John Apfelbaum

The Three Cent 1851 (#10 and #11)   This stamp paid the common letter rate that was reduced from 5 cents to 3 cents on July 1, 1851. There are two main varieties of this stamp. The #10, known from 1851 printings of the stamp, is a shade variety. The color is described in the […]

The Three Cent 1851 (#10 and #11) This stamp paid the common letter rate that was reduced from 5 cents to 3 cents on July  This is one of American philately’s most difficult and most interesting stamps. All the one-cent 1851 stamps look alike to the casual collector. However, there are several types that philatelists

In 1851, another general postage rate reduction was deemed in order. The price of sending a drop letter (a letter dropped off at a post office for someone else to pick up) was reduced from 2 cents to 1 cent. Furthermore, the first-class rate was lowered from 5 cents to 3 cents, and a five-cent

The lessons learned by Great Britain were not lost on America. This was a huge country, sprawling out by 1847 as far as California. The population density in the West was exceedingly low, although because of rich natural resources there were a good umber of small and medium-sized urban centers. The post office was required

There should be some anxiety on the part of a new collector that he or she is getting tamps of sufficient quality for the price that is paid. This is not to say that collectors should buy only stamps in exceptional quality; rather, a stamp in nearly any quality s desirable, providing it is accurately

We have discussed perforations in the printing of stamps. Now we will examine perforations in the collecting of them. Early collectors did not bother much with perforations. They separated the stamps by face difference and placed them in albums. The French set the standard for mastering perforations. When a stamp measures “perf 12,” that means

In order to determine whether a stamp has been regummed, a knowledge of stamp printing is required. When stamps are printed, they are printed on a sheet of paper that is then gummed and perforated. The order in which this is done is the clue to detecting the type of gum: on genuinely gummed stamps,

When Rowland Hill invented the postage stamp, an integral part of his design was a “wash of mucilage applied to the back, which, when moistened would allow the stamp to adhere to paper.” In the very early years of philately, hobbyists primarily collected used stamps. After all, the reasoning went, why spend good money when

Stamps are printed on paper, though most collectors wish it were granite. The quality of perfection demanded by collectors far exceeds the bounds of reality. Paper, as it ages, becomes brittle. Any 100-year-old stamp has probably been owned by fifteen people and handled hundreds of times. It may well have faults. Faults refers to flaws