Keep Or Soak?

Would you keep a cover such as this or soak off the stamps?

I would keep the envelope unless the stamps are needed for my collection. But just my idea!
By the way, beautiful stamps!

Peter

Thanks Peter for your input.

Yes I already have duplicates of all the stamps
on there.

When I look at the cover I think back 50 plus years ago
when I soaked almost all of the covers and post cards I
got my hands on.

At that time I only cared about the stamps.

I wish now I had kept more covers intact than the few I did save.

Maybe 50+ years from now someone finding this cover would
ask " What was this thing?"

Probably every long-term collector did their fair share of damage to postal history in their younger days. For me it was a couple of cacheted Spanish American war covers that immediately come to mind.

I don't have a problem with dismembering oversize "philatelic" covers, particularly if they don't have distinct postal marking or some noteworthy franking. In fact, the larger covers in junk boxes are one way to find some "harder to find" stamps. I always examine the stamps carefully before buying these. And, if the price is not right, it is easy to decline the offer.

Of course, if you are an Austria specialist, that might make a difference in your decision.

Lithograving, yes, I suppose 50 years ago we were like that! I do not ever remember seeing a cover in the hands of my neighbor who got me into stamp collecting. I do remember that some 50 years ago I got a Surinam air mail cover with a series of special DO-X airmail stamps on it and a special cancel. I still have the envelope, and I still do not have the stamps in my album! But I think that the DO-X cover was the one that made me realize the value of postal history. Now I have boxes full of covers!

Peter

Now a days I keep these (have a box full) only because they're getting scarcer...that sort of colourful piece in your mailbox.

Well I'm glad I didn't cut this one up.

I probably kept it because of the images of the
Emperor Francis Josef not because of the stamp or postmark.

@James

I keep some of them but many are wrecked when the
guy stuffs them into the community mail box slot.

Mine is the old narrow square type but I see the newer ones
are horizontal wider ones.

I have heard that Canada Post is planning on replacing
the old ones but I'm not holding my breath waiting.

I usually keep the stamps on the envelope

I would keep it as is.

Regards,
Stampalotapus

I would not see that cover as being particularly interesting from a postal history standpoint, but I would save it intact unless I had some particular thing that I wanted to do with the individual stamps.

I certainly would never soak the stamp off lithograving's Austria postcard!