My first encounters with Plácido Ramón de Torres years ago were really deceiving. A manual of Spanish philatelic forgeries presented, among many others, a dozen of fakes he had made, nothing more. And the great American expert in stamp forgers, Varro Tyler, dedicated in his book Philatelic Forgers only about 20 lines to his life and work confirming, seemingly, the mediocrity and reduced importance of this widely unknown stamp dealer.

Some years later, when preparing my doctoral thesis about aspects of the modern history of Andorra, I came across once again with him. A recommendation letter to the chief of the local Andorran administration suggesting to relay on his services to organize a not yet existing postal administration, signed by an ancient Spanish minister, was a surprise and made me wonder. But as this initiative did not come to a happy ending, it was of no further interest to follow his footprints.

The third approach was, finally, more successful. I found photos of the two first editions of his world-catalogue published in Italy. Looking at the different stamps depicted on the front-page of his catalogue, I began to suspect, that the illustrations of three of them could represent forgeries. So, my interest was finally awoken.