Classified Advertisements

Many collectors have always found the classified ads in Linns and in the American Philatelist to be among the most interesting parts of those magazines. The classifieds gave you access to everything from stamps on paper mixture, to buy lists for US commemoratives by hundreds, to the buying and selling prices of foreign postage. Linns used to have several thousand classifieds in each weekly issue (even today in this print poor hobby environment, Linns had over 700 different classifieds in last week’s issue). And those classified were really read. When you think that the classified ad rate in its heyday worked out to one ad for roughly every 20 subscribers its hard to understand how there could be enough responses to support those ads. But the response was often amazing from these little ads. In the 1970s I collected Pennsylvania Postal History (covers used from various Pennsylvania towns) and I took out a little classified ad in the American Philatelist soliciting material to purchase. From this narrow area and tiny ad I received scores of responses per year and actually discontinued the ads because I could keep up with the material that the ads produced. Classified ads are still with us though the purpose of the ads have changed. In the latest American Philatelist a number of the ads seem to be attempts to direct readers to online selling sites and web pages, further proof (if any were needed) of the ubiquity of the Internet in philatelic sales.