New Member - Old Collection

Hi everyone.

I signed up looking for some advice on stamp collecting. I just inherited my great uncles collection and I am a bit staggered by it. I have collected coins for most of my life, but never stamps and I don't know how or where to begin on organizing this.

I have 15-20 boxes of stamps, commemoratives, canceled stamps, a huge amount of first day covers, plate blocks and so on. It used to be organized, but as my uncle got older, it became a jumbled mess as it passed from storage location to storage location.

Everything is in excellent condition and there are some really interesting things although whether they are valuable or not I just don't now.

My question is how do I start organizing all this into a coherent system. I bought today the 2016 scott pocket catalogue to get idea on values, but it only includes stamps. Some of my questions include things such as are plate blocks inherently more valuable then singles (as in x4+ or just x4), are first day covers worth anything and how do I determine that, I have FDC signed by Gerald Ford, is that common among collectors and an entire host of other questions.

I don't know anyone who collects so I don't have a friend or family member to turn to for advice. The only other collector of stamps in our family is my grandmother and she is 93 and not really in any position to assist.

I know that is a lot in a first post, but any advice would be appreciated. I am not necessarily looking to sell it as I like collecting things, but I'd like to find a way to make order out of this chaos.

Cheers

Hi youssarian, and welcome to this forum. Especially in a case like yours, where you have lots of unorganized items it would be of great value if someone could look at it. Taking pictures is fine, but how many can one possibly post.
I would recommend to look for a local stamp club. If you go to http://stamps.org one of their services is a list of stamp clubs in your area. Contact the club ( numbers are on the website ) and see if someone is willing to give advise.

Peter

Hi thanks for the welcome. I figured at some point I will have to visit or consult with local collectors, but I wanted to reach out first to this community to see what advice you can give for me to begin or things I should do first in organizing or just general advice on how to put a collection together.

Here are just a few pics I took today to give you an idea, but this is like .01% of the entire collection (which is why it is a bit overwhelming).

Sorting through a collection like this one can be a little overwhelming. If you're not interested in selling things quickly, however, you have many hours of enjoyment ahead of you.

My simple advice, at this point, is to put the First Day Covers aside and concentrate on any stamps that pre-date World War One. Stamps released after World War Two, as interesting as they can be, can be placed aside for now, also.

Regarding plate blocks, these can have a value greater than the sum of the individual stamps, but ought to have the actual plate number printed on the selvage.

We're here to help, so fire away with questions.

youssarian, welcome to the community!

I advise you to spend some time thinking about what parts of your inherited collection appeal to you personally. Most stamp collectors get much more enjoyment "value" than monetary "value" from their collections. Read the topic "What if stamps had no value" in this forum.

Some people concentrate on stamps issued before 1940 or even earlier, and completely ignore anything more recent. (Read some of the topics in the US classics forum). Some people are really into covers with interesting postmarks and/or cachets (pictures), and there are lots of other specialties (read some other topics in various forums).

Basically, I am encouraging you to focus on collecting for enjoyment. After you have a better idea of what kinds of things you want to keep, community members can give more suggestions on what tools to get, how you might arrange things, and how you can sell or trade or donate any items that don't fit your plans.

Hi youssarian! Is that a $2 bill that went through the mail? Can you show it right side up? It may be unique.

The Ford FDC almost certainly was signed using the autopen, a mechanical instrument that was used to apply ink in a pattern matching the President's real signature. If so, its value is not significant, perhaps $25. Autopen "signatures" would have been applied by the thousands during the administration. If it is a genuine signature by the President's hand, which only an expert could determine (translation: fees), then it could be a $300 item; Ford's signature is not particularly highly valued by Presidential autograph collectors and this also is an obviously philatelic item. High-dollar Presidential signatures occur in the form of "free franks" where the President signed the cover in lieu of postage, which was an Executive privilege.

I appreciate your responses. How would any of you organize this? Should it be done by year, by individual stamps in books, or some other sort of "standard" method of organizing? My plan is to go through a few boxes each week trying to give it some kind of organized form. I will take the advice and avoid dealing with the FDC for now and focus on the stamps.

On the boxes I have so far they seem mostly to be stamps from the 40s to the 70s.

As to the 2 dollar bill, I will check the other side, but to my knowledge, yes it did go directly through the mail.

And thanks for the mention about the Ford signature. I found it a bit unbelievable that the President would sign some random thing sent in by some random citizen just because they asked. But its still a very cool thing to have. In fact, all of the things I am finding seem to be remarkable and interesting so far.

What got you all into stamp collecting to begin with?

My father when I was 8 years old. Still collecting 56 years later. More pictures when you have time. Always a fun time.

Keep posting a few pictures from time to time. It will be interesting to see what was collected. For instance, check to see if there is a collection of cancels. In this case, the cancels are what is of interest rather than the stamp alone. Some people make a whole collection out of cancels.

This is the back of the $2 dollar bill. And I checked, I have a letter confirming it was signed by autopen.

I got into stamp collecting because of the history of the stamps and what I could learn by reviewing them. Same as my coins. I could get a whole lot of stamps for very little money. It's great value. I am not a rarity collector. I am more a hoarder. I bought a few boxes like what you inherited to go through and have fun. I bought many collector albums nearly completed or 20% completed. Some collect the topics or topical. Like all cars, trucks, trains. Flowers. Animals, maps, famous people, political leaders, etc.

Buy some stamp albums and you'll see how they are organized by year of issue.