And now for some observations. With the five covers, we have a range of Mexico DF AEREO Station registration numbers.
- Mexico DF AEREO # Crayon Marking NY GPO Reg # Source
- ============= ========== ========= ==========
- 10679 22 Red not visible Manuel Igleias
- 10718 not visible 29041 Mexicana
- 10839 not visible not visible Mexicana
- 10960 308 Blue None Manuel Igleias
- 10989 333 Blue 29128 Ludeman
The range between registration # 10679 and 10989 is 310, compared to 400 covers stated to have been flown, and this tends to indicate that most of the covers carried were registered and the numbers applied in sequence as the covers were processed..
It is puzzling that the standard blue paper registration labels were not applied to these covers. One explanation might be that the Airport Post Office simply did not have the labels available. An alternate possibility might be that the clerk preparing the covers understood that these were not traditional registered mail, but philatelic mail, and chose to not add to the "
messiness" of the covers by adding the labels..
The presence of the crayon markings is also unusual, but such marking have been observed in the past on US registered mails, where they were believed to be nothing more than a method to verify the count of covers in a registered mail bag. So we can note that the increment between the crayon applied markings are roughly the same for these and the registration numbers, which might indicate that these numbers served some similar purpose..
A final observation has to do with the marking of a second (or third) sequence number on some of these covers. I believe that these numbers represent the US registration number assigned upon arrival at the New York GPO. The absence of this number on some of these covers is troublesome, and I have no explanation. Perhaps with a larger sample, a more definitive pattern will become obvious..Other collectors owning or having an image of one of the covers from this special flight are encouraged to post them on this thread.
Mike