Many collectors of antique stock certificates collect by
acquiring certificates with shared characteristics, or
themes.
In prior articles, we discussed themes of Industry,
Geography, Vignette (picture), Family Relationship, Time
Period, Event, Firsts, Famous Names, Unissued and Extreme
Numbers. Here are ten more popular collecting themes:
1. Celebration - Examples: World Fairs and participating
companies, construction (Panama Canal, landmarks...),
Disney (characters on war bonds, Magic Kingdom, Euro
Disney...), sports (teams, player restaurants...),
Transcontinental Railroad contributors
2. Personal Years - Examples: Birth year, when you met,
marriage, child's birth, military service, first car,
graduation, family members' important years (especially for
gifts)
3. Befores - Examples: Territories before they were
states, before modern papers and printing, financial
instruments from before we went off the Gold Standard,
pre-modern transportation (paddlewheels, steamships,
stagecoaches...)
4. Signatures, hand signed - This category includes any
hand written names (owner, company officials, bankers,
witnesses...). It can be further segmented into well-known
name signatures (John D Rockefeller), lesser-known (George
Wingfield ' miner and banker) or unknown (little historical
information).
5. Cancelation Type - Examples: stamped "canceled" or
"cancelled", hand written cancel, check mark or lines,
scribbles through the signatures, hole-punched, issued but
not canceled, canceled but not issued, marked VOID
6. Punch Type - Examples: large circles (1/4 inch), small
circles (often spelling out the word "canceled"), squares,
odd shapes (horseshoe, cross, star...)
7. Color - Examples: Certificates from the same company
were often printed in different colors if they were used
for a different amount of shares (example: printed for "100
Shares" or "Less Than 100 Shares"). Common stock and
preferred stock certificates usually were in different
colors. Certificates from some companies came in several
colors.
8. Misspellings, or variant spellings - Examples: An Odd
Fellows Hall Association certificate from the 1860's spells
"Fellows" both with and without an apostrophe on the same
certificate. Railroad was often spelled differently (one
or two words, capitals or not).
9. Stubbed - Some stock certificates still have a
registration stub attached (either all of it or a remnant)
to the left edge (similar to check register stubs for
recording the payment details in a checkbook). It may be
filled in or may not. Stubs on certificates can either be
flat and showing as part of the complete document (as a
framed wall display, for example) or it can be folded under
to show just the actual certificate.
Some stock and bond certificates have partial or full
sheets of dividend coupons attached like a stub would be,
but may be on the bottom or the right hand side.
10.Ornate - Some people take the designation of stock
certificates as artwork to heart and go for the very
decorative ones. Examples: The 1969 Ringling Bros. ' Barnum
& Bailey Combined Shows specimen is very colorful and full
of circus characters. The Boston and Albany Rail Road of
1892 has detailed train and harbor scene vignettes that
spread the width of the certificate.
It sometimes can be challenging to find certain
certificates to fill in a theme, especially if it is a very
narrow or rare theme. But the bigger challenge can be in
choosing only one theme, because there are so many from
which to choose.
----------------------------------------------------
Larry Crain is a collector, author and dealer in
Scripophily (the collecting of antique stock certificates).
Visit http://www.realstockcertificates.com/ for images,
values, more articles and research tools for old stock
certificates. Visit
http://www.realstockhistories.blogspot.com/ to research old
company and industry historical information.
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