Cherrystone will hold the next live online auction on June 2-3. This sale contains 1,215 lots of Rare Stamps and Postal History of the World, with United States and Europe, including Austria, with a fine showing of Rocket Mai,l and Austrian Levant, France and Colonies, German Area, Italy and Colonies, Poland, Russia, specialized Vatican City and other areas. A block of four CIA Invert stamps is expected to get a great number of bids and is being offered at the starting price of $55,000.
Cherrystone describes this lot as follows: “1979 $1 tan, brown orange and yellow, brown inverted, block of four, n.h. and post office fresh, v.f., one of only three known blocks of four of this popular error, significantly undervalued given its rarity.”
One pane of one hundred of these stamps was issued with the brown (the last color printed, though it covers much of the stamp) inverted. The pane was purchased by a CIA employee who had been sent to the post office to purchase stamps. After the involved employee saved one each, the remainder was sold to a stamp dealer. The stamps have become known as CIA Inverts. The government attempted to reclaim them, but was not successful.
