Z Grill facts for kids
Quick facts for kids Z Grill |
|
|---|---|
|
|
| Country of production | United States |
| Date of production | 1868 |
| Nature of rarity | Limited number |
| No. in existence | 2 |
| Face value | 1-cent US |
| Estimated value | US $3,000,000 (2007) |
The Benjamin Franklin Z Grill, often called the "Z-Grill", is a very rare 1-cent postage stamp. It was made by the United States Postal Service in February 1868. This stamp shows a picture of Benjamin Franklin.
What makes the Z-Grill special is a unique pattern of tiny bumps pressed into the paper. This pattern is called a "grill." The Z-Grill is known as one of the rarest and most valuable US postage stamps. Other Z-Grill stamps, like the 15-cent Lincoln and 10-cent Washington, are also very rare.
The Post Office used grills to help the ink soak into the stamp. This stopped people from washing off the cancellation marks and reusing stamps. However, using grills was tricky, so they were stopped after 1870.
Contents
What Makes the Z-Grill Special?
The Z-Grill is unique because its grill pattern has horizontal ridges. Most other grills used at the time had vertical ridges. This small difference helps stamp experts tell it apart.
How Many Z-Grill Stamps Exist?
There are only two known 1-cent 1868 Z-Grill stamps in the world. Both of them have cancellation marks, meaning they were used on mail.
- One stamp is owned by the New York Public Library. It is part of the Benjamin Miller Collection.
- The other stamp is owned by a private collector.
The Journey of a Rare Stamp
One of the 1-cent Z-Grill stamps was sold for $935,000 in 1998. It was bought by the Mystic Stamp Company, a company that sells stamps. An eleven-year-old boy named Zachary Sundman, whose father owned the company, actually placed the winning bid!
Later, in 2005, the Mystic Stamp Company traded this Z-Grill stamp. They traded it to a collector named Bill Gross. In return, they received a block of four Inverted Jenny stamps. Those stamps were worth almost $3 million!
Both Z-Grill stamps were shown at the National Postal Museum. They were on display from May 2006 to October 2007.
How Stamps Are Numbered
Stamp collectors use a special book called the Scott catalogue to identify stamps. In this catalogue, the 1-cent Z-Grill is listed as #85A. It's one of the few stamps that shares a main number (85) with other stamps.
This happened because the Scott catalogue system was created before the Z-Grill was fully recognized as a separate type. So, they added capital letters like "A" to the Z-Grill stamps. For example, the 1-cent Z-Grill became #85A. This way, they didn't have to change all the numbers for later stamps.
