Withdrawn Audrey Hepburn Stamp to be Auctioned

Rachel Nolan of the Associated Press reports, "A collector stands to make a tidy profit after discovering a rare stamp portraying movie star Audrey Hepburn smoking — one of a series that should have been incinerated by the German government."

According to Rachel, "In 2001, the government printed 14 million Audrey Hepburn stamps as part of a series featuring movie stars including Charlie Chaplin, Marilyn Monroe and Greta Garbo. The print run was destroyed after Hepburn's son, Sean Ferrer, objected to the cigarette holder dangling from the actress' mouth and refused to grant copyright."

She goes on to say, "But the Finance Ministry had already delivered advance copies of the Hepburn stamps to Deutsche Post for approval. Thirty of these proof copies escaped destruction when an unknown employee pocketed them and used them to send letters postmarked from Berlin."

A minimum bid of 30,000 euro ($41,959) has been set as the opening bid for the stamp at its auction today in Berlin.

This is the fifth Hepburn stamp to surface since 2004. One of the four other Hepburn stamps fetched $74,000 at an auction in Duesseldorf in 2005.

Andreas Schlegel told the Associated Press, "The rest probably ended up where most stamps do: in the trash can."

Audrey Hepburn who died of colon cancer in 1993.

Shown above, used sheet corner example of the Hepburn stamp.

To read the entire article, click here.