Thoughts & Question On Worldwide Albums?

When I got back into worldwide collecting, I picked up Scotts International (Big Blue) albums Volumes 1, 2, & 3. Overall I'm pretty happy with them, although I was disappointed in the number of stamps I acquired that had "no space" in them.

This has been addressed before, and I will be putting in blank pages to house the majority of these orphan stamps.

I was wondering.. If I had to do it over, was there a "better" choice of albums for me? Yes, I know about the Steiner pages, but other than that, is there a more encompassing album(s) out there for the "pre 1960" worldwide collector?

Please note, I am not complaining about the Scotts, just curious!

If I had to do it over I would have went with the Minkus Supreme Global Albums...They seemed to be put together by an actual stamp collector and the collations make sense. It can be hard to distinguish between the Master Global and the Supreme Global albums though! They are harder to find than the Scott Internationals. Scott Specialty Albums were fairly complete for the world though the 1950's.... Very pricey though... Any stamp dealer would drool over a room of about 300 volumes of well-filled Scott specialty albums. I put my extra stamps on quadrille pages and interleave them in the Scott Internationals.

The above mention albums are fine but looking where worldwide collecting is going. The Scott speciality series was the best but also the most expensive .The huge amount of space and weight becomes a factor ,I used and have mostly the Scott Internationals and even they take up a lot of space and they have cause weight problems .But looking into the future I think the Steiner pages are the way to go .Cost wise they give each collector the opportunity to develop their collection how they want with cheap or expensive binders and album pages .

The Minkus Global Supremes do have more early spaces, and they recognize watermark varieties, so "If I had to do it over", I would definitely take a long look at them.

But a couple of caveats...
• They scrunch the stamp spaces together to the point where using mounts is rather impossible.
• Because of the large numbers of stamps on every page, I would want heavier paper- which means ordering the "on-demand" Amos printings- $$$
• They have postage dues, semi-postals etc mixed in with the regulars. If you use the Scott catalogue, it is initially confusing. I wouldn't really have a problem with the layout, though, as many other catalogues (Michel) do this.
• No space for any additional stamps on the page.
• The Minkus numbers are dead as a doornail. That means, practically speaking, converted the spaces to Scott number equivalents.
• Do NOT confuse the Global Supreme pages with the Global Master pages. The Global Master pages have rather poor coverage of the early issues.

Having said all that, Big Blue is still an excellent choice for the WW classical collector. I am still amazed at how many stamps are required to reasonably fill the album. A lifelong challenge!

I also agree with floortrader that the Steiner pages are today, by far, the best choice for a comprehensive WW classical collection.

I prefer to make up my own album pages. That way, I can arrange sets and singles to my satisfaction. I don't want them cluttered and try to make the pages symmetrical so that there is even balance and 'eye appeal'.

Chimo

Bujutsu

thanks -Jkjblue ........I have to agree with Bujutsu on the making of pages if necessary to include extra items for one's collection . Steiner pages have some design your own features which I use .But im hoping this year to contact them to expand what they already have .Im hopeing to ask them to make a more detail layout program and offer to pay for it ,since I have no knowledge on programing .I will ask them to make it available to anyone who asks for copies .

OK, let's say its 1955 and I've got a pocket full of money and want to get into worldwide collecting (and I live in the USA). My "higher end" album choices (at that time) were obviously Scotts & Minkus. But was there anything else at that time?

Didn't the Scott Brown albums have spaces for all of the major stamps? But, then again, I think they only covered through 1940. Maybe some overseas publications like Schaubek. I think they had a world-wide album for awhile.

Scott

The "Browns"....

http://bigblue1840-1940.blogspot.co...e-album.html

http://bigblue1840-1940.blogspot.co...t-scott.html

They covered the world 1840-1938+ in five volumes, and were produced by Scott.

And of course, the "Greens"- the country specialty albums by Scott.



Others

Then, there would be the Schaubek (German produced albums), Yvert + Tellier (French produced albums), Davo (Netherlands),...Oh, and of course, the Stanley Gibbons (Great Britain) British Commonwealth and International WW albums- using SG numbers.....

I almost bid on some of the Scott's "Browns". Were they more inclusive than the subsequent "Big Blues"?

They had a space for every major number Scott stamp at the time, but read my blog links for some of the problems too- they had not been updated for some 90 years, and catalogue numbers have been added, dropped, and changed since then.

The problem with the used Browns, while affordable, is that they are almost always found hardbound and printed on both sides of the page with no interleaving. And, of course, most countries are split across multiple volumes. Also, Scott published most of these volumes in multiple editions. For example, the 20th Century Edition Volume One that eventually included the years 1901-1919 was published in interim editions that included 1901-1902, 1901-1908, 1901-1910, 1901-1912, 1901-1916, 1901-1917, and 1901-1918. This means if you aren't paying attention you might thinking you were bidding on a complete Volume One when in reality it could be any of the above.

The Vintage Reproductions reprints (now sold by Subway) solve most of these problems, but at a significant cost.

I have the Minkus Master Global 1951 edition, it has more spaces than I have stamps,It does not have Minkus numbers, at some point 1952-1960 supplements were added that have Minkus numbers I believe these are Global Supreme pages that do not appear to be as comprehensive as the Master Global pages. I was under the impression that the Master Global had better coverage than the Supreme. Anyway it works for me as I don't collect any WW past 1960 and I don't use mounts hinges are for me.

In the 1950's there were lots of world albums to choose from. Grossman had a fairly decent one, and I'm sure there were others.

I have been using Minkus Supreme binders and pages for many, many years. Although I stopped buying the supplements in 1999 as they were becoming increasingly difficult to find. I switched to Scott for a couple of years but they just didn't work for me, they had to be re-punched and are slightly smaller than Minkus not to mention they just didn't fit into what I like.

Slowly I began printing my own pages the same size as Minkus pages. As a result my albums seem fuller because I only print what I need and there are less blanks. But as it turns out, no matter how you cut the cake, pages are expensive. As for me, I will never buy a pre-printed page again!

I would estimate I've printed or misprinted at least 4,000 sheets. I am not sure how many are in use but it is a substantial number. At this point I am starting to "rebuild" one country at a time as many of the old pages are....old and loosing their good looks!

It has also made it possible for me to say the county is up to date and every item I have accumulated for that country is mounted. Recently I rebuilt the Maldive Islands...it now takes up an entire Minkus Supreme album. It took months of effort to get through it.

I believe, whatever system you deiced to use, in the end it will be a beautiful thing. After all it's the stamps and philatelic items are what count.

Good luck and have a good time!

The Steiner album has two pages for the Maldives, and has a space for all of the 30 stamps of the classic era up to 1952.

What happened after 1952?