Perfins are stamps that have been perforated with designs, initials, or numerals by private business and governmental agencies to discourage theft and misuse.
Through trial and mostly error, I have learned a little. This particular perfin was created by the Pathe`Exchange. More on that later.
For me the more interesting story is how I come to have this stamp. A lovely gentleman from California posted that he had a lot of these to sell and I jumped in. Short money. Of significant note, we exchanged money in a card and stamps in the mail on nothing more than word! How often does that happen in this world of the internet? Our short exchange of emails brightened my life. I learned he was celebrating 60 years of marriage, was retired from the USAF, endured many a medical challenge, and a Professor Emeritus at California State University, foreign languages, and been collecting stamps for many, many years.
So another fine gent on a facebook perfin page identified this as from the Pathe` Exchange (Yes, I know the punctuation on the e is backward but it is the best I got) He identified this by the number of perforations 9 on the P and 10 on the E and via some great bank of knowledge that far exceeds my own. (not difficult but hey, dementia) Pathe' Exchange was an independent film production and distribution company, wildly successful and with quite the history on Wikipedia. The parent company was a French company, Pathe', and around early 1900 was the most successful film studio in the world.
Edit....This morning I awake to another post from a gent who claims this is from Pacific Electric Company....so there we have it. Dueling perfin experts. I have no clue, but that is nothing new.
