Beautifully engraved specimen certificate from the Mangel Stores Corporation printed in 1936. This historic document was printed by the American Banknote Company and has an ornate border around it with a vignette of an allegorical woman. This item has the printed signatures of the Company's officers.
Certificate Mangel's was a women's department store with various locations across the country. Mangel Stores Corporation operated one hundred thirty-two general merchandise stores in thirty-eight states. The company maintained offices at 1115 Broadway (Manhattan) and 226 Main Street in Paterson, New Jersey. History from Wikipedia, Encyberpedia and OldCompany.com (old stock certificate research service) About Specimen Certificates Specimen 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 were 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.