Gross Postal History Sale Is Posted

New exercise program: sorting Siegel Gross auction catalogs.

A whole lot of very well known covers in that sale.

Its nice to see this stuff circulate periodically as it generates excitement for and interest in the hobby.

I'm sure this sale will snag a few new postal history collectors. Even for those who don't care to spend this kind of money, it still might stimulate some interest in cover collecting overall. I know I was heavily influenced at an early age by Ishikawa's coffee table exhibit book. I couldn't afford anything in it at the time, but it helped infect me with the bug for Classic US material. I'm still not cured.

I received the hardbound catalog today and am blown away. Put together with the other Gross catalogs it is an amazing body of reference material presented in the highest quality format. WOW.

Well, so far, a lot of very strong results mixed with some unsolds.

I guess considering the sheer volume of material here, maybe that's not surprising.

The one thing that did surprise me is that the Heidelberg cover (lot 158) did not sell. That is one of the great 1847 covers.

TX - agree that there were a lot of strong results compared to the estimates; however, I was wondering if part of that was that the estimates reflected a softening market. I don't really have a good handle on '47 prices today vs. say at the time of the Craveri sales. For the small segments of the '47 market that I follow, I thought the prices were average to strong.

From the "floor", the auction was pretty interesting. 5 or 6 collectors on the floor bidding and winning some lots. I413 seemed particularly successful. While the estimates may have felt "low", seems like they were appropriate and enabled competitive bidding to move along.

spqr - I think you make a valid observation about the market overall vs estimates.

I see a lot of covers throughout the sale that sold in great sales circa 2000, for bigger numbers than today. Many of those covers sold again in 2005-2007 for even more. The estimates do tend to reflect a downward adjustment, I agree.

Back in 2000 Hackmey, Gross and others were battling it out, putting some serious upward pressure on prices. Also, from top to bottom it does appear that the postal history market is thinner now than then. I hesitate to dwell on that, though, because there are obviously still a lot of serious buyers around, and at least with the Angel sale earlier this year it seemed as though there was an uptick.

The market for a lot of postal history is thin and one collector entering or leaving he market can have a big impact on prices. There was an APS August show maybe 10 years ago that had three major '47 exhibits (i think Mirsky, Gross, and Eubanks) and 2 of the 3 are now out of the market. There must be some new major collectors. I guess we will have a better idea of the market after tomorrow's sessions. If the first Gross sale was any indication, the fancy cancels will do very well.

I won an 1856 5c #12 cover! I now have an ex-Gross piece!

congrats - That's a nice example of the single rate british open mail to France via British steamer.

I'm quite fond of 5c covers. They aren't super common.
I considered bidding on it, but didn't.

1856 Cunard Steamer.
Maybe the RMS Persia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Persia

The Cunard steamer Asia left NYC on Nov 12 and arrived Liverpool Nov 24, 1856.

The lot description says that but I double checked it and looked it up.

I'm just starting to get into a bit of postal history. I'm, frankly, attracted to the handwriting of these 150+ years-old covers - which is a personal connection to someone who lived in the world of my great-great-great-grandparents - 5 generations ago! And nobody can write like this anymore. To see an illustration of the ship that this letter likely traveled is another connection - thank you for the link.

RMS Asia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ameri...ss_steamship