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Compared to most countries, the United States has overprinted very few of its Postage Stamps. Overprints are usually the result of rapid changes in political and economic conditions that necessitate new rates and regulations and our nation has been fortunate to have a relatively stable domestic history (at least since 1865). Germany for instance has […]

Professional stamp dealers get asked from time to time from collectors to recommend a country to collect. I have a few favorites that I often suggest. My criteria are simple. First the stamps of the particular country have to be attractively produced. Second, they have to be readily available so that the search doesn’t replace

Official stamps are stamps issued for government use. Since most postal services have always been run as government monopolies, government agencies have usually had free postage. Official stamp issues (rather than regular postal issues used by government agencies) have largely been a matter of accounting control and to prevent government workers from converting postage stamps

Stamps proved to be such a wonderful invention that most countries began to issue stamps designed for special uses beyond first class mail. The Scott catalog makes it easy to determine what special use a stamp was designed for as it gives alpha character prefixes to special service stamps. Thus “B” numbers are for Semi

Postage stamps proved to be a vital technological innovation. In a world where most innovations are beyond the ability of most of us to understand let alone initiate ourselves, the obviousness of most technological innovations before 1900 is shocking. Look at the variations of plough technology and agricultural yields (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plow). throughout history. These simple changes

Very few things have changed as little during their lifespan as has the Postage Stamp. With the exception of perforations (added about 1850) and self adhesive gum (added about 1970) the actual appearance of stamps (printed pictures on small adhesives representing proof of payment for a service) and their use is virtually unchanged since their

As details of Hilary Clinton’s private email account have become public, I have been struck by how easy it appears to hack into someone’s email account. Governor Palin’s email was hacked last year and it appears that the sanctity of private correspondence is another casualty of the high tech age. One hundred fifty years ago

I’ve always divided US philately into seven subsections, largely for ease of study and because the characteristics of the stamps from section to section are so different. The divisions are stamps to 1869, the Banknotes(1870- 1893), Bureau Issues period (1893-1912), Washington Franklins, modern, Back of the book and Revenues. Each of these sections has various

Revenue Stamp collecting has a long history in the United States. The “Boston “Revenue book (so called because it was published by the Boston Philatelic Society in 1899) was the culmination of years of research on the Civil War revenue stamps and the private die revenue stamps of the Match and Medicine companies of the