Discussion - Member to Member Sales - Research Center
Discussion - Member to Member Sales - Research Center
Is it me? I have an exact definition for a mint never hinged stamp. The definition has never changed over time.
The stamp is post office fresh on the back, meaning the gum is without ANY disturbance, no markings from being stuck somewhere, no gum disturbance of any kind, etc. The stamp has never been hinged. No postmark on the front.
Can anyone offer any exceptions to this definition when an item is offered as Mint Never Hinged?
Thanks,
Bruce
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This was getting discussed over on stampboards a lot yesterday..
And they said, just remember you can't include gum/non-gummed, since some countries do both types.
To me it's:
Mint (NO damage whatsoever) vs. Non-Mint (Any damage to the stamp , whether it's hinge damage, cancellation, bad perf, whatever)
Used (Used for any postal Mailing) Vs. Non-Used (never mailed out and no CTO's)
Hinged vs. Non-Hinged (obvious)
Gum vs. No-Gum (again, obvious)
Basically, IMO, you have to use the four combinations to get
1/2) M-NU-NH-G / M-NU-NH-NG (the only two possible Mint combinations)
Then you flag everything else as Non-Mint with the various three other labels.
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There actually is a new third definition of mint never hinged, according to Scott. This relates to self-adhesives. For a self-adhesive to be considered to be mint never hinged, it must have all the attributes of a never hinged adhesive stamp, plus it must be on the original backing paper, which also must not be hinged. So, those who are removing self-adhesive stamps from the backing paper and putting it in another position are in effect creating an unused "hinged" stamp.
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I forgot about those pieces of sticky paper... (and no, I'm not a fan of self-adhesives...)
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They can take the SAs and put them somewhere the sun don't shine. AS to MNH, pretty much agree with Bruce. What i don't get are people that list something as used-never hinged.
Also agree there can be such a thing as MNGNH OR maybe MNGNHAI (pronounced minghi, Vietnamese, I think. Oops, forgot , nobody here likes humor).
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The one that puzzles me-- seen on a number of sales sites, including (even) the APS StampStore is "never hinged" with a USED stamp.
Seriously? Really? Who cares?
My thinking is that sellers really mean "no hinge remnants" or "clean back," but still... to a newcomer to the hobby, that would be pretty confusing. 
Peter
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The answer I have received back from sellers regarding the used, never hinged is that these are predominantly canceled-to-order stamps with original gum that has not been hinged.
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I have also seen recently - on this site - stamps described as, "MNH with CTO cancel";
....I don't know how a stamp can be MINT if it has been cancelled....CTO or otherwise.
Mint is post office fresh, period....plain and simple.
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All tricks ( terms etc) used by small hidey holed dealers to make a quick buck.These days just avoid dealers.Find good people via this site or any other stamp group.
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"All tricks ( terms etc) used by small hidey holed dealers to make a quick buck.These days just avoid dealers.Find good people via this site or any other stamp group."
I don't think that it's fair to lump all dealers as being bad as your blanket comment suggests. Please provide specific examples of where dealers are trying to scam people to quantify your statement. Remember that if you have examples of one or two dealers that you had trouble with (are you sure it wasn't you who misunderstood what was happening in your transaction?), that doesn't automatically mean that ALL are bad. If you don't have any specific examples that can be verified to validate your accusation, then you have no business making such statements. It is then only rumor mongering and a lie.
There are plenty of great dealers out there, just as there are bad collectors/people out there trying to make a quick buck. Finding good people is a good idea. Just remember that many of them are dealers too.
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there are two recent threads in this conversation. the long-running debated on the definition of "mint" never seems to end. No matter. I prefer words to have specific meanings, but I'm happy when someone qualifies a term so that the essence of the thing becomes clear, so "mint CTO" is perfectly clear to me even if I would never use that phrase myself. If we can't settle on nomenclature, and we clearly can't, then i'll settle for clarity.
as to blanket condemnations of dealers, yuck, there's just no reason for it and no room for it. The guy who was president of this organization for a number of years and who almost single-handedly moved us from paper to electronic format is a dealer who also gives us (as in free) the server on which we reside. I buy from him all the time, and I have never been dissatisfied, ever. That's Roy Lingen, and his company is BuckACover (look at the top right to see his link). He knows his covers, his postal history, and prices. There are others, too, with whom I've dealt and who I look forward to seeing at shows. I'd trust these guys with my collection, and I am happy for the prices they quote me.
