In his NYT article on January 19, Healey says, " The second copy reportedly turned up in Romania in the mid-1980's, when it was bought by an unidentified dealer from Bremen, Germany. The German dealer said the seller, a dancer, had inherited the stamp in a collection from her grandfather, who was a servant to a Russian nobleman."

Certainly on of the ugliest stamps in the world, the "Penny Magenta" was not considered particularly important at all during the first 50 years after it was discovered by Vernon Vaughan, an English schoolboy, in 1872. It achieved legendary status by finally becoming part of the collection of the famed Count Philip La Renotiere Von Ferrary in the early 1900s. Ferrary had bought the stamp from a British dealer for only 120 pounds, but when his collection was sold at auction after World War I, its status as being an amazing "one of a kind" rarity caused Utica, New York, millionaire Arthur Hind to pay over $35,000 for it---a record sum at the time.

The new Penny Magenta ended up in the hands of world-renowned auctioneer David Feldman of Switzerland. Feldman, who was impressed with the appearance of the stamp as being similar in paper and ink to the original "Rarest Stamp," has turned it over to the expertizing committee of the Royal Philatelic Society, London, for detailed examination. Tests on the stamp could take as long as one year.

The essential legend of the stamp really began to take off once it became a part of the Hind collection. For instance, a story that has been told time and again in philately for more than 60 years describes the rumor that Hind actually acquired another copy of the One-Cent British Guiana Magenta of 1856, but decided on the spot to burn it so that his original acquisition would remain "The Rarest Stamp in the World".

Following Hind's death in the 1930s, philatelic consultant Finbar Kenny (who, at the time, was manager of the stamp department at Macy's in New York) brokered the stamp in 1939 to collector Frederick Small of Fort Lauderdale, Florida, in a sale that was to remain confidential for over 30 years. During that period, no one in philately had any idea who owned the great rarity. However, Small was gracious enough to allow his stamp to be exhibited in special court of honor displays at America's decennial international exhibitions in 1947 and 1956 in New York. During this period, the hobby's experts have estimated the stamp's value to be in excess of $100,000.

Then, in 1969, Small decided to sell the stamp and consigned it to auction at the firm of Robert A. Siegel in New York City. Its ownership thus became widely known. Simultaneously, rare stamp dealer Irwin Weinberg of Wilkes Barre, Pa., formed a syndicate with the goal of purchasing the stamp at the Siegel auction in January, 1970.

The night of the sale was a glittering event held at New York's Plaza Hotel with Siegel's vice president, Andrew Levitt, the auctioneer. With live television cameras pointed at the podium, Levitt knocked down the Penny Magenta to Weinberg's syndicate for $280,000. The sale was of such significance that Levitt was featured in a special article in Life Magazine.

Weinberg, who recently told the tale of his syndicate's ownership of the stamp on a special program on cable television's History Channel, got a lot of mileage out of his ownership of the rarity. He literally toured the world with it and placed it on display at major exhibitions around the world. Obviously, this venture was geared to drive up the value of the stamp. The results were spectacular!

Weinberg's syndicate sold the stamp in 1980 at yet another Siegel auction for $935,000 (including buyer's premium) to a buyer who was anonymous at the time but turned out to be chemical heir John E. du Pont.

Mr. du Pont was convicted in February 1997 of shooting and killing an Olympic wrestler whom he had sponsored, and was sent by the courts in Philadelphia, Pa., to a hospital for the criminally insane where he remains today. Thus, the current status of the stamp (whether it will ever be displayed again...or for that matter, sold to someone else) is unknown.

The potential discovery of a second "Penny Magenta" is of huge magnitude in the stamp collecting hobby. Dealers and collectors have long thought that, when sold, the original "Rarest Stamp in the World" would bring well in excess of $3.5 million. But what will happen if its cousin turns out to be authentic and it is sold? There is little doubt that it, too, will be a million-dollar stamp...but how many millions is

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