Souvenir cards

I haven't heard of anything MPC-related in the works. It looks like next year's intaglio prints will follow a WWI theme, since it is the centennial of the first world war. This will probably include vignettes from the old Liberty and Victory bonds. At the Denver ANA show, the BEP met with souvenir card collectors to gauge their opinions of proposed ideas and do some brainstorming.

The proposed theme for 2019 was space exploration, sort of, with the 50th anniversary of the moon landing coming up. Frankly, I think that's a terrible idea for the intaglio print program and I let them know. They just don't have many related engravings to draw from. I suggested it might be a good time to return to reprinting historic currency. If there are other collectors who would also like to see this, I urge you to make your voice heard. If they get enough feedback along these lines I think they will move in that direction. I've heard the new BEP director is a collector, so there's no better time for the paper money community to have an impact.

If you'd like to send your thoughts and ideas to the BEP Marketing Director, here is his contact information:

Kevin Brown
14th & C Streets, SW
Washington, DC 20228

kevin.brown@bep.treas.gov

 

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Will do.

 

Today, I'd like to discuss cancelled souvenir cards -- specifically those cancelled at the BEP Visitors Center. This is something that probably should have been posted long ago. So a little background:

The special Visitors Center cancellation was first put into use in 1981 as a way to offer visitors (mostly stamp collectors) a cheap, convenient way to document their visit. Almost from the start, BEP souvenir cards have been show cancelled at the events they commemorate, particularly stamp shows that create special hand cancellations. So a Visitors Center cancel made sense to many philatelic collectors.

The Visitor Center cancel is still around today and you'll see it on a lot of cards selling on eBay. The BEP often brings this hand cancel along to shows where they exhibit and sell products, as if it were a show cancel. Except that it's not. Many collectors believe that the VC cancel enhances the value of a souvenir card, just as a show cancel does. Except that it doesn't. In fact, it may actually reduce the value, compared to a mint card. A great many of those stamp collectors who were around back in the '80s -- those who created and collected this kind of card -- are now long gone.

Unlike a show cancel, VC cancels don't usually commemorate anything special, except one collector's trip to the BEP -- even if they match the date of the show. In the regular auction of the Souvenir Card Collectors Society, VC cancelled cards typically sell for less, if at all. This somewhat tracks on eBay, though many buyers don't recognize the difference between a VC cancel and a show cancel.

I personally prefer mint cards over VC cancels. I like the cleaner look and I think they will be easier to sell, down the line. And while I don't want to deter any collector from deciding for themselves what to collect, I think it's a good idea to be aware of how fellow collectors perceive the material you like, so you aren't surprised later on.

 

Love the engravers tool.

 

Last year, Insider mentioned these specimen cards and I finally found one at an affordable price. This is a specimen of SO-15 from 1981. I'm not certain how many of these were released, but probably just a handful. The date stamp is about a month before the cards were first sold at the show. My guess is these were given to the SPMC, who ordered the cards, as review samples.

 

WOO HOO! Our voices were heard! The Bureau of Engraving & Printing has released the designs for 2018 Intaglio Print Program and for the first time in 10 YEARS they are featuring complete currency designs!

The last card was like this was issued for the 2007 ANA show in Milwaukie. For all of you who urged them to go back to currency as the central feature -- THANK YOU. It finally paid off!

You'll note that the currency reproductions are marked "COPY." A quick recap: the reason the BEP stopped reprinting currency designs was because some dealers were cutting down the cards, having them "graded," and misrepresenting them as proofs. The Secret Service came down on the Bureau and told them they could no longer use currency on their cards. (They actually were not supposed to use any engraving that had even appeared on currency, but that was too restrictive and was ignored.) But administrations change and so do Bureau directors. The new director, Len Olijar, is a collector himself and I suspect this is what led to a repeal of the prohibition on currency usage.

