Canal Zone - Postage Due J2-J3

Hello everyone!

I've heard that the J2-J3 of the canal zone are some US-issued classic stamps with a quite low census?

The two stamps depicted seem to be genuine - with different margins and centering?

Are these some attractive and quite rare stamps?

(sorry - I do not own an updated Scott specialized catalog - and centering and grading are not so understood here in Germany)

They are not rare and you can read about them here:

https://www.canalzonestudygroup.com...de-Schay.pdf

Thank you for the very good source!

It states: "They will be sold at their face value and
canceled as sold. Not more than one hundred sets will be sold to anyone purchaser. The stock to be disposed of
consist of 80,514 – 1¢, 71,818 – 2¢ and 9,603 10¢."
So only some 10k pieces of the J3 went to the collector's market?
Or are these just the mint stamps - with canced specimens from received mail being very common (5% of 200k)?

And further:
"Mr. Calhoun refused to make the sale and on June 15, 1916 the following number of stamps were destroyed: 1¢
– 76,467; 2¢ – 67,688; and, 10¢ – 7,507. The burning was witnessed by Messrs. S. C. Russel, Post Office
Inspector; Herbert Pearson, Auditor; and H. C. Dion of the Collector's Office. During the period of the sale of
the obsoletes, only $295.23 worth were sold to collectors and dealers."

On page 103 of the reference I can see the total ammounts issued.
Any idea what survived in the tropical climate on letters written to "immigrant workers" and made it finally to the albums?

Thank you very much again for the genius link!

The Canal Zone seems to be well researched.

As the postage dues seem to be of little interest (niche market?), I found another stamp:

Canal-Zone Scott #66:


According to the referenced book - chaper 15 - "the big burn" page 47 only 14,621 were sold to public.
How many might have survived the harsh climate?
(OK - it was a "collectible" issue - can we assume 50% ?)

If any MAGA-US-collector needs one of these?

Are they really so rare?
Maybe not scarce at the moment due to low demand?

From my perspective anything with survival numbers in the four figures isn't rare. Even if there was massive demand that outstripped supply there are still thousands out there. Rare to me means rarely seen and that means numbers surviving in the double or single digits. Demand means a great deal. There are stamps of various Countries that have very low issue and/or survival rates that are a tough sell because there aren't many collectors. Catalog values are no help because they may set a high price based upon few sales over a long period.

In this strict definition - there are not so much "rarities" out there.
However, I agree, double or single digit rarities can be acquired starting from three-digit $-range - but going well up to 7-digit-$-figures if "popular".
On the other hand, classic "rarities", selling happily in the 4-5 digit range, have typically still thousands (or a low 5-digit census) of specimens out there?