Postal stationary has always languished in popularity. In the earliest years of our hobby most albums had spaces for Cut Squares (the stamp portion of a mint entire envelope cut away from the envelope and collected on its own). But with the exception of US and German Area philately there are few postal stationery collectors […]
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The war that broke out in Europe in 1914 and involved the major countries of Europe became known as World War I largely because some combat occurred outside the main European battlefields. But this name is a bit of a misnomer. The main combatants stayed the same and to the extent that the war was fought
Based on American Stamp Dealer Association membership, APS dealer members and a survey of the larger EBay and Internet dealers, I would estimate that there are less than 2500 full time stamp dealers in the United States. Many collectors sell their duplicates, some build inventory towards eventually dealing full time, and there are many part
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It is unlikely that many philatelists have read the book The Hunger Games (or seen the movie). The story is ostensibly a post apocalyptic dystopia and the book has been billed as young adult literature. But stripped of its sadistic and salacious elements the book really is about a society that has rejected capitalism as
There are two major factors that influence philatelic popularity- first, the number of collectors who have a nationalistic interest in the particular stamps and, second, the intrinsic sex appeal of the stamps from their use, colorfulness of area of origin or design. Thus US stamps or German stamps are popular under the first guide line
In 1970 a stamp collector had to work hard to find stamps for his collection. If he collected with any degree of specialization, collecting was more about searching for than acquiring stamps. Most collectors had geographic access to at least a moderate stamp dealer’s shop (there were stamp shops in those days). But stamp dealer inventories at
In 1948 Germany was in ruins. Destruction caused by the war was nearly total and even three years after the war many Germans were hungry. The United States government put forward the Marshal Plan and the United States pumped the current day equivalent of $500 billion into Europe to rebuild that continent. Republicans and Democrats
Stamp collecting has always been an International hobby and there is no better example of this than the issue of measuring perforations. Europeans and Americans differ on how they take temperature(Celsius versus Farenheit) and distance ( miles versus kilometers). But collectors all around the world use the same types of perforation gauges and count perfs
Stamp differences, the characteristics that determine which stamp is which, can be quantified into two types-the visually apparent and the equipment driven. Visually apparent differences-design difference, shades, perfs (or imperf) appeal to nearly all collectors whereas equipment driven differences such as watermarks and fluorescent varieties appeal to more limited numbers. US collectors are quite spoiled
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