California Town Postmarks 1849 - 1935 is based on California Postmarks which appeared in the Western Express for many years. Though similar in content to the previously published material it was necessary to change the numbering to accommodate the many additional markings, the value factors are revised, notes expanded, corrections, format changes, etc. Opening and closing dates for post offices are also given.
The book is devoted to the Town Postmarks, ie CDS, etc. and not to the killers or other markings but still much such information is provided. The notes column indicates killers found with duplex markings, the various styles of 4 Bar and Elliptical killers are indicated along with some notes on Flag Cancels, etc. For appearance sake some killers are illustrated with the markings.
This book is a basic work for all California collectors and is of much significance to any collector of US Postal History. No other US book illustrates such a large number of town postmarks.
It is arranged first by Counties as most State Postal History collectors think of there material in this manner. A detailed post office - county index as The County Finder is included in the book. This is especially useful when different post offices had the same name.
You can search this City - County listing on line, download it.
BE WARNED, this is a large file and will be slow to load, 130 K; 30 seconds at best and perhaps several minutes depending on your system, by clicking on California Town Postmarks Search File you will bring up a complete listing of the Cities by County.
To search this file, use the Document or Local Search function on your Web Browser. You may or may not be able to download the file and search off line, some Service Providers restrict there Browser to only function on line.
The Search function is usually found under the Edit heading and may be titled"Search or Find". The agents are in numbered lists with the city on the top. If you want to find Monckton but can't read the "M" and don't know it is in Mono County just search for "onckton" or better yet a shorter string should another letter be unclear say "onckto".
After finding a match repeat the search; the same characters may also be in other Post Office names. You may be able to search in a case sensitive basis, ie to distinguish Monck from monck and to search in the up and or the down direction in the file. Some Browsers have a Search Again button. The IBM Web Browser is excellent as is Netscape, and Microsoft's Internet Explorer.