“This was the world’s greatest trade,” said Sundman, who purchased the nearly unique Z Grill stamp at auction in 1998 for $935,000, until now a record price for a single US stamp. Sundman called his Z Grill “the Hope Diamond of American philately and the key to any collection. When we acquired it, it really repositioned our company – Robert A. Siegel Auction Galleries Catalog for October 19, 2005. Maynard Sundman reviews the sale catalog after the trade. Sundman, 90, founded Littleton it showed our buying power.” Stamp Co. in Littleton, N.H., in 1945. Littleton has served millions of stamp and coin collectors Sundman says he expects in the past 60 years. Mystic acquired Littleton’s the stamp to continue to stamp operations in the mid-1980s. increase in value as its true rarity is appreciated. He added, “The rarest American stamps are undervalued and still have room to grow in price because they’re symbols of US culture.” The room was packed with three television crews, several reporters and numerous philatelic VIPs, some of whom, to judge from conversations I overheard, had been underbidders at the Jenny Invert Plate-Number Block auction as well as at the last Z Grill auction in 1998. “Envious” was a word I heard several times. The media attention, unusual for a stamp event, was an indication of the momentous nature of this trade. Mystic President Donald Sundman and Charles Shreve interviewed after the trade. 4 Tracy Shreve, co-owner of Shreves Philatelic Galleries, introduced her husband Charles Shreve, Donald Sundman, and Allen Kane, director of the Smithsonian Institution’s National Postal Museum, which will display both known examples of the 1¢ Z Grill stamp in 2006.
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