Innholdsfortegnelse for March 2021 i Stamp Collector

SHARING KNOWLEDGE & PASSION EVERY MONTH I’m always very proud of the expertise presented in every issue of Stamp Collector, reflecting the depth of the hobby and how so many collectors gradually become the authority on their chosen field as they explore the subject. Together we have so much knowledge of postage stamps, postal history and the postal system, and it’s my job to share this in the magazine and on the website. So I’m particularly pleased to include a selection of your entries in the latest All About Stamps Competition in this issue (starting on page 65), showcasing your expertise and collections. Thank you to everyone who entered the competition, which this time challenged you to reflect GB stamps or postal history in a one-page display. Once again the…

The committee of Stamp Active Network have announced the appointment of Peter Barham as their new secretary. David Rossall, Stamp Active Network’s Publicity Officer, said: ‘Peter is not new to the organisation, having been on the committee for some time as Donations & Auctions Manager, but has volunteered to take on the secretarial role in addition to his existing duties. Peter takes over the role from Raymond Watkins to whom we are grateful for his years of service.’ Peter can be contacted by email barham42@outlook.com. You can find out more about the Stamp Active Network at www.stampactive.co.uk Subscriber Prize Draw: As a thank you to our growing number of loyal Stamp Collector magazine subscribers, we recently introduced a Subscriber Prize Draw which takes place every month giving one lucky subscriber…

The Collectors Club, the prestigious philatelic society based in New York, has revealed the winners of the Alfred F. Lichtenstein Memorial Award for Distinguished Service to Philately. Mark Banchik, a retired physician administrator who lives in San Diego, and Patrick Maselis, an agricultural industrialist who lives in Roeselare, Belgium, are the two honourees. Dr. Banchik is also a past president of the Collectors Club and serves on its board of Governors; Mr. Maselis is the immediate past president of the Royal Philatelic Society London, and currently the president of the Club de Monte-Carlo. Traditionally, the Lichtenstein award is formally given at a springtime dinner in New York, but due to the continuing global pandemic, plans for a dinner this year have not yet been finalised. Alfred F. Lichtenstein (1876-1947) was…

The US Postal Service has revealed three new stamp issues due to price rises for 2021, with four ‘Barns’ 36 cent postcard stamps; a Brush Rabbit 20 cent additional ounce stamp; and a Castillo de San Marcos $7.95 Priority Mail stamp. The four new postcard stamps celebrate ‘the beauty and history of American barns’ and feature digital paintings of four types of iconic barns found in the rural American landscape. According to the USPS, ‘with differing qualities of light and colour, each piece reflects one of the four seasons: a round barn surrounded by the hazy light and warm colours of fall; a gambrel-roofed barn in summer; a forebay barn in early spring; and a Western barn on a winter’s night.’ The brush rabbit (Sylvilagus bachmani) appears on the new…

WANT MORE? VISIT THE ‘COLLECTORS’ CORNER’ PAGES AT WWW.ALLABOUTSTAMPS.CO.UK What better way than highlighting a cover that has a touch of James Bond about it, and connects us with the iconic film Goldfinger, which 007 fans will know starred Sean Connery as the MI6 agent. But before we jet off to glamorous locations we must, like James Bond, start our journey in good old Blighty. Upper Edmonton to be precise. Now according to my car’s GPS navigation system, the London Borough of Upper Edmonton, England is 621 miles away from Geneva, Switzerland – via the A26 apparently. Upper Edmonton is one of the most deprived wards in both London and England. Geneva on the other hand is one of the richest cities in Europe, boasting over a $1trillion in financial…

Maximaphalists collect ‘maxi-cards’, a form of philately that brings together three elements: a postcard, a stamp and a postmark. Each item should be ‘concordant’ (fancy word for ‘similar’) in some way. For example, you could create a maxicard by affixing a stamp showing a panda, to a postcard also depicting a panda, and postmarked from a zoo in China. If the postmark also shows a panda, even better! Ideally the postcard image is not simply a blownup version of the stamp image. Hence, if you were thinking you can use PHQ cards, sold by Royal Mail, which depict special stamps, they’re not going to be good for this purpose. Also the stamp should be on the picture side of the card, not the written side, which feels outrageously rebellious when…

Etiquettes, marked ‘par avion’ (‘by airplane’), are often attached to letters to instruct mail carriers that airmail is required. These aren’t stamps, but labels. The first recorded airmail delivery by a lighter-than-air craft was in 1784, when American, John Jeffries, dropped four letters from his balloon as he passed over London. A combined effort between the Indian government, in a Britishbuilt aircraft, flown by a French pilot, became the first official airmail flight in a heavier-than-air craft in 1911. For decades, lighter- and heavier-than-air crafts vied for aerial supremacy, with mail being delivered by both on an ad-hoc basis. It wasn’t until the 1920s that regular, official airmail services were established, and not until 1929 that the Universal Postal Union codified the rules for airmail. These early services often utilised…

