Lot
710 
(Railroad Strike - Strike Covers, July 3 - 11) Wells, Fargo & Co's Express., Santa Barbara, Cal., Agent, Jul. 3, 1894, provisional frank handstamp on 1893, 2¢ Columbian entire (U349) to San Francisco, red Wells, Fargo & Co. Express, San Francisco, Cal., July 11 9AM oval receiving date stamp; reduced at left, otherwise Very Fine, the earliest recorded provisional railroad strike frank with a transit time of eight days to San Francisco, this was due to steamer routing from San Francisco to Santa Barbara to L.A. to San Diego, back to Los Angeles to Santa Barbara and then to San Francisco. Estimate $300 - 400.
On July 3rd, Santa Barbara Acting Agent Mark Thompson wrote to Superintendent Leonard F. Rowell in San Francisco informing him that the strike had exhausted his supply of franked envelopes, so he bought 2¢ Columbian stamped envelopes from the Post Office and stamped them with his canceling stamp and sold them at regular frank price. He reported that most of the sold envelopes went to San Francisco, a few to Los Angeles. The following day he reported in another letter that he had sold 327 envelopes all bearing the dates of July 2nd or July 3rd.