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SET II - The Blue Papers of 1909
The stamps from Set I were printed using a method that required wetting the paper first, resulting in paper shrinkage when the paper dried and quite a bit of waste when the sheets of stamps were perforated. Keep in mind that the Post Office was printing
billions of stamps for a public that was becoming more demanding of quality and ease of use. The first attempt to eliminate some of the loss due to shrinkage came in 1909, a year after the first Washington-Franklins were issued, by using a different paper stock containing about one third rag content . This gave the stamps a slightly grayish tint, especially when viewed through the gum on the back of the stamp. These stamps are referred to as the "blue paper" varieties, and are listed as Scott numbers 357 to 366. It is interesting to note that a commemorative stamp of that year, Scott 369, was issued from the same paper stock.
It had also been thought that another paper type, with a small amount of clay added to strengthen the paper, had been used to make stamps during this period. These stamps had been given the nickname "China Clay", but recent studies using x-ray diffraction have shown that these stamps in fact contain no clay and will not be included in this discussion (see the American Philatelist, March 1996).
In any event, these experimental papers proved unsuccessful and all subsequent issues were printed on normal paper.
Next: Set III
Single-line Watermark - Perf 12 of 1910
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