Far too many years ago, shortly after I had resumed collecting as an adult, a persuasive talker convinced me that the only way a real collector would complete their sets of Canadian Coils was to acquire them in groups of three. His rationale was that a)not too many people did it, b)you were always sure to have one pristine example in the centre stamp, and c)you could always argue (and believe me, he could always argue anyone out of anything) that they did not deserve the premium value attached to the more common strips of four and would therefore be relatively cheaper to obtain.
Being young and impressionable at the time, I thought the idea had all sorts of merit and persuaded myself that my 20th century Canadian coils would all be in this format.
The upshot of this is that forty years later I am still working on completing those sets. However, I am close and I think it is only about five that I still need. The end is in sight.
Now, with that goal almost obtained, I have recently decided that my next project is to find said 20th century coils, on cover, in groups of three. It was all prompted by a dealer's list that advertised three different coils, in strips of three, on cover.
Not the nicest and cleanest covers in the world but it's a start. And it should be quite within the realms of possiblity that I can get all the one cent values because the first class rate fits for a good part of the century. I am hoping that some six cent airs will account for a few two cent values but the rest are going to be really, really difficult. And that is not for once considering the multiples of all the values that exist once postal rates began to shoot up and up from the 1970s and on.
Does everyone insist on setting next to impossible challenges for themselves or is it just me? What is your personal challenge?
Posted 07/19/2011 5:53 pm
