La Mule qui rue

Many collectors worldwide and not just of US stamps, have heard of the celebrated kicking mule cancel used during the US Banknote period at the end of the 19th century. Many also know of a post office using it, Port Townsend, Washington. Less well known is the one used in Neah Bay (Clallam Co.), also in Washington state, and those used in Susanville (Lassen Co.), Forbestown (Butte Co.) and Goleta (Santa Barbara Co.) in California. So a cancel used by only 5 post offices has gained a reputation and popularity well out of proportion to its use. Dates of use can be found in the Cole fancy cancel database; search using "kicking mule".

The cancelling devices were duplex style, that is, consisting of a town postmark and killer. In this case, the killer was fixed in place together with the town mark. The mules are identical though their spacing with the individual town postmarks are a little different.

Scans of covers exist online, and you will immediately note all the town postmarks are in the same style. If you guessed that the devices came from the same source, you'd be absolutely correct. They were made and sold by C.A. Klinkner, based in San Francisco, California. Among the marking devices he sold were cancellation devices for postmasters; the kicking mule was just one design offered.

Now, back to Port Townsend. It was the first town to USE [stampsma_ss] kicking mule cancel, with the earliest recorded use on 19 July 1880. It was small but not a tiny backwater like the others, being a port town and one terminus of a ferry connection with Canada. As canceling devices wore out, they were replaced, so that 3 actual devices were used over the time period by Port Townsend. That post office continued using the design at least until February 1887.

Reported as Port Townsend postmaster from 1900-1914, A.F. Learned picked up the kicking mule "tradition" and had a kicking mule killer copied from the original. While used on normal mail, there are plenty of philatelic uses of his cancel. And this version was a killer only, a separate device from the CDS used at the time (see above). There are small design differences like a somewhat clubbier tail and back legs, but comparing those points can be made impossible by how strongly or weakly cancels were struck. However, the second mule always shows no trace of an adjoining town postmark as the original might. Yet again, originals might not necessarily show an adjoining town postmark, either. Determining the stamp issue is no guarantee of the time period of use, as the second mule was used on earlier Banknotes. That's obviously philatelic usage, but legitimate, as stamps back to the 1861 issues can still be used today for postage. Backdating cancels to 1889 on covers was apparently done but is obvious by the style of cancel used on first class mail with the second mule. Needless to say, there are many more kicking mules from this era than from that of the original.

There are a fair number of kicking mules found on loose stamps today with most from Port Townsend. There are also a number of covers still in existence from Port Townsend. Mules from the other towns are rare, both on stamps and covers. With mail from Canada passing through Port Townsend, it was probably inevitable that a kicking mule could be found on a Canadian stamp. At least two such stamps have been reported. And of course, the popularity of the kicking mule has resulted in fairly accurate forgeries being created.

The last original series kicking mule was used in 1892, But as shown above, the kicking mule still lives on in cancellations.