Vitnage Brass Postage Stamp Holder

Let's agree that this item is fairly & correctly described.

Q/ How did they know?

http://www.shopgoodwill.com/auction...8066887.html

A/ Beats me, but it is correctly described (I have a similar one in my collection).

Only one problem. It is not "vintage" unless vintage means c.1980s/1990s. We regularly sold stamp boxes as part of our public auctions for many years and this design was one of the most common. $5.00 is about right. It *DOES* exist as a genuine older "original" (c.1920s/1930s) box, but this isn't it. This is the modern repro version.

Awesome back-story, Bill :)

But I am still scratching my head, and it is not only because it is past time to break-out the Selsen Blue.

Those sloped sides would curl a stamp, but would be perfect for sliding-out, say, bobby pins.

Conveniently for me, the vast majority of the Google Images for stamp boxes show flat-bottomed containers.

My thought is that there is nothing inherently stampy about a stamp box; if I were selling that same box to smokers, there'd be cigarettes on one side, and strike-anywhere matches on the other, and it would be a smoke box; if I were selling it to dressmakers ... well, you get the idea.

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

Ikey/Pikey;

Oh yes, your point is 100% correct. While the first thing to look for in deciding if any particular box is a "stamp box" is sloped sides (to allow the stamps to be removed easily) and NO striker area (which would indicate a match box rather than a stamp box, I have seen vintage advertising for this particular extremely common box describing it as a "stamp box". Conversely though, ANY box can be used for objects it was not originally designed for - as you say, pins of all coins, loose coins, etc.

Serious stamp box collectors pretty well get a "feel" for what is or isn't a stamp box. Of course there is also an excellent but pricy book published in 1994 by the French Postal Museum "Les boites a timbres/Stamp Boxes" by Brian Beet of England which illustrates a large number of classic stamp boxes. It is a "must" for anyone seriously interested in the subject.

There is an authoritative *book* ?!@#$%?

Whodathunkit.