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TRAINS ON U. S. STAMPS
and POSTAL STATIONERY

Locals and Expresses
Page 2

Corner card of Truman and Chapman Express envelope, 1861

CUMMINGS EXPRESS New York, NY 1844-? Cummings New York 1846 Handstamp, 2 cents Not in Scott Not in Lyons This handstamp is apparently always found with an adhesive, whereas the adhesives are often found without the handstamp, so despite its clear "2 cts" inscription, this item is not considered proof of payment of postage. Of the four covers I have seen, this one has by far the clearest strike of the handstamp, and the purists may say what they wish, I like it, and I'm including it here. The high realization for the cover shown above ($20,000+10%!) has to do not with the handstamp, but its copy of Scott 55L7, of which only 5 examples are known, this being the only one on cover. It's far too blurred even to guess what the train in this handstamp might be.

Note that I have sorted the Locals alphabetically, since the exact dates of many are unknown. Most of the Scott values shown are italicized, indicating that there are too few items or recent sales to establish a reliable value. 8/28/02 - The Catalog of Private Express Labels and Stamps by Bruce H. Mosher, the definitive catalog of private Express labels and stamps in the US has just been published, and among its thousands of images are over a hundred that show a rail vehicle. Click here for a review of the book, and reproductions of all the items in it with a train on them. (Click on any image to see a higher-resolution version.)

FISKE & RICE'S EXPRESS New York, NY Fiske & Rice New York ?? Illustrated in Scott, but not numbered - "Authorities consider items of this design to be express company labels rather than stamps." Lyons illustrates and describes a forgery. I found only the one example of this label in the auctions I surveyed, and it sold for $525. Note that the design is copied from the label of Bigelow's Express, which Fiske and Rice bought out in 1851. The same observation applies here, i.e. the best I can say is that the train depicted resembles the "Experiment", but not closely enough to be given that name.

GAY, KINSLEY & CO'S EXPRESS Boston & New York 1850? Gay, Kinsley Boston & New York 1850? Express label Not listed or illustrated in Scott Not in Lyons Cover in Siegel auction 830, lot 617, sold for $450 + 10%. Gay, Kinsley was a package express, but it would not have been unusual for them to transport letters, especially ones containing valuables such as currency - the PO offered no registry or insurance at that time. The engine resembles the "Stevens", but is not an exact match. The passenger car (?) behind seems far too large for that locomotive.

KINGMAN'S CITY POST (bogus) Lyons BOGUS Not in Scott Lyons describes this as a Taylor forgery, produced on several colors of paper, and with various inks. There was a Kingman's City Post in Charleston, S.C., but its stamps were simple text-only designs.

J B LILLARD EXPRESS Lillard ? ? HANDSTAMP Not in Scott illustrated in Lyons image of a "parlor car" Considered genuine but no data available.

LOCOMOTIVE EXPRESS POST New York, NY 1847 Locomotive Express New York 1847 HANDSTAMPed adhesive (!) Scott 97L1 (no value given) This is an odd one, listed in Scott, which does not ordinarily list handstamped franking; but this is a handstamped adhesive, i.e., a handstamp applied to gummed paper and then cut and glued onto the cover to mark payment of postage! Lyons says "this item is extremely rare," and I suspect it is unique. It is listed and pictured in Patton, who described the item shown (in 1967) as the only known example, and his illustration is clearly the source of the Lyons illustration. I obtained the scan above, of the actual item, from the current owner, who acquired it in the Lilly sale of 1967, which is presumably where Patton saw it. The owner describes it as "a folded letter dated Mar 27 1847, and dealing with financial matters." The image is too blurred to make any guess as to the identity of the locomotive, but I would describe it as a very early model, with the engineer perched on a tiny platform at the back of the engine, similar to the ones shown on the Broadway and Kingman's stamps.

PACIFIC EXPRESS San Francisco 1860-90?? Pacific Express San Francisco 1880? Not in Scott Not in Lyons Express corner card printed on stamped envelopes of the period (Pacific Express logo on Scott U277) This may be the item with the least right to be included here. Pacific Express was one of many express companies in California that were tolerated much longer than their counterparts in the East, because they served routes the postal service could not afford to. The fact that we now have envelopes like this to collect implies that they were sold like this to the public. If they were, and their cost was more than the two-and-a- fraction cents of the basic envelope, in prepayment of the express fee, then to me the design qualifies as a postal indicium, and they belong here. I suspect, however, that the design was simply advertising. Nonetheless, that's no reason not to include this cover - dated 1899, and somewhat the worse for wear, it has a certain charm.

Philadelphia City Dispatch Philadelphia City Dispatch - ???? Local? Not in Scott Not in Lyons Most likely bogus 1/3/5 - I know nothing about this item, and would welcome any information about it. I assume I found the scan somewhere on the www. Scott lists a local by this name, but shows no adhesive with this design. As Bill Weinberger points out, the perforations along the bottom - no adhesives of this period had them!

POMEROY & CO New York, NY 1844-? Pomeroy & Co. New York 1844 Express Label Not in Scott Scott does not list this stamp as it is an "express label", has no denomination, and did not represent the payment of a fee. There seem to be a fairly large number of unused labels available, including multiples like the ones below, but very few on cover (Siegel writeup for cover above says "very rare use of Pomeroy label on letter mail"). There are many reproductions. The train is fairly detailed, but matches none I know, and indeed looks like it would not work - an artist's mis-interpretation, I would say.

US TRAINS continued on next page... Click on image above to continue

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Please note that ALL of the stamps illustrated on this page are considered to be genuine,i.e., not counterfeits, though some, as I have indicated, are fantasies or bogus issues, i.e., there was no such local or express. I do not wish to attempt to duplicate Larry Lyons' efforts here by showing fakes and explaining how to identify the real thing, so I have used scans from auction catalogs where I could find them, and copied the Lyons illustration only where his was the only one available to me. If you think I am wrong, and something I show is a reproduction or forgery, please email me at If you have a better scan to share with the world, I would welcome that too.

REFERENCES

Identifier for Carriers, Locals, Fakes, Forgeries and Bogus Posts of the United States, Larry Lyons; published by the author, 1998

The subtitle of this book is "A Study of the Identification of the Local Stamp Adhesive from the Forgeries and Bogus Posts". It is NOT a history, catalog, or pricing guide, and while I would love to see it expanded in those as well as other directions, I am very pleased with it just as it is. Use it to determine whether the stamp you have is an authentic local post adhesive or some sort of fake, forgery or fantasy.

LINKS

Below are some of the sites I link to above - the ones I think are worth visiting and browsing through.

Colorado & Southern Rolling- stock

This website is dedicated to the narrow gauge rolling-stock that the Colorado & Southern Railroad “inherited” from four of its numerous predecessor railroads (and such others as just might accidentally creep in)

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Revised -- 01/05/2005