I don't like all dealers, and those I don't, I don't use. Doesn't make them bad, it's just not a good fit. I can tell you this, though, that in all my time collecting, i've had some bad dealings with collectors and never one with a dealer. And even with the bad dealings with collectors, most have still been good, so it's worth the effort to explore and find those with whom you can deal.
David
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I will have to agree with Bruce with one exception. Mint Never Hinged means original gum without being hinged. Gum disturbances can and did occur at the post office. I remember buying Mint stamps from my postmistress in a rural Kentucky town and noting that she stored the sheets in a book separated with tabbed manila pages. The book lay flat in the safe and the "post office fresh" gum could have been disturbed by the storage technique. It was in the days before air conditioning. I try to identify and report any gum disturbances on the stamps that I sell.
Many of the mounting techniques besides hinging that collectors use can disturb gum. Dealers have an advantage in that the storage technique for inventory rarely disturbs a stamp bought at the Post Office by a dealer. Even those techniques could be fraught with danger, I remember buying H.E. Harris' block storage book. It was a small cloth bound album with glassine sleeves, but I foolishly kept it in a damp basement. All of my plate blocks from the 50's and 60's were ruined by the dampness.
Gum is truly worth more than its weight in gold.
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Not sure I understood you, Les.
To me, a stamp with damaged gum, even if it came that way from the post office, is not valued at the mint, never hinged price as stated in the catalog. It would be considered as damaged. Is that also what you were saying?
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Michael,
That was not what I meant to say, even though it may have sounded like that. A stamp with seriously damaged gum, missing a corner, or any other obvious damage should not get full catalogue value.
However, to me, the catalogue is a guide to the relative value of a stamp. For example look at US Scott # 934, a 3c commemorative stamp issued in 1945 is valued at $0.20 for a Very Fine Mint Never Hinged example and the Very Fine Used with a light unobtrusive cancel has exactly the same value. The $0.20 represents the so called dealer's cost of obtaining, storing and eventually selling the stamp. If I take the same stamp that is hinged or has damaged gum and soak the gum off and treat it as used, it still has the same catalogue value. Mint never hinged really means nothing to the catalogue value of the vast majority of common US stamps with a face value of 10c or less. Later day stamps which cost more for dealers to obtain in mint condition accordingly get a greater catalogue value usually double face while their used counterparts will merit only the minimum value.
The catalogue really reflects market demand, dealer pricing and the difficulty of obtaining a stamp in the desired condition. Collectors offered premiums for never hinged stamps issued early in history since most stamps had been hinged or glued down. Dealers and collectors even advised soaking the gum off the 1893 Columbian's to prevent them from being stuck down in albums stored in humid climates. A never hinged Columbian today is more likely to be regummed and should be valued as No-Gum.
Scott made an arbitary decision to say that all unused stamps after 771, March 15, 1935 would be valued as never hinged since demand is relatively low and assumed that the dealers could still make a reasonable profit selling never hinged at $0.20.
Hinging or the condition of the gum has nothing to do with the beauty of the stamp. Centering is by far the most important attribute, but if we collectors are willing to offer the dealers more for never hinged and/or undamaged gum than that will be reflected in the catalogue.
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Thanks, Les. I understand and agree with you.
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One tangent to this topic is the idea of Cancelled to Order with gum on the back. Actually, I think ( read: I am speculating because I can never quite suppress the intelligence analyst that I used to be in another long ago life. ) that it came about when German Inflationary issues came on the US philatelic market.
You know the story after World War I Germany experienced hyperinflation and postage stamps were used as currency with surcharges of millions of marks. Most of these stamps were not used for postage and were fully gummed on the back. Once they hit the market collectors recognized that they were worthless as mint stamps but a used stamp with a cancel meant that it franked a letter or package. They were rare. Thus the idea that a stamp with a cancel was worth more than a stamp without a cancel.
Countries that were trying to cash in on the US philatelic market began selling mint stamps with cancels.
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Les, not sure which country first had CTOs; may have been Germany. Other countries had hyperinflation as severe as Germany's, notably Hungary.
