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Philately is a hobby where you can turn off the modern world. And the collector who made the collection we are offering intact did just that. He collected by this edition of the 1897 Scott catalog. WONDERFUL NINETEENTH CENTURY COLLECTION of well over ten thousand different stamps in a pristine 1930 edition of the Scott […]

Millions of stamp collectors worldwide maintain new issue subscription services. Postal agencies avidly promote such subscriptions, where a collector signs up, lists his credit card, and then receives all of the new issues of the agency as they are issued. The price is usually face value plus a service fee and often, for foreign stamps,

Stamp separation isn’t something that most people, even philatelists, think much about anymore. But in its day it was a hot topic, combining technological concerns with ease of use and cost of production. The first stamps had no easy way to separate them. They were printed and not perforated, and scissors were needed to cut

Countries have been issuing postage stamps for over 175 years. The classic period of stamp issues are from 1840-1900. And the modern period is from 1960 until now. The Golden Age of philately encompasses the issues from 1900-1960. These are, for most countries, the most popular issues and usually the most interesting as well.  

Whales are near the top of everyone’s list of favorite animals. They’re beautiful and graceful, don’t bother humans, and, if they needed anything to enhance their appeal, they’re endangered. Smart and savvy, whales had been at the top of their food chain until about 1800 when humans developed the technology to keep sailing ships at

There are two main ways to collect stamps—by country or by theme. Until about 1960, collectors nearly always collected by country. The reason was simple: In the era before widespread commemoratives, there were few themes that had enough philatelic material to make collecting them enjoyable. Early popular thematics were Scouting, Red Cross, children’s welfare, and

Many of the things that make philately the world’s best hobby—attractiveness of the stamps themselves, international markets, very high values for easily transferrable  pieces of paper—have made stamps one of the preeminent bribery tools of the twenty-first century. Because bribery of government and business officials is not all that pervasive in the United States (though

The belligerents during WWII spent enormous effort trying to influence the morale of the other side. The theory was that getting your enemy to question their government’s success could aid in long term prospects of victory. We dropped leaflets over German and Japanese troop concentrations explaining how they could surrender and that it was only

The first stamp in the world was issued by Great Britain in 1840, and ever since British Area philately has been the most popular specialty worldwide. By 1900, over 300 entities owed allegiance to the British Crown and had issued postage stamps. Some, such as Canada, were significant major first world countries. Others, such as