thanks for the comments from both posters. I've not sent a query to TEX TAN because i've seen in other posts that the company had a fire some time back and has no reference material anymore. their website says to ask a local saddlery shop. I've been guessing the saddle is around 70's era, i was just hoping someone would know how to read the serial numbers to more closely fix the date. I know the first part of the number is the model and i'm guessing the "I" stands for "Imperial", since i've seen quite a few Imperial model saddles covered on every surface with the tooling, as mine is. Regardless, it's a keeper - fits my big 16.2H appendix QH as it is full QH bars size, and fits me great.