Washington Stamped Envelope Cut Squares 2c And 3c

My head is spinning. How do you tell which is Die 1-9 etc. I'm looking at Scott guide but I can't identify the small details.

The two biggest identifiers are the relative positions of the figures of value (the 2s or 3s in yo9ur case) and the head size. There are numerous small identifiers that are sometimes obscured by the inking or electrotypes or by simple wear of the die or the electrotype. The UPSS 20th Century catalog uses a better description of the circular dies which was taken from my book Collectors Guide to the Circular Dies.

Perhaps Thomas will provide a detailed identification later.

(Yo, Bill.)

These two issues can be difficult if all you have are cut squares. You really need a way to measure the head, ideally in tenths of millimeters.
Peak sells a lenticle that is ideal for measuring Washington's head.


All of your 3 cent cut squares are purple, so you can ignore the dark violet stuff in the catalog. There are no purple Die 9's (narrow "C" very obvious - see 2 centers). So we are down to Die 1 or Die 7 for the purple guys. Die 7 has the "3"'s tilted to the right - pretty obvious (row 1 #1, row 2 #2 and row 2 #5). The rest are Die 1.
On to the 2 centers.
Not going to be able to knock them all down, but there are some things we can observe.
Row 3 #2, row 4 #1, #2 are Die 9's (see the narrow "C" in "CENTS").
Row 3, #4 and #5 are Die 1 (rotary press with a die pinch crease pointing down).

Some reasonable guesses: Row 4 #4, and all of row 5 just look like Die 1.

From here the guesses are just that. Need to be able to measure the heads and the crossbar's of the "T"'s.

Get Bill's book for just $9 - a steal. Lots of very detailed data on this circular die issue.

AND, if you are a member of the UPSS, Bill's ebook is just $.01!

http://www.upss.org/code/epublications.php