It only took American Philatelic Society executives a moment to know: The “rare Jenny invert” owned by a small southwest Iowa aviation museum was a fake — and not even a good one.
“It wasn’t even close,” APS chief operating officer Ken Martin told The Virtual Stamp Club. “It was the size of the Dolley Madison or Windmill stamps,” which were smaller than most definitives, and only about 60% the size of real C3a Jenny Invert, such as the one shown here..
In addition, the Scott catalogue number (“C3a” was printed underneath the design, and the image was flat: The perforations weren’t real, but part of the printing. Martin speyculates the illustration may have been taken from The Postal Service Guide to U.S. Stamps, at one time sold in most post offices.
The Iowa Aviation Museum in Greenfield had had the stamp on display for more than 20 years, glued to a board. It had been told by the original donor that it was a valuable rare stamp.
The museum first contacted the Philatelic Foundation, but decided not to submit the stamp to PF. According to its website, PF’s fee would have been at least $1,000. Instead, at the suggestion of a local stamp collector, museum officials brought it to the APS convention in Omaha, about 80 miles away.
Stamp collectors know the whereabouts of all but one or two of the 100 Jenny Inverts found in 1918. The 24-cent stamp shows a JN-4-H bi-wing aircraft upside down.
The museum had hoped to sell the stamp, which if genuine would have fetched $300,000 and up, and use the money to build a new hangar.
“I felt so bad for them,” APS executive director Scott English told the VSC.
After explaining to museum officials why the stamp wasn’t real, the APS officials showed them a genuine Jenny Invert, which the organization is exhibiting at its convention.
I came into a collection which became the worst nightmare of my life, a bunch of crooks, had the jenny position no. 26 in my hands not having a clue, found out years later my x woman sued the crook in bloomington il and he paid off for no publicity. A retired postman bragged he got enough to buy a new house from me for chicken feed, a preacher got me in my house with my mom dying for thousands, if you want these whole true stories to publish i would be very happy to expose these dirty crooked men. I am a mess it would have been my retirement and especially the way they did it with sneaky crooked ways, me being trusting and not knowing. I been thinking of showing what i have left on camera then lighting on fire and throw in barrel burning all left and tell all the true stories, it would go viral,