The second issue was Streetcars, a block of four, and, again, 300 were produced and serviced, so my investment was 88¢ per card, times 300, or $264 just in stamps. For the Celebrate The Century 1960s, I had to print 50 of each for the five stamps I did (minimum printing quantity at the commercial printer I used was 25 sheets, and there were/are two cards per sheet). I only serviced 25 of each, and have just 11 of the 125 left (for two issues). Eight of those are Moon Landing, which I thought would sell better than it did. The Roberto Clemente, Dgn5, with the circular date stamp (small circle) cancel was the first variety ever to sell out, but I still have more than 60 of the ones postmarked in Pittsburgh. Baseball dealers (cards and topical stamps) grabbed all the "plain" ones, but weren't interested in the Pittsburgh "Unofficials." By the way, every Pittsburgh cancellation on a Clemente FDC in that particular color was serviced by me, no matter who the cachetmaker. I was part of a cooperative effort that included a number of other locations in relaying the stamps from Puerto Rico. Another green ink was used at the downtown Pittsburgh post office. The most expensive Dragon Card to print so far was Stars & Stripes Forever, Dgn 54, which required two ink colors and a "screen" to lighten the music so it wouldn't overwhelm the flag. However, that wasn't the first two-color Dragon Card, Carnegie Hall Dgn 33 was. The design was "mortised" to allow the indicia of the postal card to show. However, the printer decided the blue part of the cachet extended too close to the edges, so reduced the size of the entire background, so the mortise doesn't fit as closely as planned.
 |
