The Tools And Accessories Are Sometimes Just As Interesting

I was, again, going through my grandfather's collection. This time I was looking in a small box of covers that also had a lot of glassine envelopes and other ephemera of the philatelic world. I started imagining the number of times the envelopes were used and the stamps that had gone in and out of those envelopes. The number of times my grandfather handled them, either in a good mood enjoying his hobby, or in a bad mood trying to get to a good mood by taking part in his favourite pastime. I found these three items and began to wonder what else people in the stamp world might collect. What things related to stamp collecting become in and of themselves a collection. Tongs? Stock books? What have you?
I thought that I would share three things that I found interesting.
Cheers!

I'm not certain if collections of such things exist, although since just about anything is collected by someone somewhere I imagine there are some collections of these sorts of items. Especially, I imagine, the British postal order form would be attractive to collectors, to be put alongside similar documents like the UPU international mail coupons that years ago I sent with a mailed request for a hotel reservation in France or Italy, to be used to underwrite the return postage of a confirmation or regrets. But for me the items with the names and addresses of long-gone (I imagine) stamp dealers are the most compelling. Poignant is the word that I think best characterizes them for 21st century viewers: that's particularly so for you looking at things that belonged to your grandfather, but also for less intimate viewers.

We have a collector in our local group who is doing a decent job with his perforation gauge collection. It ranges from the late 1800s to date and he's been gathering a wealth of info on the different types.

Slugore:

I don't collect accessories/tools, but I have accumulated some of this stuff. When I began collecting stamps in 1964 I first bought some U.S. commemorative pages, but within a couple years I found I needed more specialized pages and that's when I purchased a Fila-Framer mfg'ed and sold by Laine Products to help me draw my own pages. I never really mastered it to utilize it to its full potential, but I did use it to draw many a page, especially when I turned to world-wide collecting. I stopped using it in the mid-1990s when I bought my first page maker software.

Don






While not exactly accessories or tools I have also accumulated a few items of ephemera. Here's a stamp collecting kit from the 1930s.

I love this device. I love this kit.
As a draftsman, this brings back some serious memories (and some tool envy) of the days spent in front of a board drawing away. All before the age of the computer.
And as a designer, that kit just rocks in so many ways.

Slugore:

Thanks for the kind words about my Fila-Framer and stamp "outfit." The 1930s is my favorite decade for stamps and stamp ephemera, i.e. advertising, tools, albums, etc.

The Art Deco influence of the 1930s in design (stamps, advertising, jewelry, household appliances, furniture, cars, locomotives, aircraft and even industrial equipment) is greatly appealing to me.

This a an interesting thread. My hope is that there may be more contributions to it.

Don