Newark Stamp & Coin Exchange – The Bernet Family

I.1 Introduction – Prolog – The Power of the Internet

The initial impetus for an article about the Bernet covers was an excellent workup done by Bob Wilcsek /1/ on the Zeppelin cacheted covers franked with US stamps. But whereas all the covers in his article had frames, covers in my collection with Brazilian franking demonstrated a further variety, also linked to Roessler. As can be seen in the Table, besides there being the US and Brazilian covers discussed here in detail, covers with Spanish franking, German and even mixed franking covers exist.

But the facts about Fred and Egon Bernet as well as the Newark Stamp & Coin were stretchy. Then one day I received an e-mail from a Fredrick (Fred) W. Bernet, explaining that his older brother had been searching the web for Roessler articles and had discovered my site with the “Bernet” article. Fred offered to correct and fill in some of the blanks in the previous version. Fred is the youngest son of Egon (Ed) Bernet (1910*-1998†) and grandson of Ferdinand (Fred) Bernet (1976†). In other words, the Newark Stamp & Coin Exchange (photo below) has already been in the Bernet family for three generations; quite a feat for our times.

The present day store in Irvington N.J.

I.2 Introduction – The Bernet Family

At this point I want (and feel obligated) to thank Fred for his selfless help in clearing up questions regarding these covers, and thus enriching aerophilatelic postal history with some insights in his family's history. The Bernets started out as Berndt, a German immigrant family. Ferdinand decided to change the family name to a French-like version, Bernet, during WWI, the reason for which I think is obvious. Ed, in his 20's, spent a lot of time traveling to Germany, and staying at the Baude store in Hirschberg, Silesia (now Jelenia Gora, Poland). George Baude was Ed's maternal grandfather. These trips were to pick up the covers addressed to Europe, as well as, purchase collections too. And the family's interest in the Zeppelin was great too, as two pictures below demonstrate that they were friends with some crew members.

Baude store in Hirschberg Germany

Gladys Bernet with crew member and other members

Family members + friend in front of Zeppelin

II. The Cover Types

Whereas, in considering the US case, Wilcsek found envelopes (checkerboard frames) that obviously came from A.C. Roessler, but that had an addition Zeppelin cachet that one only seems to find on covers that often appear under the name Egon Bernet. Fig. 1 displays one of these typical framed covers, with the Roessler copyright on the back. Fred /*/ confirms that there was a lot of cooperation with Roessler. Thus an example of Roessler doing printing jobs for other dealers in the area.

Figure 1a: Framed case – with added cachet.

Figure 1b: Reverse with a Roessler copyright.

Yet, in the Brazilian case, there is more to report. One also finds a lot of covers without the frame and the Roessler copyright notation. Fig. 2 demonstrates this version.

Figure 2a: Plain cover with the Zeppelin cachet.

Figure 2b: Reverse with no mention of Roessler.

As Bob has already noted, this cachet is strikingly similar a version found in the Newman catalog of Roessler cachets, i. e. ROE-FZ12. When one looks closely at the ROE-FZ12 in the catalog, which has the same picture of the Zeppelin on the right of the envelope, underneath where the stamps would normally go, but instead the inscription above the Zeppelin referring to the “Hindenburg”. That Zeppelin didn't exist yet in 1930. Consider the inscription in Fig. 3 and notice that is no mention of the Hindenburg. In the meanwhile we know why. This is then the case that Roessler recycled a design commissioned by the Bernets in 1930 for the Hindenburg flight.

Figure 3: Pan American inscription as opposed to Hindenburg in ROE-FZ12.

And also as Bob noted in his article, these cachets appear in a rainbow of colors, besides the green version of Fig. 3, Fig. 4 demonstrates the other colors that are seen, where somethings one can quibble whether a some colors have lighter or darker shade variations, possibly due to aging, bleaching or separate printing runs of the same color.

Dark(Slate)Blue	Turquoise	Brown
(Red)Orange	Red	Yellow(Gold)

Figure 4: The other six colors seen besides green.

There are several further interesting aspects and variations found on these covers that are worth systematically listing.

Return Address:

Figure 5a

Figure 5b

Figure 5b

All Bernet return addresses on the backs of the covers are either a rubber-stamp impression (Fig. 5a), typed (5b) or even handwritten, usually in pencil (5c). But perhaps the most interesting, for later discussions, is that the simple address 86-92 Park Place in Newark is used without any mention of it being the offices of an enterprise.

Back Stamps:

Bernet send a lot of covers to mail-drop addresses, so that they would return the covers to him afterwards. Most of these are the usual cast of characters known on this flight. like the companies Wille and Baquera (Fig. 6) in Spain. But for the letters that were send from Brazil to go to the end-of-the-line. i. e. Germany, a new actor enters the stage, the company Baude in Silesia (Fig. 7), whom we now know to be the grandfather of Ed, and the source of the connection.