CTOs were a initially devised as a means of salvaging something from these stamps without having to honor their franking privileges; more recent CTOs from the East bloc, sub-Saharan, and African countries were either printed as CTOs or produced with an additional step adding the cancel.
I don't know if the early CTOs were intended to be pawned off as USED stamps; I don't believe the intent was to deceive but to generate revenue.
Most contemporary CTOs are easily identified by the quarter cancel that in a block of four is perfectly centered.
As to CTOs being in the same discussion as MNH, I, for one, don't believe they belong, because a cancelled stamp, by definition, can't be mint, no matter the state of the gum. Yes, I know that some prefer their CTOs unhinged, and don't wish to dissuade them from it, but don't want to muddy nomenclature waters.
David
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David Teisler:
Reluctant as I am to get into a washing of spears with a professional wordsmith, I believe that "nomenclature" should be left submerged in those muddy waters which you love to roil. That obsolete term was one of those many favourites that Red-October USSR used to roll out, along with its predictable parade of tanks and missile-launchers, when confronting NATO in a verbal bunfight while, in the background, the PROC provided solidarity by unleashing those "running dogs of capitalism".
We could, perhaps, reduce some misunderstanding by posting on Stamporama's auction board a permanent reminder to members of the descriptive terms in the "Introduction" section to the auction board's usage. These were last updated in April 2009 and are maturing well.
I remain fascinated by how much discussion "MNH" has generated, a veritable eternal flame.
John Derry
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ah, John, just because someone else has misused a word, even a word about words, ought not dissuade us from its proper usage.
As to red parades, I have some neat MNH Mi-24 Hinds and other CTO CCCP COpTers.
Not impressed? So vi et.
David
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David,
Thanks for the chuckle of the day....!
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This, just in from Scott Catalogue Editorial Board:
MNH now superseded by DTCUH (David Teisler Completely Unhinged)
Anon.
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Ah so much for my speculation. Shall we chalk it up to an " Intelligence failure"?
Les
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11:21:42pm
Hi All,
Is it me? I have an exact definition for a mint never hinged stamp. The definition has never changed over time.
The stamp is post office fresh on the back, meaning the gum is without ANY disturbance, no markings from being stuck somewhere, no gum disturbance of any kind, etc. The stamp has never been hinged. No postmark on the front.
Can anyone offer any exceptions to this definition when an item is offered as Mint Never Hinged?
Thanks,
Bruce
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re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
This was getting discussed over on stampboards a lot yesterday..
And they said, just remember you can't include gum/non-gummed, since some countries do both types.
To me it's:
Mint (NO damage whatsoever) vs. Non-Mint (Any damage to the stamp , whether it's hinge damage, cancellation, bad perf, whatever)
Used (Used for any postal Mailing) Vs. Non-Used (never mailed out and no CTO's)
Hinged vs. Non-Hinged (obvious)
Gum vs. No-Gum (again, obvious)
Basically, IMO, you have to use the four combinations to get
1/2) M-NU-NH-G / M-NU-NH-NG (the only two possible Mint combinations)
Then you flag everything else as Non-Mint with the various three other labels.
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re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
There actually is a new third definition of mint never hinged, according to Scott. This relates to self-adhesives. For a self-adhesive to be considered to be mint never hinged, it must have all the attributes of a never hinged adhesive stamp, plus it must be on the original backing paper, which also must not be hinged. So, those who are removing self-adhesive stamps from the backing paper and putting it in another position are in effect creating an unused "hinged" stamp.
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re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
I forgot about those pieces of sticky paper... (and no, I'm not a fan of self-adhesives...)
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re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
They can take the SAs and put them somewhere the sun don't shine. AS to MNH, pretty much agree with Bruce. What i don't get are people that list something as used-never hinged.
Also agree there can be such a thing as MNGNH OR maybe MNGNHAI (pronounced minghi, Vietnamese, I think. Oops, forgot , nobody here likes humor).
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re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
The one that puzzles me-- seen on a number of sales sites, including (even) the APS StampStore is "never hinged" with a USED stamp.
Seriously? Really? Who cares?
My thinking is that sellers really mean "no hinge remnants" or "clean back," but still... to a newcomer to the hobby, that would be pretty confusing.
