Alexander Calder Scott #3202 Oddity

Scanned below is an "oddity" I discovered awhile ago. The 32 cent Alexander Calder issue from 1998 is Scott #3202. Look at the gray swirling shadow under the three-legged artwork. I have 9 used copies of this stamp, yet I was able to put together a progression of almost no shadow on the left stamp to full gray shadow on the right stamp. I soak in lukewarm water, not hot water, to prevent fading on some USA issues of this time period, but this find was new to me.

Linus

Hi Linus,

Thank for posting this. I really like these kinds of "Finds" on recent USA stamps.
So thank you for sharing!
I don't know if I have one of these in my collection, but if I do, I'm going to check it and see where it falls on the spectrum.
And I'll make an annotation that the gray swirl at feet varies.

Dave N.

Interesting. Next step would be to analyze mint sheets. I doubt you will find much progression inside each sheet, but there is probably variance from sheet to sheet. Check to see if there were different printers.
Don

Dave N. - My pleasure.

I took Don's advice and went out on eBay looking at current mint sheets for sale. Scanned below are snips of images from eBay, and the amount of gray shadow varies greatly, also affecting the neighboring stamp's gray shadow. Just search "Alexander Caulder" under the "Stamps" category. This appears to be a reoccurring variety in the printing of this sheet: heavy shadow, very light shadow, almost no shadow.

Linus

I have three complete panes (one is on an FDC). Two of them from the right pane of the sheet have consistent light shadows while the left pane is consistently darker. Most of the rest I have are singles on FDCs and are consistently darker except a pictorial postmark cover I purchased later of Artrain Station, Missoula, MT dated June 23, 1998. It is the bottom right stamp with plate number and pane price insignia and is significantly lighter than all the others I have.

It looks like shadow intensity varies on all the stamps of that pane, for example the adjacent stamp under its red artwork.

I went and looked at my mint panes (I have 17 - I like Calder) and sure enough 2 out of the 17 have diminished shadow. Thanks for pointing that out!

Alan B - My pleasure.

I showed this discovery on another forum back on 28 February 2018, but I did not get much reaction. Years ago, I subscribed to Linn's Stamp News, and they used to point out varieties such as this one, so I thought this was probably known in the philatelic world.

So Alan, do all of your panes have S111111 as the plate number? I am now trying to find out who printed these sheets, and if there were more than one company. If anyone else knows, add to this thread.

Linus

The S in the plate number means that the stamps were printed by Sennett Security Products. There were no other printers which is typical for commemorative issues.

The Durland catalog lists only one plate number, S111111.

Philatomic - Thank you for that information.

Linus

My 2016 Durland shows just the one plate number (S111111) for Calder. According to the Scott catalogue, this issue was printed by Stamp Venturers. As this entity (a partnership) was created by Richard Sennett, I suspect that it may have been the precursor to Sennett Security Products (an LLC founded in 1998). I believe Stamp Venturers was initially involved in the printing of U.S. postage starting in 1991.

yes, SV was the precursor to SSP

Hi Linus,
You might take a look to see if there is a correlation between the position of the grey plate number '1' and the lack of grey on the stamps. In the few examples I looked at, it seems like the grey '1' is slightly misregistered on the stamps where the grey is missing or not as dark.
Don

JLebbert,

Thanks for the correction. I had forgotten about SSP being formerly known as Stamp Venturers.