For most of us, the opening lines to George Harrison’s Beatles song ‘Taxman’ appear a bit obscure. ‘… one for you, nineteen for me…’. In 1966, the allusion was utterly apparent to a pre-decimal Britain. Harold Wilson’s Labour government had just instituted a 95% supertax. In the days of shillings and pence a tax of 95% would have been clearly stated and understood as 19 shillings in the pound – nineteen for the taxman with one shilling remaining with the tax payer. Later on in the song, so as to accommodate those living in a decimal world, the conversion was made easier, ‘should five per cent appear too small’. This ‘peculiar’ structure of British currency, comprised of 12 pence to the shilling and 20 shillings to the pound, would remain…

Her politics didn’t help. Frida Kahlo had been a convinced Communist. Her personal life was unconventional, too: she had many love affairs, probably with women as well as men. The stamp was controversial. She was born in 1907 into a troubled family. Her father, a photographer who had moved from Germany to Mexico to escape his own family, and mother, of mixed European and indigenous Mexican descent, were frequently ill and did not have a good relationship. As a young woman, she wanted to study medicine, but was horribly injured when a tram crashed into an old bus in which she was travelling. This put her in hospital for months and left her with pain that dogged her for the rest of her life. Unable to study, she became involved…

The second Collectors’ Conference at is set to take place from 22 to 24 February at the website www.allaboutstamps.co.uk, with a focus on modern stamps and the work of stamp designers and philatelic bureaus around the world. The online event follows the hugely successful Collectors’ Conference on GB Stamps which took place in October 2020, and was held in association with the Great Britain Philatelic Society (GBPS). The forthcoming event will include special articles, videos, and webinars. The Conference will also feature a special live webinar entitled ‘In conversation with Martin Mörck’, which will take place on 23 February at 6.30pm (UK time). The webinar will feature a conversation with the renowned Norwegian stamp engraver about his career, the engraving process and the many stamps he has produced over the…

Following their recent PTS Creative Concept of the Year Award 2021 honour, and ahead of a new ‘Conversations with Philatelists’ column starting in next month’s Stamp Collector, we speak to video podcasters Michael Cortese of NobleSpirit and Charles Epting of HR Harmer How did you both become involved in philately? Charles: Although I collected many different things as a child… I didn’t pick up philately until I was in college. I was looking for a hobby that would tie into the history degree I was undertaking, and the idea of being able to hold little pieces of the past in the palm of your hand really appealed to me. Michael: I’m a third generation philatelist… from the age of eight, my father taught me to identify stamps in the Scott…

SOLD FOR £2,009 SOLD FOR £694 SOLD FOR £615 SOLD FOR £541 SOLD FOR £1,112 SOLD FOR £600 SOLD FOR £676 SOLD FOR £560 SOLD FOR £4,523 Buy and sell on Delcampe, more than 80 million collectables are waiting for you!…

Maximaphily might be difficult to pronounce and seem like an offshoot of stamp collecting rather than a bonafide part of philately, but it’s actually hugely popular around the world and, indeed, the Federation Internationale de Philatelie (FIP) created guidelines for judging Maximaphily exhibits many years ago, so it’s a well established, recognised form of collecting. So what do the FIP say that can help us? Well, their criteria for evaluating exhibits provides some useful hints, even if you’re not intending to enter an exhibition. Obviously you need a ‘good concordance between the title, the plan and the contents of the exhibit’, and the written explanations should be ‘concise, and give some supplementary information about the elements and/or the concordances’. Even if it’s just for your own album, writing up is…

SUBSCRIPTION FORM Please complete the order form (photocopies accepted) and return to our simple freepost address: Stamp Collector magazine FREEPOST: WARNERSGROUP (SCM) For information on how your personal data is processed, secured and your rights, our Privacy Policy can be viewed here-warners.gr/privacy or available in hard copy on request. Your order will be processed in accordance with our Terms of Sale which can be viewed here-warners.gr/termssale or available in hard copy on request. CODE: SCM/MAR21 HOW TO JOIN BY POST Complete the form (on the left) and return to the simple freepost address BY PHONE Call the team on: 01778 392030 ONLINE SIMPLY Visit the website: stamp.cm/subs Someone clever once said ‘Knowledge is Power’* and stamp collecting is the perfect example. Our wonderful hobby continually challenges us – as we…