Peter
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re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
The answer I have received back from sellers regarding the used, never hinged is that these are predominantly canceled-to-order stamps with original gum that has not been hinged.
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re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
I have also seen recently - on this site - stamps described as, "MNH with CTO cancel";
....I don't know how a stamp can be MINT if it has been cancelled....CTO or otherwise.
Mint is post office fresh, period....plain and simple.
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re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
All tricks ( terms etc) used by small hidey holed dealers to make a quick buck.These days just avoid dealers.Find good people via this site or any other stamp group.
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re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
"All tricks ( terms etc) used by small hidey holed dealers to make a quick buck.These days just avoid dealers.Find good people via this site or any other stamp group."
I don't think that it's fair to lump all dealers as being bad as your blanket comment suggests. Please provide specific examples of where dealers are trying to scam people to quantify your statement. Remember that if you have examples of one or two dealers that you had trouble with (are you sure it wasn't you who misunderstood what was happening in your transaction?), that doesn't automatically mean that ALL are bad. If you don't have any specific examples that can be verified to validate your accusation, then you have no business making such statements. It is then only rumor mongering and a lie.
There are plenty of great dealers out there, just as there are bad collectors/people out there trying to make a quick buck. Finding good people is a good idea. Just remember that many of them are dealers too.
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re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
there are two recent threads in this conversation. the long-running debated on the definition of "mint" never seems to end. No matter. I prefer words to have specific meanings, but I'm happy when someone qualifies a term so that the essence of the thing becomes clear, so "mint CTO" is perfectly clear to me even if I would never use that phrase myself. If we can't settle on nomenclature, and we clearly can't, then i'll settle for clarity.
as to blanket condemnations of dealers, yuck, there's just no reason for it and no room for it. The guy who was president of this organization for a number of years and who almost single-handedly moved us from paper to electronic format is a dealer who also gives us (as in free) the server on which we reside. I buy from him all the time, and I have never been dissatisfied, ever. That's Roy Lingen, and his company is BuckACover (look at the top right to see his link). He knows his covers, his postal history, and prices. There are others, too, with whom I've dealt and who I look forward to seeing at shows. I'd trust these guys with my collection, and I am happy for the prices they quote me.
I don't like all dealers, and those I don't, I don't use. Doesn't make them bad, it's just not a good fit. I can tell you this, though, that in all my time collecting, i've had some bad dealings with collectors and never one with a dealer. And even with the bad dealings with collectors, most have still been good, so it's worth the effort to explore and find those with whom you can deal.
David
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re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
I will have to agree with Bruce with one exception. Mint Never Hinged means original gum without being hinged. Gum disturbances can and did occur at the post office. I remember buying Mint stamps from my postmistress in a rural Kentucky town and noting that she stored the sheets in a book separated with tabbed manila pages. The book lay flat in the safe and the "post office fresh" gum could have been disturbed by the storage technique. It was in the days before air conditioning. I try to identify and report any gum disturbances on the stamps that I sell.
Many of the mounting techniques besides hinging that collectors use can disturb gum. Dealers have an advantage in that the storage technique for inventory rarely disturbs a stamp bought at the Post Office by a dealer. Even those techniques could be fraught with danger, I remember buying H.E. Harris' block storage book. It was a small cloth bound album with glassine sleeves, but I foolishly kept it in a damp basement. All of my plate blocks from the 50's and 60's were ruined by the dampness.
Gum is truly worth more than its weight in gold.
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re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
Not sure I understood you, Les.
To me, a stamp with damaged gum, even if it came that way from the post office, is not valued at the mint, never hinged price as stated in the catalog. It would be considered as damaged. Is that also what you were saying?
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re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
Michael,
That was not what I meant to say, even though it may have sounded like that. A stamp with seriously damaged gum, missing a corner, or any other obvious damage should not get full catalogue value.
However, to me, the catalogue is a guide to the relative value of a stamp. For example look at US Scott # 934, a 3c commemorative stamp issued in 1945 is valued at $0.20 for a Very Fine Mint Never Hinged example and the Very Fine Used with a light unobtrusive cancel has exactly the same value. The $0.20 represents the so called dealer's cost of obtaining, storing and eventually selling the stamp. If I take the same stamp that is hinged or has damaged gum and soak the gum off and treat it as used, it still has the same catalogue value. Mint never hinged really means nothing to the catalogue value of the vast majority of common US stamps with a face value of 10c or less. Later day stamps which cost more for dealers to obtain in mint condition accordingly get a greater catalogue value usually double face while their used counterparts will merit only the minimum value.
