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Stamp used on Florida ballot a fake
stevek
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Stamp used on Florida ballot a fake
Mon Dec 4, 7:20 PM ET
MIAMI (Reuters) - A stamp that first appeared to be a rare 1918 "Inverted Jenny," used by a Florida voter to mail an absentee ballot, is a counterfeit, experts said on Monday.
The blue and red stamp, which took its name from an image of a biplane accidentally printed upside down, was spotted by a county commissioner in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, last month on an envelope that contained a ballot for the November 7 election.
The find caused a stir among stamp collectors. Only 100 of the misprinted stamps have ever been found, making them rare in the world of philately.
An Inverted Jenny stamp could be worth $300,000, experts have said. A block of four was traded recently for another rare stamp in a transaction valued at nearly $3 million.
Experts examined the stamp on Monday at the behest of the Broward County Elections office.
"To a trained philatelist, it's pretty obvious that it's a counterfeit," Randy Shoemaker of Professional Stamp Experts, a stamp grading service, told reporters at a news conference in Broward County.
Mercer Bristow, an expert with the American Philatelic Society who also examined the stamp, said both the printing method and the perforations on the edge of the stamp gave it away as a fake.
Mon Dec 4, 7:20 PM ET
MIAMI (Reuters) - A stamp that first appeared to be a rare 1918 "Inverted Jenny," used by a Florida voter to mail an absentee ballot, is a counterfeit, experts said on Monday.
The blue and red stamp, which took its name from an image of a biplane accidentally printed upside down, was spotted by a county commissioner in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, last month on an envelope that contained a ballot for the November 7 election.
The find caused a stir among stamp collectors. Only 100 of the misprinted stamps have ever been found, making them rare in the world of philately.
An Inverted Jenny stamp could be worth $300,000, experts have said. A block of four was traded recently for another rare stamp in a transaction valued at nearly $3 million.
Experts examined the stamp on Monday at the behest of the Broward County Elections office.
"To a trained philatelist, it's pretty obvious that it's a counterfeit," Randy Shoemaker of Professional Stamp Experts, a stamp grading service, told reporters at a news conference in Broward County.
Mercer Bristow, an expert with the American Philatelic Society who also examined the stamp, said both the printing method and the perforations on the edge of the stamp gave it away as a fake.
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Comments
"inside scoop is I guarantee you it is not a real Jenny. I cannot comment further but it does give stamps a headline nationally for a few days. Marketing the hobby is an art!" That was on Nov. 12.
The National Postal Museum wrote the election board sometime in Nov. and asked that an exception be made to the rule all ballots be destroyed whether the Jenny was real or not. They're hoping to take possession of it. I don't see why they shouldn't.
Jerry
Richard Frajola
www.rfrajola.com
www.rfrajola.com
Also tells me that the copy was just a "crude" inkjet or laserjet copy and not an offset or letterpress copy trying to "really" fool anyone. This whole story seems like much ado about nothing, but if it brought interest to the collecting hobby then I guess that's okay.
Jerry
www.rfrajola.com