The One That Got Away

Most people involved in this hobby are glad to tell you of their great finds. Last week John Murray died and he was involved in one of the great finds of the last thirty years in the entire hobby of philately. And it was at my expense. In 1995, I bought a pretty mediocre quality US collection at an auction in Switzerland. The dollar was very strong in those days and I went to Europe quite often to buy stamps for resale. This particular collection looked to me to be nothing special but I made a big mistake when I didn’t carefully check the One Cent 1851s. The collection in question sold for about $1500 to a Houston collector John Murray and he carefully checked the stamp that I should have and found it to be a variety, Scott#5. The stamp was worth $40,000 and John had bought it in a lot where he had paid about $10 for that particular stamp. Most of our lots don’t work out that well for the buyer but John Murray could tell you that he probably got more value from that auction lot than from any other purchase he ever made. John was a brilliant computer programmer and a good friend to us and to our hobby. He died in a tragic fall at his home and was only in his mid 60s. He will be missed.