Beautifully engraved specimen certificate from
Marchetti Motor Patents, Incorporated printed in 1928. This historic document was printed by Republic Bank Note Company and has an
ornate border around it with a vignette of an early Monoplane with the name Marchetti on the side. This historic item is over 77 years old. This is the first time we have had this certificate for sale and it is believe to be rare, possibly unique.
Certificate Vignette
Old Company Ad shown for illustrative purposes
Marchetti Motor Patents, Incorporated was founded by Paul Marchetti. They operated out of Mills Field, San Bruno CA. In 1927, only a single prototype of this engine was made for Paul Marchetti. Unfortunately, Paul Marchetti was killed in a crash while undergoing flight training. Keith Rider, who had been employed by Marchetti, acquired the company in 1930. Later that year, the company was sold to United States Aircraft Corp Ltd, San Francisco.
About SpecimensSpecimen Certificates are actual certificates that have never been issued. They were usually kept by the printers in their permanent archives as their only example of a particular certificate. Sometimes you will see a hand stamp on the certificate that says "Do not remove from file".
Specimens were also used to show prospective clients different types of certificate designs that were available. Specimen certificates are usually much scarcer than issued certificates. In fact, many times they are the only way to get a certificate for a particular company because the issued certificates were redeemed and destroyed. In a few instances, Specimen certificates we made for a company but were never used because a different design was chosen by the company.
These certificates are normally stamped "Specimen" or they have small holes spelling the word specimen. Most of the time they don't have a serial number, or they have a serial number of 00000. This is an exciting sector of the hobby that grown in popularity over the past several years.