Census Of 2c Harding, Rotary Perf 11 (Scott 613)?

Yes, it is impossible. Scott 610 is perf 11 - that's what you have.

Hello, so I found on the website https://www.linns.com/news/us-stamp...arding-.html another interesting note: "It is important to remember that authenticated rotary-printed stamps measure as short as 22.375mm but will always be longer than 22¼mm." Judging whether #610 or #613 doesn't make it any easier purely from measuring.

Looked at the questionable stamp again, measured it with MICHELperfoscope and here are a few pictures, maybe others can see more than my old eyes.




left stamp 10x10 (22,51mm x 19,27mm) #612
middle stamp 11x11 (22,25mm x 19,22mm) #610
right stamp 11x11 (22,33mm x 19,08mm)



The right stamp shows a little blur and is a bit darker, the image size is towards rotary-printed but unfortunately I can't see anything else.
Sorry, I translated my text with Google, I hope you can read it.

The stamp on the right is a flat plate stamp.
When you glide a finger over the design, you should be able to feel the raised parts of the design, the surface does not feel flat.

Your stamp in the middle shows the typical setoff on the back of flat plate stamps. The middle stamp has many black dots on the back that came from the not-quite dry sheet that was below the newly printed stamp sheet. If you look closely to the back of your right stamp, you can detect just a few black dots (though some dots seem more brownish like you have a mildew problem with this stamp). Even one black dot will disqualify your stamp from being a rotary printed stamp.

Thank you very much Drkohler, I don't want to make anything special out of the stamp. The surface of a #610 feels scratchier when you run your fingertip over it. I can't confirm this with my stamp, at least not as strongly. Linn's describes a lot in his article, 22.375mm for authenticated rotary-printed leaves a lot of room open. My stamp is minium 22.33mm rather 22.38mm with 600dpi with an error tolerance of 0.04mm. Everything is and remains very relative and that's a good thing and what I want to say is that everything is subjective in the eye of the beholder. you want to see what you want to see.
I expect relatively sharp demarcations in the printed image with these flat plate stamps, like this, also a bit extreme:




I found my stamp to be a bit washed out, but here too, that's my subjective feeling.


back of the stamp, yes you will definitely find something, I also find everything very relative there.


For all collectors trying to find a #613, extremely difficult to measure or look at and there is no unused stamp... no one knows what it might look like.
In this sense, the stamp goes back into the tray where it waits for its end to be dirty rather than manipulated. lol

In my opinion, sizing the design (ONLY with a template, not in any other way) should only be used as a final, verifying criterion; the tolerances are too tight and the process too subjective to be used as anything except this.
Don

For a quick search with a template, definitely, the stamp is slightly smaller than my #612 about 0.12mm and the unused #610 about 0.15mm. the printed image will be crucial.

There are two other items of note in the Linn's article:







The stamp on the right is too well centered and is absent the gray look that the leftmost stamp has.

I would only partially agree with the second quote, there are certainly well-centered stamps.
First quote, yes I agree to some extent, the stamp should be more black and gray and have a visible blurring. Here they write about a high percentage... this information drives all collectors crazy.

We should be careful to NOT mis-apply generalities to specific stamps. I will cite three from this thread:



While a fact, it is not disqualifying.



Not all black specks are equal, they are not all set-off. They may be dirt from storage and handling over the past century. One black dot is not necessarily a condemning factor. It depends on the source.



A generality of centering of other examples of this Scott number, but not disqualifying.

Bottom line, EACH stamp should be evaluated on its own merits. While we should not forget the other examples, we should not be blinded or biased by them.

The qualities/criteria pointed out in the article are what expertizing bodies use to render an opinion. They don't work in a vacuum. If you are reviewing a potential 613 that is very well centered and has no patina those are likely disqualifying conditions.

I just don't understand the comment regarding not being blinded or biased by other stamps. The PF uses other stamps all of the time to make decisions.

I agree they don't work in a vacuum, but some of the comments on this thread suggest that general characteristics should be used to judge future discoveries of individual stamps. That is just plain bad methodology and should not be encouraged here as it misleads those who ask about their particular stamp.

I would bet you a steak dinner that the centering is NOT a qualifying/disqualifying condition on the genuineness of a 613 and that each submission is examined on its merits of perforation rate and printing method. Patina, as you call it, is another feature of these stamps and not a part of my comments in the previous post.

Due to inflation would you consider lowering the bar to a spam sandwich? Toasted of course.

For those interested here are all of the known copies of 613 in one place (Courtesy RAS):

https://resources.siegelauctions.co...s.php?id=237

If one clicks on the photos of the above link and enlarges them, it will soon become apparent that the perforations of the 613 are not nearly as clean overall as the perfs of the 610. While I would not use that as a final proof, it is something important to notice. It does seem to be a fairly constant characteristic.

Good pick-up Bart.