SEE THE VERY LATEST NEW STAMPS AT: WWW.ALLABOUTSTAMPS.CO.UK/STAMP-GUIDES/NEW-STAMPS During the Covid-19 lockdown of 2020, we all found different ways of coping, be it baking, gardening, writing or creating. Berni Martin lives in a first floor flat in the parish of St Brelade, in the west of Jersey. Whilst she wouldn’t describe herself as an artist, she spends a lot of time crafting, making and photographing. Outside Berni’s window is a huge tree alongside which she likes to hang bird feeders. She enjoys watching the birds who come to eat the seed, each with their own personality and trademark song. She particularly likes watching the fussy eaters who cunningly shake the smaller seeds to the ground to get to the bigger, tastier nuts. During the COVID-19 lockdown, people stayed at home…

Spink China recently held a sale of ‘Fine Stamps of China and Hong Kong’ with highlights including this block of six 1894 Dowager Empress 9ca dull greens, imperforate between vertical strip of three and tête-bêche. The ‘highly important variety’ was said to be unique with all other examples recorded in strips of three. SOLD FOR £38,850 A full pane of fifty of the USA’s 1938 6¢ Eagle airmail stamp, featuring the ultramarine and carmine colour error, was recently sold at Daniel F Kelleher. The auction description stated: ‘we do not know of any other panes that exist’. Read more about the stamp and the 1938 airmail celebrations that took place in the USA in our article on page 50. SOLD FOR £3,480 Spink’s recent sale of ‘Important Stamps and Covers…

Given the proximity of our Gallic neighbour, some readers may be surprised to learn that four other countries took up Britain’s adhesive stamp system of postage prepayment before France adopted the innovation in 1849 (namely Switzerland, Brazil, USA and Mauritius). Although somewhat tardy when joining in, France, it must be said, followed our design more closely than those who had gone before. Her first stamp was black; it carried a central, left-facing female portrait head; the flanking vertical borders displayed simple decoration; the engraved white lettering on the lower border included the postage value; and the stamp was imperforate. Ironically, the French postal authority also made the same mistake as that of the British authority nine years earlier: it issued a black stamp that proved all too easy to fraudulently…

I have mentioned previously in this column that I get quite excited when I find a stamp with a complete postmark, especially when both the stamp and the postmark are interesting, writes David Gwynn. The postmark featured this month comes on a 1d stamp from the Niger Coast Protectorate. The postmark is a beautiful strike of the single circle SAPELE datestamp, code A. It was used on 2 May 1902. Sapele at the time had only recently replaced Benin City as the local centre of administration. Its convenient position on the left bank of the Ethiope River, near it confluence with the Jamieson River, made it a good choice by the colonial authorities. There already was a Okpe community at this location which was called Uriapele The colonial administrators amended…

The American Topcial Association (ATA) is offering free webinars via Zoom on a wide variety of topics. Topics include ‘Do You Think You Might Like to Try a Thematic Exhibit?’ (20 February); ‘Extraordinary, Ordinary Black Women on U. S. Postal Stamps’, 23 February; and ‘Have Fun With a Mini Topic!’ (13 March). Registration is easy on the ATA website at americantopical.org The British Thematic Association (BTA) Weekend due to take place in March has been rescheduled for 30 September to 2 October 2022. Meanwhile, the BTA has announce its first-ever ‘One-Page Competition’ to ‘encourage people, regardless of age and experience, to exhibit something from their thematic collection that excites them and will be of wide interest to our members as well as other thematic and topical collectors. The rules are…

Arabs dominated the West African slave trade for four centuries, until Portuguese adventurers equipped with firearms sailed down the Atlantic coast in the early 1400s and stumbled upon the mouth of a wide river called the Bartering Place by local tribes. The Portuguese translated the phrase to Câmbio, meaning the Exchange, which became the Gambia in English. Like the Arabs, they sought gold, acacia gum, beeswax, and exotic animal skins. In later centuries they would also require slave labour for their New World plantations in Brazil and other colonies. As a location for an exchange, the banks of the Câmbio met all requirements: a navigable channel that provided 300 miles of access towards the heart of the continent for shallow-draught boats; 200 miles for ocean-going ships; and a wide estuary…

In addition to postal history and commemorative stamps, there are also many first day covers to collect, issued on various anniversaries of the mission. Benham produced a cover in 1999, featuring the commemorative label and the signatures of RAF personal including Squadron Leader Peter Izard and Air Marshall Sir John Curtiss, who were involved in the loading process and flying of aircraft during the airlift. The British Forces Post Office (now the British Forces Philatelic Service) issued a cover in October 1989 to mark the fortieth anniversary of the end of the mission for No30 Squadron. These souvenirs were flown in Hercules XV191 from RAF Lyneham to RAF Gatow, Berlin with members of the Squadron on board. Another cover from the BFPS was issued on 26 June 1998 marking the…