Canadian Stamp Auctions

Cherrystone held one of its regular auctions in New York City recently featuring a selection of stamps from the United States and the rest of the world. Included in the sale was a small Canadian selection of 12 lots. We show below the one that caught our attention:

Lot 829 Scott 95 Estimate $25,000 Realized $25,750

Here’s how the above block was described:

“1908 Edward, 50c purple, top sheet margin and "Ottawa No.1" imprint block of 24, never hinged and post office fresh, natural irregular gum at top and diagonal gum crease, bottom row of six slightly folded and creased, otherwise fine-v.f., rare unhinged showpiece (catalogue value for singles, plate block unpriced) cat. $50,400.”

We checked our records to see if we had seen anything like this in the past and came up with a blank. No plate blocks and no large multiples. We did find 2 sales of blocks of 4 that were offered at auctions in 1982 and 2008, but that’s all.

What this tells us is that this is an extraordinary multiple, combining both a rare plate block and the largest block we know of. Granted, the condition wasn’t perfect and few of the stamps were centered, but the rarity and uniqueness more than compensated for this.

The price paid for the block was $25,000 U.S. We converted this to $CDN at the rate of $1U.S = $1.03 Cdn.