29c Children's Classic Books Tagging

I hope mstocky2 sees this

I am going thru a 20 year stack of The United States Specialist trying to decide which ones to keep and which to recycle as I am in danger of going from a hoarder in training to graduating, and I came across an article by Gene Paquette in the Oct 2001 issue where he says there are two major types on tagging on this issue, but Scott does not list two versions (just one they merely describe as "tagged"). Both are on prephos paper. His type 1 also has solid block tagging over the printing on only the Rebecca and Little Women stamps, while his type 2 has solid block tagging over the printing on the Rebecca and Little Women stamps and finely screened block tagging on the Huck Finn and Little House stamps.

He further breaks the type 2 into 3 sub-varieties depending on the strength of the block tagging, which is something Scott would never do, but they should have recognized the difference between the Huck Finn and Little House stamps having and not having the block tagging. I wonder if his type 1 (not having the block tagging on the 2 stamps) was later found to be faintly tagged, or if Scott just dropped the ball on this one?

He lists plates A1-1111, A1-3332, A3-3443, A5-4554 and A6-5877 for type 1 and A2-2222, A6-4765 (strong block tagging on the two stamps), A2-2222, A6-4655, A6-4765 and A6-5877 (weak block tagging on the two stamps), so some plate numbers go both ways.

Hi eyeonwall

Type 1 indeed has a faint tagged version. I called it 1a on the tagging DB. I have pictures of how to identify all five versions.

http://www.stampsmarter.com/feature...ingView.html

I don't see Scott listing these varieties l, they are too specialized for their specialized catalog. I have written them about luminescent ink varieties and that was their response; that those were for specialized publications and not necessarily their specialized catalog. Go figure.

I was trying to ask if Paquette mistook a block with very faint overlying block tag on the 2786 & 2788 as having no overlying block tag on the 2786 & 2788 (mistaking a type 2a for a type 1), but you also claim a type 1 (no overlying block tag on the 2786 & 2788)

While Scott will never recognize the difference between strongly tagged and weakly tagged, they most definitely will recognize the difference between with overlying block tag and without (see their listings for the 29c Rooster #2720).

First off I noticed a typo, which I have fixed. It should have been 2786 & 2787 instead of 2786 & 2788. Sorry about that.

I pulled a bunch out and looked at them under higher magnification. Below is what I refer to as a 1a which is: 2785 & 2788 faint or very faint overlying solid block tag; 2786 & 2787 no block tag. Pretty clear to me there is no block tagging on the 2786 or 2787. So I think Gene got it right.

2785 is on top and 2786 on bottom of image.

Scott clearly missed the ball on not flagging the block tag.

you can't look at the unprinted area to prove no faint tagging on top of the prephos paper - you have to look at the printed area and then if you see no tagging over the ink you have proved it

More pictures. I hadn't looked at these under the microscope before so it has been very interesting. Having done so, in all cases no matter which variety of 2785-2788, if there is a block tag it is printed under the ink. Since the ink is printed on top this method can't be used to determine if the block tag exists on 2786-2787.

Here are some closeups of a 2788 with bright block tag.

Closeup of a dark area showing dark ink. Tagging not visible on top as a normal overall tagged stamp which would have bright speckles of taggant.

Section of lettering more clearly showing black "IT" is on top. You can see edge of block tag near top of image.

Top of "T" magnified even more. While it looks like there could be taggant on top of ink in this image, that is not the case. The dark ink dots aren't solidly printed leaving gaps.


Close up views of several 2786 with cross hatch pattern.

Bright cross hatch pattern easily visible. Fuzziness on bottom of letters is shadowing from taking the picture and not tagging.

Cross hatch is fairly light but still visible.

This is where it gets interesting. To eyeonwall's original question if I understand it correctly. My conclusion is a Type 2 could easily be misidentified as a Type 1. In the image below traces of the cross hatch are clearly visible on this 2786 under higher magnification. I have highlighted the block tag traces between the red lines.

I examined many that appeared to have no block and in many of the cases I could identify traces of the block tag under higher magnification. These traces are typically a slight edge as show above. There were also many where I could not readily find a tagging trace edge. Looking at the edges is the only way I see to check for block tag.

Based on what I have seen it begs the question is the Type 1 Gene identified and Type 1a I added really just freak varieties. Meaning they should have had the cross hatch pattern but appear not to for various manufacturing reasons.