Canadian Stamp Auctions

22 May, 2008 - H.R. Harmer Inc.

The "Mount Royal" Collection
of Canada

This was, without doubt, one of those extraordinary collections that someone put together with great care and, of course, at great expense. We were able to obtain two copies of the auction catalogues from H. R Harmer Inc., the well known philatelic auction firm now located in Bethel, Connecticut. For this we are most grateful because the pages of these catalogues are full of treasures.

It is hard to put into words our impression of this collection, but let us try. It had quality and it had quantity. Almost everything was of an exceptional quality, well centered, well perforated, clean and mostly no hinged. If a single copy of a rare stamp was offered, sometimes there was a block as well or even a whole sheet.

67 New Record Prices

The sale had 67 new record prices. As will be seen below, this represents a new record in itself. The 67 are just the ones we could identify, but there were probably more. How significant is this? Here is a list of the most new records we have noted in recent years:

For a full list of all 67 new record prices, please click here.

Let’s look at some highlights from the sale. Here are some of the stamps that attracted very strong prices :

Lot 2045 Scott 9 Catalogue $8,500 Realized $25,740

Lot 2059 Scott 20b Catalogue $3,500 Realized $2,572

Lot 2090 Scott 47 Catalogue $475 Realized $3,960

Lot 2115 Scott 61 Catalogue $2,400 Realized $5,197

Lot 2227 Scott 110a Catalogue $3,600 Realized $3,960

Lot 2341 Unitrade 203ii Catalogue $5,000 Realized $6,682

Lot 2374 Scott 245a Catalogue $4,750 Realized $6,187

Lot 2400 Scott 387a Catalogue $48,000 Realized $56,925

Lot 2740 Unitrade OX2a Catalogue $5,000 Realized $3,712

Most of the above stamps sold for record prices. For example the price of Scott 9 realized in the sale of $25,740 was well in excess of the previous record of $17,600. The price of $5,197 for Scott 61 ($1 Jubilee) easily exceeded the previous high of $2,700.

8 New Unlisted Varieties

We cannot previously recall having seen so many previously unlisted varieties appearing in a single auction. Here are the 8 new ones that appeared in this sale:

Missing "Canada 17"	"Imperforate Horizontally"
Scott 840	Scott 950

"Black Colour Shift"	"Imperforate Right Margin"
Scott 1183	Scott 1448-51

"Imperforate Left Margin"

Scott 1553-1557b

"Die Cutting Omitted"

Scott 1568-69

"Imperforate Pane "

Scott 1856

"Bottom Pair Imperforate"

Scott 1881a

Unusually Large Blocks

Lot 2172 Scott 82ii Realized $8,415

Lot 2203 Scott 95 Realized $8,910

Lot 2248 Scott 119a Realized $4,950

Lot 2362 Scott 221a Realized $4,702

Lot 2366 Scott 227a Realized $2,277

Lot 2497 Scott 1133a Realized $5,692

We treasure these large blocks as one seldom gets a chance to see them and they contain special information that is helpful to researchers and specialists. We sometimes wish Canada’s Postal Archives in Ottawa had the resources to acquire them so that they would be available to be looked at by all collectors. However they are not in a position to do this, not only because they don’t have the resources, but also because this might tend to legitimize some of the varieties that may be of dubious origin.

Full Sheets

We can’t remember seeing so many full sheets of Canada’s modern varieties offered in a single sale:

Lot 2536 Scott 1289-92b Realized $15,840

One wonders who has the resources or motivation to buy these sheets. Would it be a collector of unlimited means? We hope so, because it means the sheet may remain intact. On the other hand, if it were a dealer, it could be very profitable to break the sheet up and sell it. The only downside for the dealer is that it would take some time to sell all of stamps, because the market can only absorb so many stamp varieties at a time without the price becoming depressed.

Conclusion and Words of Appreciation

We finish our review with a thank you to Harmer’s for presenting this important collection to the stamp community so beautifully in its auction catalogue. The auctioneer’s job of describing a large collection like this takes a great deal of time and care and Harmer’s can be congratulated for having done a first class job.

As a final word, we note that some of the material in the sale came from the well known Dale Lichtenstein collection that was auctioned by Harmers in 1969 -70. This was probably the biggest and most significant sale of Canadian stamps ever, at least in our experience! Please click on this link if you’d be interested in seeing our review of that sale.