Old Album Pages

Hi to all

It seems in there wisdom many persons in the 1840's onwards who began to collect stamps had no idea how to care for them.

On many old album pages you find mint stamps that have had their gum moistened and stuck to the pages. Also you find unsightly thick white hinges stuck to the back and stuck to the pages as well.

Do you soak the stamps off the pages and mount them as MINT NO GUM, or do you cut carefully around the paper they are stuck to and then mount them in your albums.

If you soak them of the paper, you then have to be careful about the inks that were used, because some of them run.

How do other members on the forum cope with this problem.
Regards
Horamakhet

If I can't get used copies off the pages I soak them, but I would do some testing or research on specific issues before soaking if they are particularly valuable. I think the chalky paper GB issues might be susceptible to ink running.

For valuable mint, you might try some stamp lift techniques for the mint ones. There have been some discussions about this recently I think, involving either solvents, stamp lift fluid, or freezers and plastic wrap. I removed a couple recently that were partially affixed to the page and each other (see below) using a moistened Q-tip, but I expect that won't work for fully stuck stamps.

As for the big hinges, I just dealt with some old New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Canada issues circa 1860's that were heavily hinged that way. Some had become accidentally partially affixed to the pages. (Some were unused, i.e., MH or MNG.) Generally, I use a Q-tip moistened with saliva to remove the hinges. Rub the slightly damp Q-tip against the hinge part that is affixed to the stamp and be careful and patient. Eventually the hinge will peel off, and when it does the gum under the hinge might still be moist. Practice on low value stamps. I removed one that was PARTIALLY stuck to the page by moistening the reverse side of the page with a Q-tip. The used stamps that were stuck I soaked with no problem.

In the process I undid a repair (didn't know about it before hand) and may have damaged a low value MNG stamp due to carelessness. But other than that, I successfully liberated quite a few decently valued stamps.