If having "COPY" on these designs is the price we have to pay for intaglio currency reprints, I'll take it. The next step is to encourage better overall design of these cards, but I'm not going to complain. This is probably a better time to write Kevin Brown (see address above) and offer your praise for this policy reversal.

 

Yes received the email notice today on this item from the BEP. I'm definitely interested in the set.

 

The obsolete banknotes on souvenir cards produced by American Bank Note Co. are rarely cut out and resold. Why? ABNC was smart enough to stamp the cards on the back (right behind the banknote) with something indicating the date they were reprinted. There's no way to misrepresent them as older proofs.

Here are a couple examples -- SO-116 and SO-117. Rather than stamping a rather unattractive "COPY" on each reprinted note, which detracts from the beauty of the engraving, I'd like to see the BEP do something like this on their cards.

Does anyone else have suggestions on ways to discretely identify currency reprints as modern reproductions?

 

So, a little insider information: The Souvenir Card Collector Society is in the process of finally building a website. The core of the site will be a visual reference of all intaglio (engraved) souvenir cards. There are probably a lot more categories of cards than many collectors realize and there are easily more than 1,000 varieties.

While it's likely to be some time before the site goes public, I thought it might be interesting to show representative examples of the various categories that will eventually be available for viewing:

Souvenir cards produced by government and commercial printers

B - Bureau of Engraving & Printing


B - BEP Spider Press


BV - Bureau, Veterans Day


FM - Federal Managers Assn.


PS - US Postal Service


SO - Semi-Official (ABN, etc.)


F - Forerunner (Union cards)


FPS - Forerunner, Postal Service


FB - Forerunner, BEP


FSO - Forerunner, Semi-Official printer

 

Privately printed intaglio cards

N - National SCCS (annual cards)


W - Washington Chapter SCCS


M - Metro NY Chapter SCCS


Q - Lee Quast (Ameri-Show cards)


MB - Mike Bean


NA - National Philatelic Exhibitions (NAPEX)

 

Hi All,

While researching some details for an article, I found this nice thread on intaglio souvenir cards. I have not read it all but it seems there are a bit of difficulties to obtain the Japanese Intaglio Souvenir Cards of Tokyo International Coin Show. I am based in Tokyo and if anyone needs I can give a hand. The Insatsu Choyokai Foundation says that card #3,4,5,8,9 are sold out but all the others are available. Their entire card collections goes from card 3 to card 28 (from 1992 to 2017). This because they started to issue cards from the 3rd show so basically card 1 and 2 do not exist. The steel intaglio part on this cards are highlighted in the photo I am including.

Their selling price is JPY1500 up to card #25 and JPY1550 from card #26.
They charge domestic shipping according to the number of cards purchased, but is only few dollars.

I don’t intend to make a commercial ad here but only give a hand. If anyone interested, please let me know. On top of the amount of the card/s, I will add a small nominal fee and shipping cost to US.

I should be at the ANA Summer Seminar in June in Colorado Springs if anyone will be there

All cards can be seen here
http://www.choyokai.or.jp/suvenir-jingukoukou.html

Best wishes
Fab

 

Krispy, who started this thread, has had a table at the TICC for a number of years (Atlas Numismatics). He got me started on the TICC souvenir cards and I picked up all the ones that had engravings from notes that were originally produced by Continental Bank Note Co. I'll post one of my favorites.

Many thanks for your offer, Fab! I hope some other members take you up on it. They are very nice cards.

 

Does anyone know whether the BEP raffled off their usual spider press limited-run cards at the FUN show, earlier this year? If so, could you post a scan?

