The Saint Paul globe., 1902-12-04
.pApERED WITH MONEY
AN ALBANY ROOM pEcKED WITH
STAMPS WORTH $1oo EACH.
TWO Thousand of Them Are Pasted on the
Room Of an Old Fashioned House in
New York's Capital = Paint Has
wrought Its Deadly Work on the
Stamps.

20 albany, n. Y, Dec. 3.-Part of the
VI the walls OF an old-fashioned residence
ilad In Ai2any 10 Is adorned with wall paper val
ued at upward of 5000, 900, or about SEQ q
square inch. This high priced wall ma
per consists OF very rare revenue stamps.
prIGea s15c q n IN current stamp catalogues at
$l5O each and readily selling at 500 each.
Fairy tales of apartments having walls
plastered with stamps of great value have
gone. the rounds of stamp journals, but
this is true story. A local stamp dealer
has investigated the matter personally and
vcuehes for the accuracy OF the State
ments.
ell, of Albany. manufactured certain
preparation which at that time required
the atnxlng OF proprietary revenue
stamp uron each package.
After time the law imposing stamn
taxes was repealed. Having several thou
sards Of the unused stamps on hand and
the there being no further commercial use for
them and no market for their sale to col
iectors, Mr.. Powell, rather than throw the
pretty things into the stove took them
nome 1on to To- mis- little daughter then 10 or IL
years oid. That was the last the busy
father thought Of his surplus revenue
stamps.
One small room in the house had been
set apart for the exclusive use of little
MISS PoWeil as a playrcom. The room
was located in an IL and the partitions
were of boards instead of lath and pIas-
ter.
She had long wanted papered room.
and one day, when the novelty of the
stamps as playthings had worn off and
she was debating the problem what next
TO DO with them, it occurred to her that
Sne might paper her room with them.
without delay she set about the task and
In the course of three or four days had
aftiXed the entire lot of stamps, some
coted wall
There were enough of the stamps to
ccyer practically one side of the room as
high as she could reach, and with the
help Of some of her girl friends she, sue
ceedeG in producing some pretty designs
and figures upon the wall.
Years passed on; the little girl outgrew
her aells and play ythings and blossomed
into the real Miss Powell. The playroom,
with its boarded partition and its UNIQUE
decorations, was abandoned by her and
thereafter became the store room for the
family. Ssme years later Mr.. Powell
erected residence in another part of
the city and the old home was rented
A couple of stamps escaped the paper
of the books in the library, although just
how this happened is not known. In
atter al G years e young man, while visiting
two stamps in the book.
This young man belonged to Guild
known as ph!latslists to use the scien-
tine term, or, in the common vernacular,
stamp cranks, and the instant his eye
fell upon one Of the cid stamps he was
nearly overcame with philatelic paralysis
a disease common to the craft. He knew
ilS was UcIlOIIutB Tie TarGSI anV hlgn6SG
priced specimen of proprietary stamp,
and 1t made him faint.
When the young man spoke about the
stamps and asked where they came from
and OF there were any others, Mr.. Powell
laughed and assured the young man that
there were hundreds and perhaps thou
sands of them pasted upon q wall in the
old house. The young man evinced a de-
sire to know more Of the old house and
Mr.. POWELL accompanied him to the
scenes of his earlier married life
The room referred to by Mr.. Powell was
boards, as had been said. but there were
no STAMPS upon the wall; nothing but
light-colored paint.
knife and attacked the painted wall, and
after some little craping and peeling
came upon the wood. Sure enough, there
upon the board could be detected the COL
stamp, but the paper itself seemed to
have disappeared; there appeared to be
no texture or fiber.
Inquiry developed the fact that some
years before, when the house was under
going some repairs, the board walls had
been treated to two coats of paint. The
present occupant of the house remember
ed that there had been some doubt as to
whether it would be best to soak of the
old stamps before painting, but the
painters had assured him that would be
no stamps there after the first coat of
paint
The brush artists were good guessers.
There was not the slightest outward evil
dence of the existence of 5000, 900 worth of
stamps upon the WALL
Various schemes were employed in the
effort to recover some of the stamps, by
soaking the paint with chemicals, by
scraping, by planning off the back of a
board until the paint had been reached,
but without success.
1t was found that there was NO longer
any tcdy to the stamps, the action of
the oil in the paint had Incorporated the
a baGer in the paint amt, itself The stamps
thin tissue-lilSe paper, and upon this
fimsy material the paint had wrought it's
deadly work.
And there 1000 stamps. more or less,
each one catalogued at $3.50, remain to-
day. hidden from view and beyond the
reach of man. Like the uncounted gold
lying in the hulks of wrecked galleons
upon the oceans bottom. it Is known the
treasure is there, but no mans hand can
grasp it.