Monthly Archives: April 2020

One of the more interesting anomalies in philately is how some types of specialty items of some countries are very popular while the same type of specialty material for another country is ignored. Look at marginal inscriptions. Marginal inscription plate numbers of the United States are avidly collected as plate blocks. Marginal inscriptions are avidly collected in Israel as tabs and the British area as Traffic Light gutter pairs. But for UN nobody collects Mint Inscription blocks despite years of dealer hype about them. Proofs are another area where collectors show different preferences by area (Proofs are the first impressions of the plate taken for printing control purposes and sometimes issued to the collecting public or prominent officials). Proofs of British Commonwealth stamps are scarce and were not regularly issued. When offered they sell quickly and for a lot of money. Proofs of Latin American stamps are also scarce, typically existing in quantities of less than 200. But they

Most philatelists soon exhaust the specialty that they have chosen. Virtually any country can be 95% completed for between a few hundred and a few thousand dollars. Most collectors never spend more than a hundred dollars for a single stamp and so the problem with our hobby is that collectors soon paint themselves into a corner and either move on to another country to specialize in or add covers or other specialty items to their collections. Another way to jazz up a collection for not a lot of money is to add nonphilatelic collateral items. Some collectors add maps or personal pictures relating to visits or to the stamps themselves. Some add autographs of famous people. Many autographs are quite modest in price and they can personalize a collection and add a great deal of interest to your hobby. Suppose you collect Vatican City stamps-a pretty nice specialty and quite manageable. Vatican City has issued a couple thousand stamps- all but about fifty of which should cost less than a thousand