Mon, Nov 13, 2006
Those Wacky Floridians...
It's understandable you may cringe a
little when hearing the words "Florida" and "election" used in the
same sentence, even six years after the state immortalized the term
'hanging chad' for posterity. This time around, though, we're not
talking about swinging an election... but perhaps the financial
fortunes of a voter.
Reuters reports a voter in the Sunshine State sent in his or her
absentee ballot in Tuesday's congressional election with far more
than just proper postage; in fact, the 1918 Inverted Jenny
stamp used on their ballot may be worth over $500,000.
The stamp -- named for the image of a Curtiss JN-4 biplane
accidentally printed upside-down -- turned up on Tuesday night in
Fort Lauderdale, as election officials inspected ballots from parts
of south Florida, said Broward County Commissioner John
Rodstrom.
"I thought, 'Oh my God, I know that stamp, I've seen that stamp
before,"' said Rodstrom, who was also a novice stamp collector as a
boy. "I'd forgotten the name. I just remembered there was a stamp
with an upside-down biplane on it and that it was a very rare, rare
stamp."
Indeed... only 100 Inverted Jenny stamps have ever been found.
An original block of four sold for nearly $3 million at auction
last year -- a far cry from the original 87 cent price in 1918.
In an even more ironic -- some may say "2000-esque" -- twist,
the absentee ballot sent using the stamp was voided... as the
envelope had no return address, and officials had no way to verify
the voter's identity.
"It's now government property," Rodstrom said of the stamp. Talk
about phrases that make you cringe...
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