Canada Plate/Inscription/Corner Blocks And Panes Confusion

There are some times that plate/inscription/corner blocks can be confusing to collectors of Canadian postage stamps, especially for those issues from 1958 on wards. Canada # 375 and # 376 were issued with no plate block inscriptions at all along with # 337 (pl. 10), 338 (pl. 10), # 340 (pl. 13, 14), 341 (pl. 14). This occurred because the post office department wanted to get rid of plate block inscriptions on stamps because collectors looking for these were disrupting regular retail post office operations with their demands for plate blocks.

However, after many collector complaints, plate blocks would become available again to collectors, but only through the Canada Post philatelic agency. All post offices would only carry panes that had the inscriptions trimmed off. Some collectors still buy panes from their local post office or from others with trimmed off inscriptions (field stock) not realizing that panes with full inscriptions (philatelic stock) are or were available from the philatelic agency since full inscriptions are more desirable to collect for stamp collectors.

I remember those days well Jogil

When the PO decided to do away with the inscription and plate blocks, I did hear about the Philatelic centre at the major / larger post offices. Our local post office was too small; therefore, we did not have them at the post office here.

Whenever I visited a friend of mine who used to live in North Bay, Ontario, I would make it a point to get caught up on the latest plate block and inscription blocks. You could buy them in plastic packets that contained all four corner positions, where applicable, at face. You could also buy the postage due stamps with inscriptions as well. In fact, regarding PD stamps, you could also buy the "Warning" labels in panes of 20. Those are nice too and dress up any PD collection.

I am pleased with the fact that I got a lot of my 1967 Centennial stamps in plate blocks from this post office there. In fact, I still have a great deal of those blocks in my collection. There are also the plant definitive stamps in plate blocks too and a number of them beyond Plate 1 and up.

Around the mid to late 80s, plate blocks took a dive in value. However, they are slowly making a come-back. I was ok anyway because the majority I bought at face. I did collect the older stamps as well and still have those as well.

Chimo

Bujutsu