 

Hi Alex - I am about 99.9% sure the card you show was not cancelled at the Visitor's Center. It is almost certainly [I'll explain the "almost" later] what the BEP calls a "Post Office Cancelled" card. The BEP would send a couple of thousand cards and the Visitor Center cancel die to the USPS Fulfillment Center in Kansas City, and they would affix a stamp, put the VC cancel die on their cancelling machine and cancel the cards. Then ship them back to DC to be sold already cancelled at the Visitor Center. From B 52 to B 178 [excepting Savings Bonds cards or other special issues] the USPS would set up at the Visitor Center and you could hand cancel the cards with the VC cancel [most cases - a couple of times they forgot the VC cancel and collectors could only get a circular date stamp on the day of issue souvenir card]. You can tell a actual cancelled at the BEP card by the fact it does not have a Flag over Supreme Court stamp or the cancel is in a different location. [I'll attach a scan of such a card.] Why the "almost"? It is just possible that a collector went to the BEP first day and hand cancelled a card with the Flag Over Supreme Court stamp and put the cancel in the same place as the USPS cancelling machine did. Not very likely, though

 

Thanks for the post, Harry! Very interesting information. I was unaware that the flag stamp typically indicated a cancelled-to-order (CTO) card by the USPS, though I did know large numbers were cancelled for the BEP.

Btw, a forum now exists specifically for collectors of souvenir cards and security engravings. This would be useful knowledge to post there as well.

-- Greg

 

The Flag over Supreme Court [Sc 1894] was used on the POC up to B 75, when the postal rate increased. After that, they mostly had whatever was the the current definitive for first class postage. Occasionally commemoratives were used - I wish they hadn't used the Elvis stamp on B 171; not one of my favorite designs. [Nothing against Elvis; I just think the stamp isn't very attractive.] I use 'Post Office Cancelled' for BEP cards, since that is what the BEP called them. But I think the PS cards usually are called Cancelled to Order [CTO]. Although POC cards usually go for less than mint [B 55 and B 126 are a couple of exceptions], cards that are clearly hand cancelled at the BEP go for about the same as show cancels. And I am not aware that the Visitor Center cancel was ever available at shows. For one thing, it would have been the post office, not the BEP, that had custody of the cancel die [I call them dies; maybe rubber cancel would be more accurate.] Sometimes the post office used coil stamps; POC cancels which have the coil stamp plate number on the stamp go for about double a regular POC.

 

Time for an update on the website of the Souvenir Card Collector Society (SCCS). In October we marked a year since the start of the project and it has come a long way. The central feature is the photo gallery, which will eventually (I hope) have reference images and data on every official card issued.

We recently completed posting images for the *entire* category of BEP cards, 1969 to 2018. That represents more than 330 different cards, many of which have text on the back or information sheets. We have nearly all the semi-official (SO) cards in place, missing only two images out of 164. Some of these cards are nearly impossible to find. And the first completed category was the USPS philatelic cards. There are only 71 of those, so that was easier, but still a challenge.

We recently posted some new categories, including the hand-pulled spider press cards -- which are hands-down the rarest souvenir cards issued, many 100 or less. And many of the intaglio "club cards" issued by the SCCS itself and its chapters are now on view, including all the annual "national cards."

Look for a large block of early forerunner cards to be posted in the near future. If you haven't taken a look at the site recently, I encourage you to do so. You'll also find information on how to join the Society (I encourage that, too ). Here are a few teasers...

 

Bump! Here's a card you don't often see and could easily be mistaken for a stock certificate. It was produced by the British American Bank Note Co., in Ottawa, Canada, using preprinted 12" x 8" stock certificate blanks on security paper, and features the well-known engraving of Jacques Cartier's Arrival in Canada. But this one was overprinted to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the Canadian Paper Money Society in 1989. And since it was produced by a security printer as a souvenir of a specific occasion it qualifies as a semi-official souvenir card and was given a catalog number by the SCCS: SO-70.

This is a fairly scarce card, so I was happy to finally add one to my collection.

 

+1 for the British American Bank Note specimen.

 

Been a while since I posted anything here, but I thought I'd let forum members know that we recently added two completely NEW categories to the SCCS catalog: Canada Post cards and Christmas Seal cards. Both have been included on the website Image Gallery. The Canada Post souvenir cards have been given temporary catalog numbers because we think there may be more varieties yet to be reported. If anyone knows of any, please contact me!