and just touches a fifth stamp. It starts at the bottom of the "5" of the top stamp, runs downward through the "0" of ''POSTAGE,'thru the ''I'' of ''FIVE'' of the next stamp, then thru the '' U'' of "U. S." and down the stamp just to the left of the "F" of "FIVE" thru the bottom border, and on the fourth stamp it just touches the upper left corner of the stamp and then goes on thru the margin to just touch the lower right corner of the stamp to the left.

Not a crack. Look at his forehead, you can see the dots of his face through the supposed crack. If it was a crack those dots would not be visible and the line would be a much stronger color. Just a bad wipe job.

I agree with rev

Makes sense.

I thought I'd resurrect this thread, just to add a scan of a 179 that appears to show one of the cracked plate positions - sold on ebay yesterday for $60.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/07-1879-Sc...ig_cvip=true