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Its hard to see but is this a pre cancel or a fancy cancel?

Exchange Student Kazuko Koheyashi sent this. Dec 16,2003,From Noboritoekimae Japan, To Kingston Ontario . paid 60. It was nice to hear from her again we all became great friends while she lived hear and went to Queens.

Vernon Texas Oct 9 1919 with in city

U.S. Scott 13 guide line on cover A Stanley B Ashbrook cover Autograph on back.

A pair of Scott 300 Jun 20 1908 Newton Conn.

Baltimore 1823 Feb 24 to Merchant New  York Feb  26 1823

Picked up a very nice item at the club meeting last week. 

It's an express cover sent on October 12, 1938 from the 'new' German post office in Schlag, in the district of Gablonz, [formerly in Czechoslovakia] to Halle (Saale) in Germany.  This was four days after the German Occupation (Annexation) of the Sudetenland following the Munich Agreement.

   

It has a rather unusual provisional, roughly set, rubber hand-stamp, BAD SCHLAG / 12.X.1938 in black ink.  It's actually two hand-stamps, one for the town and one for the date. The word BAD was added by the local authorities who were perhaps eager to position the town as a spa town for German tourists. 

   

As well,  there is a 34mm purple hand-stamp commemorating the occupation of Gablonz four days earlier.

   

The arrival cancel on the back is dated the next day ... and is from HALLE (SAALE) / FERNSPRECHAMT. [Fernsprechamt = Telephone / telegraph office]. 

   

There is a German delivery / route number 21 on the back next to the arrival stamp. The arrival CDS and this route stamp would seem to confirm postal use and delivery. 

It's been franked with 57Pf in Hindenburg stamps cancelled with the date stamp and provisional rubber hand-stamp. There is a manuscript Durch Eilboten [By Express Messenger] in blue crayon in the upper left corner. There is also a manuscript 826 on the front, presumably it has to do with the brown etiquette reading EXPRÈS. It is, I assume, a Czech stock label still being used during this early period.

The routing appears plausible for next morning delivery. Over-franked perhaps but it was sent express and it would have bee a confusing period. No contents.

It was addressed, in a German cursive script known as Schreibschrift, to:

Herrn Robert Schuler
Halle (Saale)
Cansteinstrasse 14

I haven't yet found any information about Robert Schuler but the street address is a private residential building. It still exists. 

   
Source: Wikimedia

The town and the postmark is listed in Die Not-und Befreiungsstempel in den sudetendeutschen Gebieten 1938/39 (The Emergency and Liberation Postmarks in the Sudeten German Territories 1938/39). Another monograph confirms it was assigned to the German Postal Region of Dresden. 

In short, a postally-used philatelic souvenir created in the days following the occupation. The provisional hand-stamps were replaced within weeks.

Today, Bad Schlag is known as Jablonecké Paseky and is part of Jablonec nad Nisou (formerly Gablonz) in the Czech Republic.

Cheers, Hugh

This is modern but I have always liked it. 1964 5 cent Graded 100 none higher top of the pop

Scott 271 imprint  pair OG/NH  Ad yours used on or off cover.

I was always interested in the guide lines on a stamp, So I turned it into a  collection. Some collectors don't like  the strait edge. But  it helps to find the location of the stamp  and where it was in the full sheet  before it was cut. Show me your lines. This Scott 300 was in the Centre of   the sheet right side. Cut on top and at  the left. And a small bit of the guide arrow. The lines  make it easier to plate. Now you have a starting point to recreate a full sheet. All you need is a plating chart. for positions and plate types, If your an APS member you can  get the plating charts from there library. They will send you the scans. I will not buy a stamp that has been re-perfed. It makes it look beater but takes away from the hobby, Makes it harder to find its original position.