Newbie "Marty" Says HI To All!

Hello out there in "Stamp Community" land. I am new to the Stamp Forum world, but I am hoping to get to know a lot of you and pick all your brains a bit...lol

I have been collecting stamps, FDC's and Souvenir sheets for many years, but I am still very new to this world. Most of the time it has been just to collect them, I buy them or get them as a gift, they get "put away for the future" and that is where it ended. Recently, I came across my old collction and dug it out of storage, and it has re-sparked the interest.

I went out and got the 2007 copies of the Scott Book as well as Brookman Book and have been going through cataloging all of the FDC's and Souvenir Sheets I have. I am still having problems finding all of the Sheets and FDC's I have in their books. So, as I can, I am going to scan them and post them in hopes some of you can help me ID them.

What I have that intrigues me the most are a set of old post cards that I have. These are 1c or 1/2c postal cards that are post marked 1883 & 1884. They are correspondance of various sorts. I am having a problem identifying the "stamp" printed on the cards though (at leats on two of them). I don't know if they are valuable or not, but we shall see.

Anyway, thanks for reading and I sincerely hope to get to know a bunch of you. Thanks.....Marty

Welcome Marty. You are our 100th member. Congratulations.

Steve

Welcome Marty, its always great to see someone getting back into the game..i always toyed with stamps since age 9..but it was only in my 50's that I got into it in a fairly serious way..its my hobby, my relaxation, I have a budget, my collecting does not hurt anyone..its all good as they say !!

Great to have you here Marty!

Welcome Mate

I'm only new to this forum too
signed up yesterday



I've only been here one day but I have learnt alot
the people here are great

Welcome to the forum.

Welcome, Marty. Happy to have you here.

How does it feel to be a milestone?

Funny, I never thought of myself as a Milestone, but it feels good.
Thanks for the warm welcome from all of you.
I guess Jason BD is no longer the "Newbie" huh??...lol.

Just out of curiousity, can anyone tell me which Forum I can go to where they might discuss Souvenir Sheets?? I see my old favorite FDC's, but I thought since I dug out my Souvenir Sheets, I might go and possibly read about them too. Thanks....Marty

Hello Marty....

Welcome to the club. You can ask about anything stamp related here.....most likely someone will be able to help. Do you collect worldwide or just US material ?

Add my to the list. Perhaps you should consider changing your username to Milestone.

Charles

Welcome Marty

Post pictures of Youre misteries!! And someone is sure to help whith them. The rest of us just like to see them.
Dianne

Hey nr-notrare,

So far, I am just into collecting US material. Although, throughout the years, I have accumulated some International stamps. Some is probably not even close, a lot I guess...lol.

Right now, I am just looking through and taking time with my FDC's and Souvenir Sheets. I am getting into putting them into individual envelopes and labeling them with Scott's Numbers and Values, seeing if I have anything interesting or rare/valuable. As I can, I want to get some scanned and then posted.

What I don't get is this...Scott's catalog posts values of FDC's/Souvenir Sheets, Stamps etc. But, no one wants to pay that much for them. I see all kinds of stuff on ebay, but then again, I would think that ebay is not really a great place to sell rarer and interesting stuff like this huh?? But, as I have the time to go through it all, I am hoping to find something rare and valuable. We'll see.......Milestone-Marty

happy to have you here . I am new to .

Hello Marty......

Catalog values represent what you could expect to pay if you went to a dealer and asked him to locate something for you.....his time, overhead and shipping costs. When trying to find a value for an item you have in hand, catalog values are simply a starting point.....deducting the perceived value of flaws or availability to arrive closer to a true value. Very few items sell for book value, most sell for under 70% of Scott.......this is especially true for very common material, less so for scarcer items. Another consideration is that cat values sometimes rise out of sync with the market.....how can values rise on something that is still available from the PO at face value ??? (I've seen this happen to many of the Famous Americans from the 1980's & 90's. The $5.00 Bret Harte is up to $9.00 mint but I bought some a few months ago from my local PO at face. They are not available everywhere but they can still be found.) At the time of sale, it also depends on how many people are interested in any given item and how determined each is to acquire it.

You may have noticed that mint blocks from the 1950's & 60's are valued at less than the value of four mint stamps. This may seem ridiculous but it reflects the fact that this material is over abundant. Many collectors at the time thought that the value of sheets and blocks would always rise but there were so many saved that today many can be bought for less than face value.

One thing collectors can do to avoid this pitfall is to purchase items that fall "below the radar"......meaning the items that many avoid when issued such as the higher face value material or older material in very good to excellent condition. Common items will almost always be common items, better material has the best chance of gaining value in a free market. With that said, some common items can be found that rise above the vast majority of items, for instance: Have you noticed how few newer commemoratives are found on covers ? Most are being soaked off for placement in albums. In the not too distant future postal historians will be paying a premium for such covers, especially those in period use and those in very good condition and/or those to interesting/odd destinations. Also, one could look through Scott cat for odd items like the Toledo Brown Flag over Rushmore or Bronx Blue Ferryboat coils both mint, used and on cover. (there are others but these two come to mind because they are two that I actively search for)

Everything postally oriented is collected by someone, many collect a large group of relatively common items. A smaller number actively seek the not so common material.......Fewer items, eagerly sought by competitive buyers, will raise prices.

nr-notrare (Tom),

That makes a LOT of sense! I guess I never thought about all of that. I just assumed that Catalog values were something that I would expect to get at a sale or auction. I never thought about the time and expertise of the retailer/seller. Thanks for all of that though, helps me to understand things a bit more. I appreciate it!....Marty