On May 14, 1918 the 24 cents stamp illustrating the US air mail is available to the public in the post offices of New York, Philadelphia and Washington DC. In Washington the collector William T. Robey buys for $ 24 the sheet 8493 of one hundred stamps on which the blue illustration is printed upside down. There is no other example of this error then designated as the Inverted Jenny.
Robey immediately tries to sell his treasure. He is in a hurry, perhaps fearing that additional examples are discovered. He proposes the sheet on May 19 to the stamp dealer Eugene Klein in Philadelphia in a one-day purchase option. On May 20 Klein accepts the $ 15,000 price requested by Robey in a typed letter estimated $ 15K, lot 8 in the auction organized by Robert A. Siegel in New York on February 28.
On the same day, May 20, 1918, even before receiving the sheet, Klein concludes an agreement with his client Colonel Green for a share of the stamps. Before dissociating the sheet, he serializes the stamps with a number from 1 to 100 on the reverse side which makes it possible to identify afterward the original position of each element.
The philatelists follow with passion the varied fate of these one hundred stamps. Until last year, no information was found on two of them, positions 49 and 79.
# 79 surfaced in a private collection. It is for sale on February 15 in Chicago by Leslie Hindman, lot 12. It is very well centered like other pieces at the bottom right of the original sheet but small disturbances caused by a paper clip and the removal of a hinge are announced in the catalog. It is estimated in excess of $ 200K.
On February 28, Siegel also sells the position 28, lot 9 announced with a guide value of $ 450K. Its colors are fresh and its margins are complete but its centering is poorly balanced. Its location was known but it had not been available on the market since 1950.
RESULTS :
Leslie Hindman : SOLD for $ 300K including premium
Robert A. Siegel :
Stamp SOLD for $ 330K before fees
Letter SOLD for $ 42.5K before fees
Robey immediately tries to sell his treasure. He is in a hurry, perhaps fearing that additional examples are discovered. He proposes the sheet on May 19 to the stamp dealer Eugene Klein in Philadelphia in a one-day purchase option. On May 20 Klein accepts the $ 15,000 price requested by Robey in a typed letter estimated $ 15K, lot 8 in the auction organized by Robert A. Siegel in New York on February 28.
On the same day, May 20, 1918, even before receiving the sheet, Klein concludes an agreement with his client Colonel Green for a share of the stamps. Before dissociating the sheet, he serializes the stamps with a number from 1 to 100 on the reverse side which makes it possible to identify afterward the original position of each element.
The philatelists follow with passion the varied fate of these one hundred stamps. Until last year, no information was found on two of them, positions 49 and 79.
# 79 surfaced in a private collection. It is for sale on February 15 in Chicago by Leslie Hindman, lot 12. It is very well centered like other pieces at the bottom right of the original sheet but small disturbances caused by a paper clip and the removal of a hinge are announced in the catalog. It is estimated in excess of $ 200K.
On February 28, Siegel also sells the position 28, lot 9 announced with a guide value of $ 450K. Its colors are fresh and its margins are complete but its centering is poorly balanced. Its location was known but it had not been available on the market since 1950.
RESULTS :
Leslie Hindman : SOLD for $ 300K including premium
Robert A. Siegel :
Stamp SOLD for $ 330K before fees
Letter SOLD for $ 42.5K before fees
#Stamp collecting's most expensive mistake coming to auction, @LHAuctioneers: https://t.co/YD6s1Seu3o pic.twitter.com/fVT3A42k6x
— JustCollecting (@just_collecting) January 4, 2017
Siegel is offering something very special in its upcoming auction... https://t.co/7dhMR32FZS #stamps #invertedjenny pic.twitter.com/7GEJc7V1lr
— Paul Fraser (@PFCollectibles) February 3, 2017
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