It may be difficult for you to imagine the many thousands of earnest stamp collectors for whom no stamps exist outside of the communist area or from before the communist take over of their country. But there is such a group of collectors in Czechoslovakia.

The government of that communist satellite sees to it that no foreign catalogs, stamps or even information about issues from the west from iron and bamboo curtain countries is to give collectors a wide range of material to keep them interested in their restricted hobby.

In the free countries of the world, there is a continual striving for all kinds of knowledge. In the communist countries, people can only strive for the knowledge that their government wants them to have.

The collectors in these countries, as individuals, are just as pleasant and friendly as our own hobbyists. It is too bad that they can only buy, sell and collect on a restricted basis which most of us would fine detestable.