Figure 6: Baquera/Spain

Figure 7: Baude/Silesia

Routing Markings:

Since auction houses are always highlighting new, official and as yet unknown routing rubber-stamps in their lots, I thought it wise to display the typical ones used by Bernet on his covers: a basic rubber-stamp that appears in two colors varieties (wine-red and bluish-violet), both of which are displayed in Fig. 8 (and mentioned by Wilcsek too).

Figure 8a: Reddish

Figure 8b: Bluish

Enclosures:

Very often envelopes of dealer covers contain some sort of filler in an attempt to ensure better strikes of cachets and postal markings. Exactly these fillers are what enable us to confirm that the Bernets and the Newark Stamp & Coin Exchange (NSCE) are one and the same. The filling, consisting of several pieces of paper fragments, were back stamped with one of two return address rubber stamps of the NSCE. Figure 9 demonstrates the two different versions. The first of them, the boxed version comes in the red-violet as well as a greenish-blue version.

Figure 9a: Box version

Figure 9b: 3-line version

I've seen four basic filler types and these are displayed in the following figures along with how the return addresses appear on their reverse side.

Figure 10a: “Bank”-front	Figure 10b: Box reverse
Figure 11a: Vertical lines	Figure 11b: Box
Figure 11b: Box	Figure 12b: 2 line strikes
Figure 13a: “Corner”	Figure 13b: Box

There just remains a quite review of some details about these fillers:

“Bank” - The box on the reverse appears most often in the reddish-violet version but bluish-green is also possible.

Vertical Lines – Here the boxes have always been in the greenish version.

“Deduction” - Only case where the line address appears, always diagonally and in black.

“Corner” - Same as the vertical lines case.

III. The Numbers

On quite a few of these “Bernet” covers one finds, in the lower right handed corner of the cover's reverse, a five digit number in green as demonstrated in Fig. 14. This is not to be confused with the five digit von Meister # in black that is often seen on the cover front. In fact, most of the Bernet covers, ones with Brazilian, Spanish and German franking, usually also have the vM# on the front. This green five digit number found on the reverse is larger and different.

Figure 14: Typical green 5 digit Bernet # on back.

It would seem that the green number on the back served for Bernet the same purpose as the black vM# on the front did for von Meister: accounting. If Bernet was servicing covers for clients and for his own stock, it would have been prudent to have a way of keeping track of what he sent. Considering only the covers with vM#s, we see that these can be segregated into 3 general categories. There are the covers Bernet addressed to himself (C1), those that are addressed to others but carry a green # on the back (C2), and those that are addressed to others, without any Bernet return address and no green # (C3). Fred has verified that a hand stamp device exists, that his father Ed used to keep track of covers, especially for more personalized versions. Thus, these numbers fall into exacting the same category as the vM#s. In the meanwhile, Fred has managed to find the old device used. Below a set of five photos showing the device in all stages. Two very important facts come out of these pictures: the digits are 5 in number and the same type found on the Bernet covers,. Additionally, in two of the photos, the ink pad is visible and still carries the shade of green ink found on the covers. Another small, but interesting, aspect is that the device was manufactured locally by the Bates manufacturing Co. of East Orange, N.J. That means that the cluster of dealers (e. g. Roessler), at that time in that area of Jersey, might have also used a copy of this device for a similar purpose – needs to be followed out.

Compare the # and style of the digits and the ink pad color!

Table below is the present status of our cover “census”.