The catalogue really reflects market demand, dealer pricing and the difficulty of obtaining a stamp in the desired condition. Collectors offered premiums for never hinged stamps issued early in history since most stamps had been hinged or glued down. Dealers and collectors even advised soaking the gum off the 1893 Columbian's to prevent them from being stuck down in albums stored in humid climates. A never hinged Columbian today is more likely to be regummed and should be valued as No-Gum.
Scott made an arbitary decision to say that all unused stamps after 771, March 15, 1935 would be valued as never hinged since demand is relatively low and assumed that the dealers could still make a reasonable profit selling never hinged at $0.20.
Hinging or the condition of the gum has nothing to do with the beauty of the stamp. Centering is by far the most important attribute, but if we collectors are willing to offer the dealers more for never hinged and/or undamaged gum than that will be reflected in the catalogue.
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re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
Thanks, Les. I understand and agree with you.
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re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
One tangent to this topic is the idea of Cancelled to Order with gum on the back. Actually, I think ( read: I am speculating because I can never quite suppress the intelligence analyst that I used to be in another long ago life. ) that it came about when German Inflationary issues came on the US philatelic market.
You know the story after World War I Germany experienced hyperinflation and postage stamps were used as currency with surcharges of millions of marks. Most of these stamps were not used for postage and were fully gummed on the back. Once they hit the market collectors recognized that they were worthless as mint stamps but a used stamp with a cancel meant that it franked a letter or package. They were rare. Thus the idea that a stamp with a cancel was worth more than a stamp without a cancel.
Countries that were trying to cash in on the US philatelic market began selling mint stamps with cancels.
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re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
Les, not sure which country first had CTOs; may have been Germany. Other countries had hyperinflation as severe as Germany's, notably Hungary.
CTOs were a initially devised as a means of salvaging something from these stamps without having to honor their franking privileges; more recent CTOs from the East bloc, sub-Saharan, and African countries were either printed as CTOs or produced with an additional step adding the cancel.
I don't know if the early CTOs were intended to be pawned off as USED stamps; I don't believe the intent was to deceive but to generate revenue.
Most contemporary CTOs are easily identified by the quarter cancel that in a block of four is perfectly centered.
As to CTOs being in the same discussion as MNH, I, for one, don't believe they belong, because a cancelled stamp, by definition, can't be mint, no matter the state of the gum. Yes, I know that some prefer their CTOs unhinged, and don't wish to dissuade them from it, but don't want to muddy nomenclature waters.
David
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The past is a foreign country, they do things different there.
15 Oct 2012
01:38:37pm
re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
David Teisler:
Reluctant as I am to get into a washing of spears with a professional wordsmith, I believe that "nomenclature" should be left submerged in those muddy waters which you love to roil. That obsolete term was one of those many favourites that Red-October USSR used to roll out, along with its predictable parade of tanks and missile-launchers, when confronting NATO in a verbal bunfight while, in the background, the PROC provided solidarity by unleashing those "running dogs of capitalism".
We could, perhaps, reduce some misunderstanding by posting on Stamporama's auction board a permanent reminder to members of the descriptive terms in the "Introduction" section to the auction board's usage. These were last updated in April 2009 and are maturing well.
I remain fascinated by how much discussion "MNH" has generated, a veritable eternal flame.
John Derry
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re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
ah, John, just because someone else has misused a word, even a word about words, ought not dissuade us from its proper usage.
As to red parades, I have some neat MNH Mi-24 Hinds and other CTO CCCP COpTers.
Not impressed? So vi et.
David
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re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
David,
Thanks for the chuckle of the day....!
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The past is a foreign country, they do things different there.
15 Oct 2012
10:54:01pm
re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
This, just in from Scott Catalogue Editorial Board:
MNH now superseded by DTCUH (David Teisler Completely Unhinged)
Anon.
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re: Mint Never Hinged and MNH CTO discussion
Ah so much for my speculation. Shall we chalk it up to an " Intelligence failure"?
Les
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