A small stamp that could sell for millions

Good morning. It’s Monday. We’ll find out why a 1-cent stamp could become the most expensive US postage stamp ever. We also get details about Governor Kathy Hochul’s order banning National Guard soldiers from carrying long guns while on metro duty..

William Gross told him to sell everything, an order that would have made Wall Street shudder if he had been talking about his enormous bond portfolio.

But he was talking about his enormous portfolio of stamps, and Charles Shreve – a stamp dealer who built Gross’ collection for him – spent years fulfilling the sales order.

The sale concludes in New York with a sale featuring a small 1-cent stamp from 1868 – a used stamp with a silhouette of Benjamin Franklin partially blocked by the curve of the postmark. It is known among collectors as the ‘Z-grill’.

The auction house that will sell it on June 14 predicts it will fetch between $4 million and $5 million. That would make it the most valuable U.S. stamp. It would still lag behind the British Guiana 1-cent magenta, which sold for $8.3 million in 2021.

What makes the Z grill so valuable is not something that is easily seen, unlike the inverted biplanes from the famous misprinted sheet of Inverted Jennies. “Everyone knows the Reverse Jenny,” Shreve said. But “eyes glaze over” when he tries to explain the Z-grill and why it’s called that, he said.

There’s a simpler explanation, one that always makes collectors’ mouths water: rarity. The Z-grill is one of only two known stamps. The other has been owned by the New York Public Library since the 1920s. They were apparently the only survivors out of the thousands of copies printed. The others were thrown out after being sent by “tax consultants mailing income tax forms in March 1868” and publishers sending circulars, said Scott Trepel, the president of Robert A. Siegel Auction Galleries, the firm that handled the sale.

Gross ended up at Z-grill in 2005 in a trade arranged by Shreve for a block of Inverted Jennies records. The trade, estimated to be worth about $3 million, completed Gross’s collection, which began in the 1990s when Gross decided to buy every 19th century U.S. stamp then in the Scott Catalog, the bible of stamp collectors , was standing.

Shreve spent a lot of money at stamp auctions. Gross said in 2016 that he had spent more than $100 million amassing the collection.

But Gross “didn’t just say, ‘Raise your hand and buy,'” Shreve said — Gross did his research. On Sunday afternoon, “he had the 49ers on, looked at the catalog and called and said, ‘Where is this stamp?’ I would say, ‘I don’t know, but I’ll find out.’

Gross has said that stamps gave him a way to “reconnect with my childhood.” Shreve said Gross’ mother bought stamps when he was growing up, telling Gross they would increase in value and “that’s how we’ll send you to college.” They did not. “He said, ‘I’m going to prove that stamps are a good investment; she just bought the wrong one,'” Shreve said.

Buying the right copies became Shreve’s job after he made contact with Gross, after Gross had already spent more than $1 million at his first stamp auction in the 1990s.

The Z-grill is made to be tamper-resistant. After the Civil War, the post office was concerned that people would rub away the stamps, using chemicals that would break down the dyes in the ink, and reuse the stamps.

The Post Office printers began experimenting with ways to dent paper, embossing the sheets on which the stamps were printed with small shapes that would absorb the ink from the stamps, making them more difficult to wipe away. The printers developed different grill patterns, which were later given identifying letters.

Gross’s Z grill hit the market in 1977, selling for $90,000, and again in 1986 for $418,000, including the buyer’s premium. This completed the collection of a former financier with a passion for philately, Robert Zoellner. It was sold again in 1998 for $935,000.

It completed Gross’ collection, and with nothing left to sell, “he lost interest,” Shreve said.

“One day he said, ‘Come and get it all,’” Shreve said, and in 2007 they began selling the stamps from Gross’ international collection. He kept his U.S. stamps until 2018, when Siegel auctioned off the first batch. Since then, Shreve said, he has sold more than $24 million worth of stamps through the Siegel company, donating all proceeds to charity.

Gross said through a spokeswoman that “obtaining the rarest stamps took patience, but the business was part of the fun.” He will “certainly feel sorry” if the Z-Grill sells, he said, “but the person who buys it will have something that no one else can have.”

Weather

Expect a mostly cloudy day that will turn sunny, with temperatures in the low 40s and gusty winds continuing through the evening. Tonight will be mostly clear, with temperatures in the low 40s.

ALTERNATE PARKING

In effect until March 24 (Purim).

The latest New York news

Gov. Kathy Hochul’s office made a quick adjustment after announcing that National Guard soldiers would be deployed to patrol the subway system and inspect passengers’ bags: The soldiers will not carry long guns at bag check stations.

The change was ordered Wednesday to be implemented Thursday, a spokesperson for the governor said. My colleague Hurubie Meko reported that early footage of the deployment shows soldiers standing at turnstiles and holding long rifles.

Hochul, a Democrat, said the move to flood the subway system with reinforcements — 750 soldiers from the New York National Guard and 250 personnel from the state police and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority — would make commuters and visitors feel safe.

Donna Lieberman, the executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, disagreed with that idea but called the ban on long guns at bag check stations a “relief.” She said the Guard’s underground presence remained “an unnecessary overreaction based on fear, not facts.” She added that the deployment “will unfortunately create a perfect storm for tension, escalation and further criminalization of Black and brown New Yorkers.”

In January, there was a 45 percent increase in major crimes in the metro, compared to the same month last year. That increase prompted Mayor Eric Adams to add another 1,000 police officers to the subway system. Reported crime rates in the system fell in February, according to city data.

METROPOLITAN diary

‘Don’t think about it too much’

Dear Diary:

I was walking my dog ​​down the street in Carroll Gardens on Sunday. As I reached the corner, a man with a large brown duffel bag walked hurriedly toward me.

“I am really sorry!” he shouted as he stopped at the corner.

My dog ​​and I were both looking at him, but he was looking up.

“Throw them to me,” he shouted. “Don’t think about it too much.”

I followed his gaze to the corner apartment on the top floor of the building we were standing in front of. There was a woman standing by the window with a red sneaker in her hand.

“I just want to wait for…” she said, her voice trailing off. She gestured to me.

I smiled and waved at her, then continued walking around the corner. When we got a little further, I paused and turned around.

I looked at my dog. My dog ​​looked at me. We both looked at the apartment as a red sneaker floated through the air.

I couldn’t see the man anymore, but I could see that he had taken the sneaker.

“Great,” he shouted. “Now the other one!”