1908 US 1 Cent Franklins

Photos of three 1908 franklins are included here. One has no perforations at bottom, one has no perforations on the left side, and one has no perforation on the top. Are these stamps from a booklet?

Also have one 1903 1 cent franklin with no perforations at bottom. Same question.

Are any of these of interest ie. valuable?





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No, unless you find pennies valuable..

And you should have posted this in the US section, not world wide.

Very common stamps with standard perforations and anomalies. Please try to post in-focus pictures next time. Thanks for participating in the SCF.

Yes, these are booklet stamps.

These are NOT stamps from a booklet pane. (No idea where Philazilla is getting incorrect info from).

Booklet panes of this era have the format of 2 stamps wide by 3 stamps tall with a tab at the top as follows (image borrowed from Hipstamp):


In more detail, the panes of 100 which were sold over the counter were printed in press sheets of 400 and cut into 4 panes of 100 for retail sale. These cuts created panes with straight edges along 2 sides and selvage on the two other sides. Thus a pane of 100 had 18 stamps with one straight edge and one stamp from the corner with 2 straight edges.

For booklets, every stamp will have one or two straight edges, but only in certain configurations, which must match one of the six positions in the pane illustrated above.

Overall:
Straight edge at the top: must be from a sheet (meaning pane of 100, but will use the term sheet here)
Straight edge at bottom only, must be from a sheet.
Straight edge at bottom and 1 side, can be from booklet pane or the corner of a sheet, requires further examination.
Straight edge at one side or the other, can be from booklet pane or the corner side of a sheet, requires further examination.

Bottom line, the stamps you show so far can only be from sheet-stock.

(The exception to the pane format comes with the scarce WWI AEF panes, but that is later and not directly relevant here.)

As for retail value, essentally nothing for these stamps. Even IF they had been from booklets, there is only a very modest demand from specialists for them, and the lack of pricing booklet singles by Scott means little added value - unless they are in full panes of 6. The value of your items will be driven by the postmarks and the postcards.

There are no anomalies, both the perforations and the various straight edges are exactly as planned and produced. Nothing is a deviation from normal.

Great explanation, John.

For completeness, here is what a full pane of 100 sheet stamps looks like. Image from Siegel Auction Galleries.


From this example, one can easily imagine how this pane of 100 came from the upper right of the full sheet of 400 stamps. The full sheet was cut into 4 panes of 100 stamps, with the help from the guidelines and arrows that are partially seen at the left and bottom edges of this pane. Sometimes straight-edge copies will show a trace of the guideline if they were cut wide enough, sometimes they won't.

@John Becker. . .Thanks for the correction. I blame my late night post and the blurry images (I would have sworn that I saw 2 straight edges on at least the 1st image - not that that would have been conclusive). I thought I would just quickly answer OPs direct question, and I got it wrong.