This Is About Stamps!

and padding my post count until I can raid someones
auctions.

I so love the US commemoratives from the 1930's and 1940's.
There was actually artwork there. I collected numbered plate blocks
as a kid, and it seems prices in the late 1960's and early 1970's
plateaued then, or maybe the web has just had an economical
leverage.

I agree. Stamps depicting mushrooms have to be among the most ridiculous. I think most countries ran out of good ideas for stamps a while ago. Many countries don't have a long enough history to produce enough really important figures or events worthy of a public memorial such as a stamp.

Governments have also taken advantage of the propaganda value of a common everyday item. It becomes easier to restrain the urge to completeness in my collection when I am faced with the daunting task of obtaining every example of socialist realism depicted on a country's stamps.

Maybe the useful length of a certain design could be lengthened. Look at Machins. They are interesting to non collectors because they depict a cultural icon significant enough to not become trite. They are important to collectors because of the length of their run and subsequent varitites.

Imagine a US stamp depicting the top 15 most important people in US history. Create a classic design that can be altered very slightly over time to reflect changing rates and uses. Like the Washington-Franklin designs, they would earn revenue from postal and philatelic customers alike. They would not dilute the iconic significance of stamps in general because they would recycle subjects. The value of an image placed on a stamp would be raised only because of a decreased need to create new issues.

But, unfortunately, philatelists do not run postal services, and Tweety Bird sells. And if you can only use Lenin stamps in your country, they will show up in kiloware throughout history.

Most of these rascals (too nice of a word for some) were highly enough regarded or feared at that time to justify being on a stamp, regardless of how history has come to view them differently. These examples are easy and numerous.

What would be curious is examples of stamps that depict an individual because they are nasty. Like a UK stamp honoring Mary Tudor or a US stamp depicting Stalin. Or a Jamaican stamp depicting pirates.

Imagine the pain and suffering of coming up with that list!



They couldn't even agree on the 15-member commission to pick the 15 subjects.

While most stamps can be considered topicals. My point is their are better choices as to what we could honor in this fashion.

It's easy to get on a stamp if you are obsessive, maniacal, and psychotic.
















NUFF SAID !!