United States Fourth Bureau Definitives

Part VI
by Michael Mills

Take any of the errors, varieties, overprints, or other Fourth peculiarity mentioned here, and it's easy to envision a highly specific specialty collection that would be at once challenging and within most collector's means. If covers, earliest known usages, and usages are then thrown into the mix, the Fourths are an almost endless source of study and delight to delve into America.

Follow up: Collecting The Fourths

US Fourths

And should more traditional US issues be your forte, you'll be happy to know that there are still really good Fourth Bureau definitives to be uncovered in accumulations and on full covers. It seems that every three weeks or so there's mention of some lucky philatelist chancing upon something that he or she could otherwise afford, though it does seem that these items do make their way into the very specialized collections of what we might call the serious collectors. Usually, at costs over and above catalog value.

A one-cent Franklin coil waste pair was bought for twenty-five cents and in the Midwest last year, but the buyer didn't correctly identify the two stamps until now. That doesn't surprise me as I have many inexpensive items that I bought just because they caught my eye for some reason of other. On the other hand, this bargain cover is no pauper. A single copy of the stamp on cover is rare running to well over ten-thousand dollars US, and I'm sure one day when this cover goes to auction many hopeful eyes will have their paddles ready.

Coil waste stamps result from portions of rotary print runs, perfed for coil usage, judged to be technically unusable for separation into coil rolls. The Bureau of Engraving and Printing processed the coil waste as sheet issues with additional 11 gauge horizontal perfing. The Fourth's one-cent coil waste sheets were issued in '23 with a further printing in 1924, but as the 1924 coil wastes had never been perfed for coil usage, they are 11 gauge. The best way to detect coil waste is to horizantally measure the designs. The waste issues are a half millimeter bigger

Likewise, a Fourth Harding perforated 11 tumbled out of a pile of thousands of Fourth Bureau duplicates, though I would assume the discovery was actually due to collector Bill Lenarz's patience, knowledge, and eyesight. The stamp now has a PSE certificate, and Harmer-Schau estimates the value of this newly-found gem at between fifteen and twenty thousand dollars US.

Meanwhile, two booklet panes of six of the carmine-lake colored two-cent Washington Fourths was unearthed by an auction house selling off a color-shade collection. The Fourths are great subjects for US, and many of the earliest flat bed printings are considered to be quite rare. The pre-sale at auction for one pane is estimated at seventy-five hundred dollars US.