Postal Rate Increases
Postal rate increases have been more modest in the last ten years than they were in the earlier era. Between 1971 and 1981, US postage rates increased from 8
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Hyde Park on the Hudson
The new movie Hyde Park on the Hudson is the first mainstream movie in years in which stamps and stamp collecting play a major part. The movie is about Roosevelt in the late 1930s at his summer home in Hyde Park, and Roosevelt is portrayed as a person to whom his stamps are very important. He shows
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Great Buys
In all the many ways that the hobby of stamp collecting has changed in the last 50 years, probably the most significant has been in the de-emphasis of the “great buy” that was at the heart of philatelic writing in previous generations. Everyone wants a good deal and to get what they pay for (and
Cinderellas
Preprinted labels as collected by philatelists come in three broad categories: postage stamps, revenues, and Cinderellas. Postage stamps are collected by all philatelists. They are the major stamp issues of each country and are issued for the prepayment of postage. Postage Stamps are listed in many major worldwide catalogs. Collecting postage stamps has a long history and
Modern Forgeries
Probably nine out of ten philatelic forgeries were created in the nineteenth century. There were three primary reasons for this. First, stamps that were issued in the earliest period (before there were many stamp collectors) never existed in sufficient quantities in even the limited market by 1890. Second, early philatelic standards did not view forgeries
Philately Today
The world was very different in 1960 than it is today. The universe was only four billion years old, a considerable age but adolescent compared to the nearly 14 billion years astronomers think it is today. Black holes hadn’t been theorized or discovered. There was less documentation to prove evolution, as DNA had only been worked out a
The Problem with US Philately
The United States is probably the most difficult country to collect, no matter how you figure difficulty. If your measure of difficulty is cost, then US stamps win hands down; a complete collection of US stamps, only done once, would be worth near $20 million, many times the cost of any other single country. If your definition
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Stamp Packets
Every kid in the 1950s and 1960s began collecting stamps the same way. We started with a Harris or Minkus worldwide album. Mine was the Statesman Deluxe, which had spaces for over 25,000 stamps. Next up the ladder was the Citation album, which had spaces for over 50,000 stamps, and to which I aspired. What made
Italian Area Speculation of 1965
The great stamp speculation of the late 1970s, which saw worldwide stamps at least double in price in less than five years, had a precursor in the mid 1960s. The European stamp speculations that were then the driving force in worldwide price increases had a basis in reality. After World War II, Europe was devastated.
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