Any Interest In World Postal Stationery?

tonymacg: In regards to your Bussahir item. I was once told that if the item has a physical postage indicia issued and authorized by the post office of a particular country on the item it is "postal stationery", if no postage it is called a "formular stationery" item. GB is well known for "formular" airletter sheets (will post one or two when I get home). Hopefully this may help?

You're probably right.

Bussahir was one of the mayfly States: it first issued stamps in 1895, and the State Post Office closed in 1901. Tika Raghunath Singh (on the front) was the ruler, and so might not have felt he needed to stamp his letters - although there is an apparent box for a stamp. On the other hand again, any covers from Bussahir are rare, and I have no records of how Government mail was treated: whether it was stamped, or sent without stamps.

The item remains a minor mystery.

Here is an undoubted postal stationery item: a Hyderabad 4 Pies postcard, uprated with a 2 Pies stamp issued in 1949 specifically for uprating postcards, following the increase in rates after the September 1948 takeover of the Hyderabad Post Office by India:



The Hyderabad State PO was finally closed on 30 April 1950. The postmark is dated 1359 (Fasli), equivalent to 1949.

Bamra was another mayfly: it first issued stamps in 1888, and was closed down on 1 January 1895. Nevertheless, it managed to issue postcards



probably a philatelic use, sad to say, and envelopes:




and also



which comes in a couple of different forms.

Soviet Union, 1930. Savings bank.

As mentioned here is a scan of some "formular" airletter sheet. This one is from Bristish East Africa (Kenya)...



Here is one from Great Britain itself...




And the last one for now is from Hong Kong.



I think that these formular items were issued inlieu of various smaller countries having to print up airletter sheets, and additionally they could be sent to printers to get advertising and tourist photos applied.

Formular airletter collecting is a sub hobby all in its own. I suppose purists would call these items cinderellas!

Cursus: Nice Russian card.

1930, Dutch folded card, overprinted and uprated.

Israel Postal Stationery

Difficult to find 5th Anniversary Republic of Kosovo 2013 cover

Here are some more Argentina postal stationery.

Chimo

Bujutsu

The 'slogan' in the cancellation on this bit of postal stationery reads (more or less) (okay, less) "Theodor Herzl! The state you envisioned today receives your casket with love"; as per his request, he was disinterred & re-buried in Jerusalem, in a state cemetery that bears his name.

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

This one is a ½ Anna postal stationery envelope from Dhar State



The Dhar State PO only operated from 1897 until 1901, so used specimens like this



are quite hard to find. Better still, it was addressed to (and has a nice strike of the CDS of) the village of Dharampuri, in the south of the State. Cancellations of anywhere other than Dhar Town are quite uncommon.

The black oval marks below the indicium are the Maharaja's seal, certifying the envelope as genuine. Neither the original, type-set, stamps nor the envelopes were supposed to be sold without the seal.

This Indian ½ Anna postal stationery envelope is nothing much to write home about: they're available by the cartload.

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It was sent to Jhalrapatan ("City of Bells") in 1893. However, on the back



is a British Indian CDS of Jhalrapatan, and a Jhalawar State cancellation, indicating that the State PO took over the final delivery to the village of Pachpahar.

This is a British Indian ½ Anna envelope, overprinted for use in Gwalior State. Again, nothing out of the ordinary: these are also available, for cents each. It was sent from the holy city of Ujjain to Jhalrapatan.



However, the back has a Jhalawar State Postage Due mark



indicating that the Jhalawar PO was unwilling to pay the cost of final delivery this time. Win some, lose some.

Great images in here. All of them are quite interesting. Here are a couple more stationery, but, a little different. These are "Money Order Advice" ones from Trinidad and British Guiana.

The Trinidad one is postmarked in 1936 and the British Guiana one is dated in 1935.

Chimo

Bujutsu