Siegel Offering The Edward Morton US Collection In April

This is part of the description of this stamp. Part of it is nonsense, as was stated above.

"The example offered here comes from a strip of three of Positions 6-8R1E, offered in our 2007 Rarities sale, which was cut apart with a view towards preserving the margins of this stamp"

Precisely. That's what makes true four-margin copies of this stamp so rare. Four-margin "jumbo" copies created during the past decade are not the genuine article.

It was cut apart with an eye towards someone paying 3X or 4X catalog for it. Nothing more, and nothing less.

That is correct.

I heard that Siegel changed its mind and decided to accept the $90,000 bid on the #5.

Yes, their site now shows a $90,000 price realized.

Which means the owner decided to accept it.

I am in agreement with those who feel that this problem is created by grading, which in my opinion has been a cash cow to certain expertizing organizations and in my opinion a disaster everywhere else in the hobby. Again, my opinion, it was created as a parallel income stream when the appeal of straight up expertizing was not generating enough capital in the same way that sports paraphernalia is more important to some than the game being played or on the hour legal fees sometimes dwarf the amount of money being fought over.

Funny—in the old days, a collector could see a stamp and without a numerical grade put into the categories or avg/fine, fine, f/vf, vf, and better than VF. He or she could also correlate that roughly to the catalog price, particularly since the time Scott's tagged its listing price to VF. Now that you have on line sources of market realizations like Siegel, the job is even easier—again without the need for a numerical grade.

When I look at numerically graded certificates, I do not appreciate a major, and most often not a minor, visual difference between 95,98 and 100. I see perfectly centered jumbos graded 90 and I ask myself why is this not graded 100? I see stamps clearly not perfectly centered graded 98 and have difficulty explaining this. Do most of us actually believe that there is a difference between 98 and 100? Between 95 and 98?

Finally I look at the number of stamps from the 1940's on submitted for grading as if finding a well centered stamp with the recent technology is the same as finding a VF or better centered stamp from the 19th centered and I shake my head.

Anyone can look at the mutilated strip of #5 and readily conclude what happened and why it happened. Without grading—the Coronavirus of the hobby—-it might still have happened, for greed and manipulation knows no boundary, but I am thinking maybe not

Grading helps in some respects. One that comes to mind is not having to deal with sellers describing all of their material as "Superb" which is a pain in the neck. It quantifies a condition. No process is flawless however. Grading is hardly the "coronavirus" though. LOL It is disingenuous to lump the mutilation of a rare multiple in with a grade being assigned to a one cent Columbian. Kind of like demolishing your house because the paint is peeling.

"Do most of us actually believe that there is a difference between 98 and 100? Between 95 and 98"?

Much as I despise grading, there is a difference between them. I sometimes disagree with the grades given, but it is there.

Meanwhile a used 206 brought $450, Used 210 $850!!!, used 213 $750!!!, mint 220 $700, mint 231 $1000!!!!!!, mint 267 $550, mint 279 $500, used 285 $800!!!, used 286 $600!!!, used 289 $1200!, used 295 $285, used C7 $750!!!!!, used C9 $475!, used C10 $800!, well you get the idea. The certificate collectors were out in full force. I'm sure glad it wasn't my money.

This proud "certificate collector" was "out in full force" and very happy to get 3 lots! Whiffed on 3 others.

Congratulations Rhett!

But were you bidding those types of dollars on the numbers I posted? There were certainly nice stamps worth bidding on.

No, not on the lots you mentioned. I won lots 125, 476, and 608. Whiffed on lots 94, 335, and 452.

Personally I think you were lucky on 94 and 335, but the 3 you got are very nice, particularly the #34. Although it was certainly pricey.