Youthful Collector..well At Least I Made The Attempt !

I introduced my young son (11) and daughter (9) to stamp collecting about a year ago. While they have some interest, there is just too much going on in their lives to justify spending any significant amount of time in the hobby. After doing tons of homework each day (way more than I had growing up), their piano lessons and their soccer/basketball/sports we let them relax with an hour of video games. Not much time left after that. One day when their lives slow down, they might have time. Maybe in the summer, there will be a bit of time.

I'm practically in the same boat as they are, with very little time to devote to the hobby at the moment. There are just so many interesting things to do in our free time (video games included), I completely understand their viewpoint.

The best I can do is get them interested and when they are much older, if they are still interested in it and they can find time, they can work on their own collection or mine.

Will,
I guess I am one of the lucky ones. I always got to spend time with my kids and now my grandson too. It was actually tough to get any of my kids to move out when the time came and they all visit often. I was fortunate to have my grandson live with me from the time he was just a few months old until he was about two and we still have him almost every weekend, but none of them show any real interest in stamps. My youngest,(Derek),who is still in college shows a glimmer of interest at times. He will ask questions. He actually started collecting machin heads at one point and was even getting into fly specking on them a bit. Time will tell. I think a lot of us have amassed collections that are a bit overwhelming to a non collector. Maybe we need to break it down into manageable chunks. I have done a presentation on Minnesota DPO's a few times and Derek actually attended once. He was more interested in how I knew "all that stuff" then the covers themselves. Curiosity is where it all starts. Mainly he was just there to show support for the old man.
Pat

For your information, I'm 21years old with a lot of interests.. I've played lots of sports(hockey, soccer, floorball etc), read lots of fantasy books, played computergames since I was 7.. But here I am.

I wasn't introduced to stamping at a young age. At least not from what I can remember.. My father collected stamps in his youth, and his father collected everything and anything (still does). Now me and my father has taken over the collections and after a few years of sorting through the coin-collection, we've come to the stamps. I can't say that I'm really hooked into stamping, it comes in waves.. What I like most is to soak, sort/ID, make pretty databases in Excel, and have everything in order. Makes me relax and completely absorbs me from the real world outside the stamp room.

Coins are fascinating in a way, however I like covers the most, particulary the ones from 18XX and from/to my relatives, with letters inside written in a font I can hardly read..

But I do find it hard to believe that I won't have any interest in our coins/stamps when I get older.. However I guess as many of you have said, that there will be a period of non-stamping for many years before finding back to the hobby.

In June 1951, on the last day of second grade, the school bus driver gave each kid a packet of stamps as he/she got off the bus. He said our parents "would know" how to proceed.

My only regret was that it was indeed the last day of school, and there would be no opportunity to buy up those packets (10 cents?) for the kids who looked baffled or contemptuous -- but who never turned down a freebie.

My goal was, and has been, simple -- collect as many different stamps as I could, revenues, seals, whatever, didn't matter, although some 60+ years later, I must admit a fondness for Germany and the Canal Zone. Collecting everything under the sun, you pick up a lot of odds and ends of knowledge, reinforced by the fact that I have always been a book and catalog buyer. I try to pass along those tidbits of knowledge here.

I stayed out of trouble in the Army in Germany by pursuing stamps instead of beer, and attended several shows with a German-speaking Canadian sergeant stationed at Lahr.

My experience is a lot different than all those you read above. As a life time collector my two daugthers grew up helping Dad with his stamps .The most treasured time that I had with my girls was that private time with them working on my collection .
Most eveings before bed I would spend time in my stamp room,sitting at a desk ,the girls would come in and want to talk and see what was so interesting before they went to bed .We would chat about their day and school or their friends or future plans that mother and me wanted for them .They understood about our value beliefs and how important different decisions were in their life.
They learned and helped Dad make his first computer album pages ,they learned how to do watermark testing and sorted watermarks.They took the time to sort stamps by perforations .They spend time talking and learning something about every country and what was on that countries stamps.The oldest daugther submitted a college paper to her college professor about the Spanish Civil War with page after page of stamps showing the different political groups ,the professor was impressed and gave her a A+. My youngest daugther who was in High School also did a term paper about Early Greek Math Scholars and had stamps showing their achievements in her paper.
The girls are not collectors today but they know the subject well and would still go with Dad to a stamp show.

Thanks everyone for the input...its good to get different views..i wish I could have pursued stamps more when I was in Europe in the service..i did send away for my first first day cover when I saw an article in the European version of the Herald Tribune and I mailed a couple of covers to myself from the Vatican post office...when I returned home in the early 60s I worked in mid town Manhatten and there were stamp store fronts all over with 10 cent cover boxes ..but rent was cheap back then..i paid 94 dollars a month for an apartment..i wonder how many times that has multiplied by now ??

pjsstamps said:




My children and I eventually did break down their focus to one or two countries because collecting WW was not of interest to them (they were put off by lack of complete coverage in starter albums). My son chose to focus on Italy and US and my daughter Canada. My son wants to fill spaces in a pre-printed album, so we purchased a Liberty Vol 1 album and we are talking about an early Italy album. My daughter on the other hand insisted on using stock books, although I offered to get a Canada album for her.

Stock books have their advantages...all you need is imagination..i love them for back of book collections !!

Floortrader,
Your reference to your kids using stamps on their reports reminded me of when my oldest was in Middle school. They were studying the civil war. I offered some civil war covers and letters for him to take to school. He was a bit reluctant, but still young enough that he went along with the idea. The teacher was fascinated with the letters. He made copies to use for his classes along with typed translations of the letters as the old script was difficult to read. He was extremely grateful and when I went to conferences all we talked about was cover collecting, which did not go over too well with my wife. I got him to a stamp show and I don't know what happened from there. By the time my youngest went to middle school the teacher had retired. I like to think maybe a stamp or cover collector was born.