Rare Century-Old US Postage Stamp Sells for Whopping $2 Million

An incredibly rare US postage stamp from 1918 has sold for a staggering $2 million at an auction, setting a record for the most expensive single US stamp sold.

The famous red, white, and blue "Inverted Jenny" stamp originally cost 24 cents more than a century ago. The popularity of this particular stamp is tied to two factors. These are its rarity as there were only 100 of them printed at the time and due to the plane that it depicts being printed in error upside down.

Rare Century-Old Postage Stamp

Rare Century-Old US Postage Stamp Sells for Whopping $2 Million

(Photo : Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
A rare century-old "Inverted Jenny" postage stamp that dates back to 1918 and was initially sold for 24 cents has sold at an auction for a staggering $2 million.

The unique stamp was bought by collector Charles Hack, who purchased it on Wednesday as part of an auction held by Robert A Siegel Auction Galleries. The stamp collector said that he had been looking for the coveted stamp since he was a kid and called it the "holy grail of postage."

The century-old stamp was part of a collection to mark the start of regular airmail service. The multimillion-dollar stamp features an image of the Curtiss JN-4 airplane in the center but printed upside down, as per BBC.

When the stamp was originally printed, the public only had access to 100 of them and they have since become highly sought after within the stamp collecting community worldwide. It is also so well-known that it was once featured in a 1993 episode of the long-running American animated sitcom The Simpsons.

During that particular episode, Homer Simpson was looking at a sheet of inverted Jennys while at a yard sale. He noted that the airplane was upside down shortly before throwing out the sheet in a pile of other princess American artifacts. These included a copy of the Declaration of Independence.

The absurd rarity of the stamp led to its value skyrocketing almost instantly after it was originally printed. Several stamp copies have been sold at various auctions in recent decades.

Selling for $2 Million

Three bidders went paddle to paddle during the Wednesday auction of the rare and unique postage stamp. The president of Siegel Auctions, Scott Trepel, said that the sale of the Inverted Jenny stamp marked a historic moment for the lobby, according to Barrons.

In a statement on Thursday, Trepel said that he believes that when the stamp comes to the market again, it will sell for even more than it already did. Based on the stamp's condition and centering, the auction house said that the particular one sold to Hack has a grade of 95 on a scale of one to 100.

Other Inverted Jenny stamps sold for not so ridiculous prices and some sales involved multiples of the same stamp. For example, in 2005, a block of four was sold for $2.7 million, costing each stamp roughly $675,000. And in 2018, another one was sold for $1.35 million.

Sotheby's also sold a block of four Inverted Jenny stamps in June 2021 with an estimated $5 million to $7 million price tag. It was sold for roughly $4.85 million after adding in the cost of fees, said Art News.