Canadian Stamp Auctions

2 November, 2007 - Eastern Auctions Ltd.

This auction house is going from strength to strength. Its latest public auction offered a very broad selection of stamps of British North America. The Canadian section showed outstanding quality across the board.

Particularly noticeable were the stamps from the most popular early sets, in particular the Large Queens, the Numerals, Edward VIIs and the Admirals. There were nine new record prices. We start off with a rare imperforate block from 1864.

Scott 20 – Imperforate block

Lot 475 Scott 20b Catalogue $6,000 Realized $4,250

According to Eastern, there are only 4 blocks like this. This one was described as a very rare imperforate multiple, just touching the outer frame line in the upper right corner to large margins, without gum as issued.

How rare is the above lot? This is the first imperforate block of this stamp we have recorded since 1995, some 12 years ago. That’s a long time between sales!

1¢ Large Queen – Lovely used copies

Lot 485 Scott 23 Estimate $250 Realized $525

Lot 486 Scott 23 Estimate $250 Realized $700

Lot 483 Scott 22 Eatimate $1,500 Realized $2,700

These stamps are very special in their centering and postmarks. This type of quality would be expected to attract strong prices and it certainly did!

1¢ Orange Small Queen – Montreal printing 11½ x 12

Lot 503 Scott 35d Catalogue $210 Realized $1100

These 11½ x 12 stamps often come with rough perforations. That is one of the reasons why we were so impressed by this copy. Eastern expands on this in its description:

“ an extremely well centered mint example with deep rich colour and proof-like impression, possessing full pristine original gum. Rarely encountered in such superior quality, worthy of the finest collection, VF+ NH GEM ”

There’s no way we could top this description. Well done Eastern !

This would have been a record price but for the fact that a year ago, another copy of this stamp sold at an Eastern sale for $1,300.

Scott 82a – new record price

Lot 547 Scott 82a Catalogue $1,450 Realized $1,900

There have been a surprising number of imperforates from the Maple Leaf and Numeral sets offered at auction in the past two years. They seem to appear in pairs or blocks at just about every auction. The prices have not been impressive. Most of them have no gun. This is why we especially noted the result in this sale.

The best price for a Scott 82a pair in NH condition in the past ten years was $1,210. This was realized a year ago in the sale of the outstanding Sir Gawaine Baillie collection. Now, just over a year later, the price has jumped to $1,900. This is truly impressive.

The New “Sismondo” Measurement System in Action

Here, in the Eastern sale, are a number of examples of the new Sismondo system which measures the degree of centering of stamps and will in future have a strong influence on how well they do at auction. Stamps are judged out of “100”:

"100"	"85"	"98"
Lot 552 Scott 85 Catalogue $62 Realized $400	Lot 558 Scott 89 Catalogue $62 Realized $150	Lot 578 Scott 98 Catalogue $70 Realized $240

"95"	"95"	"98"
Lot 635 Scott 173 Catalogue $25 Realized $50	Lot 637 Scott 194 Catalogue $18 Realized $100	Lot 675 Scott C1 Catalogue $12 Realized $55

"98"

Lot 676 Scott C3 Catalogue $10 Realized $50

What we find particularly interesting about this development is that, when it is applied to even some of the more common stamps of the modern era, ie post 1935, it can highlight the qualities of that stamp sufficiently to attract active bidding. This wouldn’t have happened in the past, at least not in the larger auctions.

Note that the first stamp in the series is a “100”….this won’t happen very often. We note that the margins are not perfectly even. The ones at the top and bottom are wider than the ones on the side. On the other hand, the image in the stamp is perfectly centered and that seems to be the key. After all, we usually talk about a well centered stamp.

For further details, please click on the Highlights button.

This sale had 9 new record prices.