John Apfelbaum

The Small Queen issue commenced in 1870, though most values of the Large Queens remained in general use and were slowly replaced by Small Queen issues in the ensuing twenty years. The primary reason for the change was that the demand for stamps in Canada proved to be very great. The smaller format allowed the […]

The Large Queens, as philatelists call the 1868 issue, was the first stamp issued by the Dominion of Canada created on July 1, 1867, by the British North American Act. Immediately Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia were united. In 1869, the Dominion purchased the Hudson Bay Company’s considerable lands, and when British Columbia

As can be seen on the Canadian stamps pictured, the monetary system of Canada was figured in both currency and sterling. The variations were irksome, and the calculations of who owed what to whom and in what currency were ended in 1859, when the Canadian government enacted laws giving Canada a decimal currency system. The

The stamps of Canada are among the most popularly collected stamps anywhere in the world. Their designs have been chosen with near-uniform excellence, and their execution as a printed product is first rate. Canadian stamps up until World War II were all engraved, and have been designed and printed by the best bank-note-printing firms in

The 1869 issue of the United States was the world’s first pictorial stamp. Until that time all United States postage stamps, and all world postage stamps for that matter, depicted either heads of states or numerical figures. The 1869 issue was unpopular from the start. But it is important to note that deriding the quality

The twenty-four cent 1869 (#120) has been acclaimed by many enthusiasts, the authors included, as the finest stamp ever produced by any nation. The colors are green frame, violet vignette. The vignette measures 3/8 inch wide by 3/16 inch high, and the engraver has portrayed a faithful reproduction of John Trumbull’s Declaration of Independence. With a

The 1857 Issue Great Britain began perforating its general issue postage stamps some two years before the United States. In 1857, the Post Office Department contacted Toppan, Carpenter & Company (the printers of the stamps, and the surviving firm from Toppan, Carpenter, Casilear & Company, printers of the 1851 issue), and instructed them to begin

The British Post Office had evidence that some postal users were clipping uncancelled parts of stamps and reassembling them on letters to pay postage. Finally, in 1857, the post office got around to ordering stamps with four check letters, the letters in an order reversed from the top to the bottom. The check letters make

While the post office was experimenting with these perforations, some other stamps had been issued, caused primarily by increased public usage of the mails and Britain’s growing commerce overseas. Three stamps, all embossed Queen’s heads against colored backgrounds, include a one shilling issued in September of 1847 (#5), a ten pence (#6) issued in November