myStampJourney

Christmas falls on 25th December worldwide but the spirit of giving spans almost the entire month, and perhaps even longer in some parts of the world as I was told. Christmas, as popularized by mainstream media, plays out with snow falling, jingling bells, a warm fireplace, and wrapped presents under a decorated tree - the good kind of Christmas in family movies. Relatives and close friends that are far away are reached through mails and postcards sent throughout the season. And as stamps were affixed onto mailed letters and postcards, a Danish postal clerk,  Einar Holbøll, thought it would be better to incorporate additional stamps to raise fund for charity.  Einar Holbøll; portrait obtained from Seal Society Holbøll worked as a clerk at the post office. He had long been interested in philanthropic work and thought to himself, "If we could only catch people while they are in this holiday mood and filled with kind sentiments, I am sure that they would buy a charity stamp to be put

Agro-based product definitives were issued in 25 October 1986 in all states of Malaysia featuring a set of seven stamps depicting agricultural products: Coffee, Coconut, Cocoa, Black Pepper, Rubber, Oil Palm, and Rice. Throughout the years, these stamps ran from sheet 1A to 14A, signifying the massive reprints as definitive stamps before it was eventually replaced by the new state definitives issued in 2007.  Initially, the Agro-based state definitive stamps were lithographically printed on SPM watermarked phosphor coated paper with a perforation of 11.75 (listed as 12 in both Scott and Stanley Gibbons). Each state shared a similar design type except the state name, emblem/ coat of arms, and portraits of respective rulers.  Perlis 20c, P. 11.75 Reprints, later on, had more interesting changes to perforation, watermark, gum, and denomination. Varieties in perforation always the easiest to distinguish, at times, even without a perforation gauge. I have had no luck with finding an unwater

The Camel Corps Military Telegraph stamps were released in 1898 for telegraphic purposes until 1901 between towns in Sudan. On the stamp is the Camel Corps of the Sudan Defence Force marching through the desert with telegraph lines depicted in the background. The Camel Corps was established by the Egyptian army in 1883; it was then reformed again in 1884 for the Gordon Relief Expedition.  For this issue, telegraph stamps were bisected in the middle with a central perforation for the ease of separating the telegraph and its receipt. Not an error, rather for convenience. When separated, sender would receive the telegraph receipt with half portion of the stamp affixed while the post office keeps the other half attached to the telegraph form. It is an interesting find because it is very creative considering that the top half of telegraph forms used then was the receipt. Some time ago I came across just that example commented by Dave on Stampboards in 2019, which provided a visual explanat

The conventional method of removing stamps off paper is by soaking in lukewarm water. However, there are certain stamps that should stay far from the soak-in-a-bulk technique especially those that were printed with fugitive ink .  Fugitive ink wash off when exposed to water or any organic solvent such as spirits, which will stain the stamps and other unlucky stamps too that soaking together. Thomas De La Rue & Co., a firm based in London is quite well-known in terms of the usage of fugitive inks especially shades of purple to magenta and green. The nature of fugitive ink, I believe, is solely to combat the issue of reusing stamps by removal of postmarks. From all the gentle scrubbing while removing postmarks, one could potentially smudge the entire stamp in purple or green. With that, it is important to have knowledge of which printing firm responsible for any said stamp prior to soaking. If not, separate the purple and green ones for careful removal and to avoid the washed off ink

This is quite new, and it just further proves the elaborate use of stamps beyond mainstream postage purposes. Newspaper stamps as the name suggests are affixed on newspapers or newspaper wrappers as means of paying the cost of mailing them. Quite specific, isn't it? There are many examples of newspaper stamps issued by many countries but since I happen to collect German stamps, I think that it is great to feature an example here.  1943 German Reich - Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia 7 Heller brick red  These are with left margin There are two versions of newspaper stamps (Zeitungsmarken) for this protectorate: the first set being released in 1939 (MiNr. 42-50) with nine denominations, and the second set being released in 1943 (MiNr. 117-125), also with nine denominations, however, bearing an additional inscription 'Deutches Reich'.  For the newspaper stamps that were released in 1943, they were the only stamps that were allowed to be used after the re-establishment of th

First and foremost, happy World Pneumonia Day (12 Nov 2020). I personally find that the significance of World Pneumonia Day this year has been greatly redefined by the COVID-19 pandemic. Pneumonia is the infection and inflammation of lungs that lead to fluid-filled air sacs (alveoli). This respiratory disease has long existed and therapeutic solutions against it includes vaccines and steps to lower its risk factors such as smoking. However, with the current pandemic affecting every country, the availability of medical oxygen has been put into attention - thus, this year's theme is 'Every Breath Counts'. 1989 Taiwan - Anti-smoking campaign Pneumonia was not as popular in philately compared to other medical themes such as Tuberculosis, Malaria, diabetes, AIDS, and now, COVID-19. Speaking of COVID-19 stamps, they fetch quite a premium with most, if not all, sold at several times their face value. Hence, after weeks of browsing through stamps that were offered by local sellers,

Mail-carrying rockets?  It was a plan first proposed by Heinrich von Kleist, a German editor of the Berliner Abendbl ä tter (Berlin Evening Papers) in 1810. However, the first rocket mail, after decades of fascination towards delivering mail via a faster projectile led the launching of the first rocket mail by Friedrich Schmiedl. Among other pioneers are Hermann Oberth, Gerhard Zucker, and Stephen Smith.  Friedrich Schmiedl To be honest, I was not aware that rockets were ever considered as another mode of mailing. The idea of mail being shot up the sky and finally parachuting down to its destination sounds cool but at the same time, quite risky. Changes in wind direction may steer the rocket off course.  In spite of that, there were numerous successful launches containing postal covers commemorating such. For instance, the launch of a long range rocket mail from the US submarine USS Barbero in 1959 to a naval station in Florida.  At the time of writing, I had only acquired one example