Unissued 1998 Hat postcard-rate stamp found in 1-pound United States mixture

By Charles Snee

A collector in Troy, N.Y., has discovered a used example of the unissued United States 1998 Hat postcard-rate stamp that was first reported in 1999.

The stamp, illustrated nearby, is the nondenominated (20¢) H-rate Hat stamp with a yellow background that is inscribed “Postcard Rate.”

The used stamp bears a partial strike of a double-outline circular handstamp at top right. Not enough of the postmark is present to indicate a date or location.

On Nov. 19, 2023, Chris Johnson contacted Linn’s Stamp News about the stamp, which he discovered in a 1-pound mixture of on-paper U.S. stamps that he bought for $13 at a stamp show in Albany, N.Y., in October 2023.

Johnson has collected stamps for more than 40 years and focuses his attention on used U.S. stamps and Canada. He also owns what he calls “a languishing German and Austria collection.”

Johnson said he found “a few stamps to fill holes in my collection” while sorting through the mixture. He also found a stamp “that didn’t look familiar.”

“When I buy kiloware [a stamp mixture], I usually go through once sorting stamps into three piles: stamps that I know I need, stamps I know I don’t need, and those that I am unsure of,” Johnson said.

“I had a dozen or so stamps that I knew I needed, and a couple dozen I wasn’t sure about, including the H stamp,” he recalled. “So I was at least two or three hours into sorting before I realized what I had.”

Johnson told Linn’s that he has not had his yellow H-rate Hat stamp expertized.

The unissued Hat stamp is noted but not listed in the Scott Specialized Catalogue of United States Stamps and Covers: “Unused and used examples of an ‘H’ nondenominated stamp inscribed ‘Postcard Rate’ exist in the marketplace. There is no evidence that these stamps were ever officially issued.”

The stamp, which was printed by the Bureau of Engraving and Printing in Washington, D.C., is valued in the Scott U.S. Specialized catalog at $2,400 in unused condition and $1,750 in used condition.

Linn’s reported the initial discovery of the unissued Hat stamp in a page 1 report in the Dec. 6, 1999, issue. In that article, Charles Snee wrote that two used examples were found on a business-reply envelope postmarked Oct. 26, 1999, in Albany, N.Y.

Joan Risteen and Dave Brown of Middlesex Coin and Stamp Co. in Melrose, Mass., found the cover in “an assortment of similar commercial covers from a company that regularly supplies Middlesex Coin and Stamp with postally used business-reply envelopes,” Snee said.

Snee learned from a source at the BEP that the yellow postcard-rate Hat stamps were shipped to the USPS beginning Sept. 12, 1997. The final shipment was sent to the Postal Service on Jan. 6, 1998, about 11 months before the official release date of the other known Hat stamps.

From December 1999 to May 2006, Linn’s regularly reported the discovery of additional yellow Hat stamps, documenting a total of 67 used examples. A number of unused stamps have been reported since then.

The yellow H-rate Hat stamp was to have been issued Nov. 9, 1998, in lick-and-stick panes of 20, but it was held back.

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