Marshall County Republican., 1877-02-08
CANCELLNG POSTAGE STAMPS.
Some Devices which the PoscofHce De.
partment Has Tried.


partment Has Tried.
Gwsshington Cor. New York worid.l
Every year in something over 80, ,OOC
offices the Postoffice Department cancels
thousand million postal stamps of one
sort and another. It was really a little
more than this last year,, ,049, 797, ,5O7
-but few thousand more or less make
small difference. The thousand million
give work enough. One third the
stamped envelopes and the postal cards
cancel themselves, In q sense. No one
can use them twice. The stamps no
body has been able to cancel fairly and
completely, and within the past month
the departments closed two years of ex
pertinent no wiser than it began. No
one has got past the pad, the stamp and
the printers ink with which the depart
ment began thirty years ago and which
it uses still. Down in one corner of the
Postoffice building there is room full
of some 400 or 500 fruitless inventions.
A new ink is generally the stronghold
of canceling genius, and to the fat inks
printer sand metallic inks-writing
fuid-the three principal acids, caustic
potash and drug-shop OF other chemi-
Gals have been added by genius at work
on letter-stamp. There is sulphuric
acid ink there which came from Cincin
natl, warranted to cancel a stamp, and
which eats hole through the envelope
into The bargain. There is one
of caustic potash, backed by q
distinguished chemist, which bis
ters a mans fingers at touch and
has it's effects on the glass bottle which
holds it. Nitric acid is at the bottom
of another ink, and fills the air as it is
used with the fuples familiar to labora
tories. All these inks do too much.
Most of them do too little. Your aver
age inventor never tests his invention.
A shelf full of inks-warranted to stand
acids-have been washed clean and dry
from cancelled stamps with ordinary
soap at the wash-stand in the corner.
One such ink man brought precious
bottle of from st. Louis. Was doubt
full about trusting the bottle out of
sight, for fear of losing his "secret.
Saw some stamps cancelled with 1T in
his sight by Mr.. Hazen, in charge, and
the stamps washed clean ten minutes
after with soap and water. Of the
whole bottled array of inks not one has
stood the acids and the alkalis of the
Patent Office chemist. Last on the list
is his ink; Smithsonian chemist set
tied him. and the department still uses
printers ink of the best quality. No
one improves on that.
There are other ways to cancel stamps
by genuine canceii9. They have all
been invented-a good many separate
times. People in small Offices have in
vented hooks to harrow the surface Of
the stamp. That takes too much time.
In q large Office q single motion from
pad to letter must dispose OF stamp and
postmark. Men with q vague idea of |
this have put together an elastic stamp,
which jabs stamp full of holes. A lit
tie steam and fatiron smoothes that,
And there is one ingenious contrivance
which brings disc down with half
turn at the stamping-a slanting slot
does the work-and rips half the features
of G. W. or Franklin. Somewhere
along the eten-thousandth letter this dulls |
and takes blow like sledge hammer
to do its work The New YoIk Office can
cels 200, 600, 600 stamps . year, and the
New York clerk takes more kindly to the
firm, light tap of wooden stamp. No
invention has displaced that any more
than the ink.