vM#	Type	Addressee	Color	Frame	Green#	Source
02373	59E	Miller	yellow	no	?	Ebay
03183	59E	Vorbach	red	no	none	ex Knoth
04947	57	Ernie Hober – Newark	?	yes	?-none	Auction
04953	57	Ernie Hober – Newark	red	no	?	Auction
05126	59AC	Egon Bernet c/o Baude	orange	no	00130	ex Knoth
05127	59AC	Egon Bernet c/o Baude	?	no	?	Auction
05129	59AC	Egon Bernet c/o Baude	?	no	?	Auction
05136	58	Egon Bernet c/o Baude	?	no	?	Auction
05144	59C	Egon Bernet c/o Banquera	orange	no	00208	ex Knoth
05145	59C	Egon Bernet c/o Banquera	brown	no	00038	ex Knoth
05148	59C	Egon Bernet c/o Banquera	?	no	?	Auction
05150	59C	Egon Bernet c/o Banquera	yellow	no	?	Kofler
05152	59C	Egon Bernet c/o Banquera	yellow	no	?	Auction
05183	57	Tony Fao	yellow	no	?	Auction
05188	57	Tony Fao	?	no	?	Auction
05203	57	Egon Bernet c/o Wille	?	no	?	Auction
05214	59E	Bach #224	green	no	00151	ex Knoth
05221	59E	David Franzmathes #224	green	no	00036	ex Knoth
05228	59E	Harry Smith #224	?	no	?	Auction
05232	59E	Ernest Scharrenberg #224	brown	no	00148	ex Knoth
05234	59E	Netzoff	turquoise	no	00159	ex Knoth
05235	59E	Don Ewalt #224	blue	no	00151	ex Knoth
05236	59E	Don Ewalt #224	?	?	?	Auction
05249	58	Egon Bernet c/o Wille	?	no	?	Auction
05255	58	Egon Bernet c/o Wille	?	no	?	Auction
22693	59CG	Ernie Hober c/o LBZ	green	no	none	ex Knoth
22703	57	Egon Bernet c/o Banquera	?	yes	?-none	Auction
24094	57	Egon Bernet c/o Baude	?	yes	?	Auction
24100	59B	Egon Bernet c/o Banquera	red	yes	00464	ex Knoth
24108	59B	Bernet c/o Baude	brown	yes	00459	ex Knoth
24118	59AC	Egon Bernet c/o Baude	brown	yes	00455	ex Knoth
24127	59H	Albert Thorp	?	yes	?	Auction
24128	59H	Murray Apfelbaum #224	?	no	?	Auction
24135	59H	Murray Apfelbaum #224	?	no	?	Auction
24138	59H	Bernet	?	?	?	Auction
24143	59D	Bernet c/o Borstelmann	brown	no	?	Auction
24146	59D	Bernet c/o Borstelmann	yellow	no	00439	ex Knoth
24181	58	?	?	no	?	Auction
24195	58	Egon Bernet c/o Wille	?	no	?	Auction
24198	58	Egon Bernet c/o Wille	?	yes	?	Auction
24209	59B	Bernet	?	?	?	Auction
24226	59C	Bernet	?	?	?	Auction
24273	58	Egon Bernet c/o Banquera	red	yes	?	Auction
24311	57	Egon Bernet c/o Banquera	?	no	?	Auction
24320	57	Egon Bernet c/o Banquera	none	yes	?	Kofler
?	57	Bernet c/o Cookingham	?	no	?	Auction
-	64AAB	John Schoenberger	yellow	yes	00489	Wilcsek
-	64B	Egon Bernet c/o Banquera	?	yes	?	Auction
-	64B	Egon Bernet c/o Baude	?	yes	?	Auction
-	64B	Egon Bernet c/o Banquera	?	yes	?	Auction
-	64B	Egon Bernet c/o Banquera	?	yes	?	Auction
-	64C	Fred Wm. Bernet	green	yes	00593	Wilcsek
-	64C	Chas. C. Lane	red	yes	00061	Wilcsek
-	64C	Trautwein	brown	yes		Fishbain
-	58/64C	Knehr	orange	no		Fishbain
-	many	Knehr	none	yes		Auction

Table 1: Overview census of “Bernet” covers I currently know of.

There are many interesting correlations when one examines the data in the table. Those covers of C2 that have #224 next to the name, indicate that the address used is identical to that of Bernet, except that instead of 86 Park Place, their address is 224 Park Place. What a coincidence! Additionally, all C1 and C2 mail seems to have been sent to von Meister in 2 batches. Note the first batch starts with 0512x and goes to 0525x and the green # up to at least 208! Just this batch would imply that over 200 covers, franked at a minimum with the equivalent of 65 cents or more. Easily around $150, just here, that's a lot of capital. Then there's a second batch starting at 2409x and going to 2432x, with the green #s all in the 400's. Thus one can't be certain that the numbers go straight through from 0 to the highest I've seen, reported by Wilcsek of 593. Could be that the initial batch went to 2xx and then he restarted with 400 for the next, no way to prove one or the other unless someone discovers some numbers in the 300's

Equally interesting is that all the covers where I know there's no green # (C3), the vM#'s are outside these batches, as if a collector had purchased a envelope, prepared and send it to von Meister on his own.

Another aspect, is that those sent early (i. e. assume that the vM#'s give a chronological indication) were, except for one case, nearly all without the Roessler frame. The later batches are mainly the framed variety as are almost all US-franked covers. Possibly, the initial printing order to Roessler was for plain envelopes, but then the cachet was so popular that Bernet and Roessler had to fall back on Roessler's framed envelopes. This would impart a certain logic to the table.

Maybe even Roessler himself sold the “Bernet” cacheted envelopes himself and/or Bernet started to use non-cacheted envelopes as everything ran out of supply. This would explain why one Bernet cover in the second batch has no cachet and the covers sent to Knehr in Germany; one comes with a “Bernet” cachet and all the rest are simply framed Roessler envelopes.

As far as the US-franked covers go, since these were serviced by Bernet himself without von Meister's help, the seem to have been made during the whole time when the other covers were being prepared. This would explain that some of these covers have very low green #'s and some, some of the highest numbers. And this is exactly the case, Ed didn't need von Meister's help for covers franked with US stamps.

IV. Conclusion

Some questions remain. Therefore, I would appreciate anyone reading this piece who has one or more “Bernet” covers to get in touch with me. This data could then be used to expand the table and enlarge the data-base. And a giant thanks goes to the Bernet family, a lot of answers have been provided and some very valuable aerophilatelic history has been saved.

References:

/*/ Fred W. Bernet: Private Communication

/1/ Bob Wilcsek: The Bernet Covers from the 1930 SAF; Airpost Journal 71(#11), 469 (November 2000)