J88 Cover With Legitimate Usage Found

'The Half - Collection' was an exhibit by Clyde Jennings and later became a series of articles that
ran in the 'The United States Specialist' from February 1991 through June 1992. As you can see below
it also became a series of two books. As you may have guessed the exhibit and books were centered on the
1/2 cents stamps issued by the US Post Office. For years he was missing one thing and that was a legitimate
usage of J88.




Of course there were First Day Covers with J88





Eventually after searching he offered $500 for a legitimately used J88. Finally someone found one, but it wasn't on a cover.



Until today.

Real interesting. Great find!!

I am not a postal rate collector..
But is there a rate that needed just the 1/2c to make that rate?

My meaning being a need like the Postage Due Bill that needed a 1/2c to make the 871/2c due. Or a rate similar to your great find but only needing 4 1/2c due, so needing only one 1/2c stamp?

Something a little strange about that cover. It seems fortuitous that the address was all the way to the left, giving enough room for the postage due stamps. Is the remainder of the address hidden below the 1/2 cent stamps? And was the postal rate 10 cents in 1964?

Thanks!!! Actually there was. It was for return envelopes which said 'addressee will pay postage' for charities who had a 4 1/2 cent rate at the time. This rate was eliminated soon after. Apparently they had to use up the old 1/2 cent stamps (J79) before using the new ones (J88).

Quote:
Something a little strange about that cover. It seems fortuitous that the address was all the way to the left, giving enough room for the postage due stamps. Is the remainder of the address hidden below the 1/2 cent stamps? And was the postal rate 10 cents in 1964?

The first class postal rate was rate was raised to 5 cents on January 7, 1963 and each additional ounce was also 5 cents. So maybe weighed 2 ounces.

It was a large lot of postage due covers so I looked through them again and found similar covers from the same town, but without J88.

So, why 4 1c dues & 2 1/2c dues instead of a far simpler 5 1c???

Occam's Razor, put simply, states: "the simplest solution is almost always the best." The postal clerk ran out of 1 cent postage dues.

I agree with eyeonwall. The simplest solution would indeed be a single 5 cent due stamp, which the reply did not address. Combinations with two-stamps would be a 4+1 or 3+2. Then 2+2+1. The idea that the clerk was out of 5's, 4's, 3's, 2's, and finally 1's. The combination used is not a typical use by a clerk.

So you have a stack of covers with several addressed to the same person in Ottawa, OH, named Goodkin. One cover addressed to Goodkin is from a stamp dealer, and is marked please cancel lightly. I would suggest the simplest explanation is that the cover with the 1/2 cent dues is philatelic.

Nice to find a use "in period" (mine is out of period). Would be nice to find an actual fractional-cent usage for which the stamp was originally intended (yeah, yeah, I know... beggars being choosers and all that).

I collect all of the half-cent dues (J68, J69, J79, J88) on cover but whenever possible I look for either solo usages or combination usages resulting in a fractional amount owed... this is strictly a personal preference, but I've always considered even-numbered multiples comprising whole-cent amounts to be "cheating" and not "real usages," but again, that's just me.

Regardless, given the scarcity of this stamp used on cover, card, or receipt in any manner at all, it's a great find!

Finding a single J88 on cover might be tough since the postage due clerks usually dealt with multiple covers and it would have to come out on a odd number. The stamps would be placed on the top cover in the bundle or on a separate postage due bill. Since these were delivered to organizations using the fractional rate they most likely were thrown away after the contents were removed. Also as you can see from my previous posts the post office was thrifty back in the day and had to use up the old 1/2 cent postage dues first.

I've seen some of J68, J69, and J79 stamps used singly on cover, but not J88 except for that one postage due bill above. At least the pair was used correctly to pay the rate.

Thanks!!! I've been looking for J88 on cover for decades and who know maybe I'll find one used singly on cover next week. You just can never tell.

Congratulations on your unique find. It is discoveries like this that make stamp collecting very interesting. Since it is a unique legitimately used cover, is its value more than the $500.00 originally offered? Also, are used copies of J88 as singles or multiples with in-period cancels also scarce? In such a case, would seeing any such used stamp off cover feel somewhat like a loss?

I would think so since it is the first one found in cover correctly used and currently unique.




Actually no. If you wanted to buy postage dues before 1974 'over the counter' at your local post office the clerks were suppose to cancel it before selling it to you. Not to say every clerk followed that rule since I have quite a number of postage due plate blocks between J1 and J87.

Here another discovery I made back in 2016:
http://goscf.com/t/48849&SearchTerms=j92

and in 2019:
http://goscf.com/t/68989&SearchTerm...m,guard,mail

Goodkin was a stamp collector. It seems that he liked postage due covers.

When he received a notice that he had personal mail with postage due, he went to the counter with the notice to pay the due postage and pickup that mail.

It is likely that he would have been friendly with the Ottawa, Ohio, clerks and would have asked that certain postage due stamps be affixed and be canceled to receipt his payment.

I find it interesting that there is still not a single usage of J88 out there on cover that does have not *SOME* philatelic connection or origin. FDCs, this cover, the example I have, all are at least somewhat philatelic in origin as opposed to truly commercial usages.

One would think that they must exist (or why would the stamp have been printed to begin with?), but this isn't the first stamp where the used catalogue value is nominal but finding actual intact usages is virtually impossible (see Scott # RD1 and RD42).

That's quite possible. When I was a teenage the town next to mine had a farmer's co-op and the clerk told me they had about $100 postage due per week. So he would save me the plate blocks and use the rest of the sheets. But he would use only the 1, 5, 10, and fifty cent and dollar postage dues. So I asked him if he could get some of the other denominations. He said what do need and I told him the 4s, 6s, and 7s and that's where I think that's I got the eight dull gum 7 cent postage due plate blocks I have in my collection.