Canadian Perfin Officials
by Tony
Brown
Introduction
A perfin is a postage stamp that has been perforated with distinctive marks such as initials (hence the contraction perfin from perforated initials) to discourage theft by employees. The practice ceased with the introduction of postal metres.
There are two general types of perfin: private and official. Private perfins were used by commercial enterprises, with the earliest known Canadian example being that of the W.J. Gage & Company of Toronto, found on a 3-cent Small Queen on a cover postmarked October 2, 1887. Official perfins included those used by government departments and agencies. The aim of this document is to describe the Canadian perforated official stamps, otherwise known as the perfin officials.
The source of the statistics (i.e., years of first and last issues for each perfin type) in this document is Canadian Stamps with Perforated Initials, Fourth Edition, BNAPS Perfin Study Group. It should be noted that the years indicating first and last issues pertains to the issue dates of the stamps on which the perforations have been made, and not to the dates when the perforations were made. For example, the first issue year for the PEI perfin is listed as 1911 because it was found on an Admiral issue first printed in that year. This does not mean, however, that the PEI perforator came into use in that year. The actual dates when the perforators were created and put into operation are unknown to the author.
The term type used in the context of perfins refers to the unique set of pins used to perforate the stamps, e.g., when a used damaged set is replaced by a new set in the same perforator or different sets used in different perforators..
Categories of Perfin
Officials
Perfin officials fall into four main categories:
- Provincial Official - perfins used by more than one department or agency of
a provincial government;
- Provincial Departmental
Official - perfins used by a single
provincial department or agency;
- Federal Departmental Official
- perfins used by a single federal government
department or agency; and
- Federal Official - perfins
used throughout the Canadian federal government.
Provincial
Officials
Three provinces used perfins: Ontario, Prince Edward Island, and Saskatchewan.
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Province of Ontario
First Issue: 1922 The initials stand for "Legislative Assembly." |
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Province of Ontario The Ontario Government produced perfins at Ontario House, its office in London, England. The office, opened in 1908 and remained in operation until 1934. This perforation was made on several British stamp issues. First Issue: 1912
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Province of Prince Edward Island
First Issue: 1911 |
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Province of Saskatchewan
Type I First Issue: 1922 |
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Province of Saskatchewan
Type II First Issue: 1922 Note: Perfin collector Mike Behm reports "by the mid-1950s, Die II was missing many pins. However, it was reworked around 1964 so that all of the pins were again legible. I think of this as being the equivalent of a third die." |
Provincial Departmental Officials
Three perfins were used by departmental agencies: The Québec Liquor Commission, an agency of Québec's Department of the Solicitor General; The Temiskaming & Northern Ontario Railroad, which came under Ontario's Ministry of Transportation; and the Workmen's Compensation Board of British Columbia's Department of Labour.
Québec Liquor Commission
First Issue:1918 |
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Temiskaming
& Northern Ontario Railroad
First Issue: 1911 |
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Workmen's Compensation Board
First Issue: 1911 |
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Federal Departmental Officials
There are a total of 12 federal departmental official perfin types: the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation; Canadian Northern Railway (two types); Canadian National Railways (five types); the Intercolonial Railway, the Department of Finance; the Militia Department; and the Department of National Defence.
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Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
First Issue: 1939 |
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Canadian Northern Railway
Type I, Winnipeg, Manitoba First Issue: 1903 Taken over by the federal government in 1917. |
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Canadian Northern Railway
Type II, Toronto, Ontario First Issue: 1903 Taken over by the federal government in 1917. |
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Canadian National Railways
Type I, Toronto, Ontario First Issue: 1932 |
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Canadian National Railways
Type II, Vancouver, British Columbia First Issue: 1922 |
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Canadian National Railways
Type III, Montréal, Québec First Issue: 1911 |
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Canadian National Railways
Type IV, Winnipeg, Manitoba First Issue: 1923 |
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Canadian National Railways
Type V, Montréal, Québec First Issue: 1922 |
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Intercolonial
Railway
First Issue: 1872 The Intercolonial Railway was the first federal Crown corporation. |
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Department of Finance
First Issue: 1922 The year of last issue reflects the use of this perfin by the Department of Finance. The same die was used for the first federal officials. |
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Militia Department
First Issue: 1911 |
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Department of National Defence
First Issue: 1914 Note: According to Mike Behm, MD and ND are from the same perforator, one that was reworked in the 1920s. |
Federal
Officials
After the discovery of a very large theft of postage stamps in 1937 in one of the government departments, all departments were required to use perfins, effective July 1, 1939. The Department of National Defence was granted a temporary reprieve due to the war effort. The design of choice was a four-hole OHMS set of initials, so-called because four holes were used to make the legs of the "H" and "M." As the perforator that was ordered had not arrived in time for the July 1 deadline, the Department of Finance's perforator, with its old five-hole die, was used to perforate the first set of stamps under the new government-wide ruling.
The federal officials, which were perforated by the Philatelic Division of the Post Office, were made available to stamp collectors.
There are a total of three federal perfin officials, the five-hole OHMS, and two die types of the four-hole OHMS.
Five-Hole OHMS
First Issue: 1938 (as a
federal official) |
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Four-Hole OHMS
Type I First Issue: 1938 |
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Four-Hole OHMS
Type II First Issue: 1942 |
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The practice of overprinting officials, first with the initials O.H.M.S., and then by the single letter "G," began in 1949. The Die II perforator was temporarily brought back into service in 1950, however, to compensate for a shortage of overprinted stamps.
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The author would very much appreciate any |
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Updated: 21 April 2016