Has Anyone Tried To Complete A "One Stamp From Every Country" Collection?

A few years ago I purchased the "Single Specimen World Gazetteer Stamp Album: from Terra Nova Publishing. Unfortunately, it is no longer in print. The album has 122 pages and spaces for 600 stamp issuing entities both active and "dead countries." I was able to obtain all but one entity -- the Argentine province of Cordoba (still looking). I very much enjoyed this project. I decided to try out the new Smithsonian album without poaching on the Single Specimen collection. There is another thread on this topic that suggests there are several errors with the Smithsonian album. A lot of the comments are about the number of different entities that can be identified. Given the complexity of the issue, I think it wise to be somewhat arbitrary and just get on with whatever number of entities your or the album publisher chooses and enjoy the project!

The province of Cordoba is one of the most difficult stamps of the 780ASFE lisit (based on Scott Stamp Atlas and Orbis Philatelic Atlas). *** Edited by Staff - Please Review the rules that you agreed to when you registered. ***

That Cordoba stamp is a local revenue stamp from Argentina . You include local revenue stamps in your list ?

VALDPETE --If you start adding local revenue stamps from city ,provinces and states ,then on top of that you start adding "Basement Printed Stamps" your list becomes endless with philatelic junk .
It is like me starting to issue stamps from BONGOLAND and selling them on ebay for $4.00 each . Yes FRIENDS there is already a book printed and published about making money overprinting stamps and printing stamps to make money . The danger is for a website like yours to be writing up and promoting this false image of getting some rare far off and unknown place to new collectors .

Hi Floortrader,

that Cordoba is a postage stamp, not revenue. I write me articles for ASFE community not to be ignorant... a good example is my article on GBL labes, which many buyers have a problem to distinguish from GBLA stamps and pay for them as for GBLA stamps... *** Edited by Staff - Please Review the rules that you agreed to when you registered. ***

I've never seen a multiple of the Cordoba stamp. That's pretty cool. (I hope you don't cut those up to distribute them. ) I don't know the spotting features of forgeries without looking them up, other than the basic catalogue info of laid paper.

Yvert lists three variations. Missing first "O" in CORDOBA, a stop after CEN, and no bar on the "5".

The image in Scott sure looks like it has a stop after CEN, which would be bad luck on their part, showing as an example an image of a stamp variation that is only found once in each setting.

Back to your regularly scheduled programming.

Bad luck, as ASFE collectors need just one stamp, the block of 12 got cut.... enclosing the certificate of authenticity for them.

Well, you made 11 other people happy, and I get that...

Thanks for sharing. That was fun to see.

Stamps from province of Cordoba ,Argentina .These are revenue stamps .From my collection .

Nice revenues, very different from the postage stamps. Generally, ASFE colletors do not collect fiscals if there exist postage stamps.

Im currently in the process of acquiring all the #1's of each country. However, I believe that maybe 90% of all countries existing or dissolved are represented in my collection.

If given the time, might put together a post with every country represented or maybe our community can have this concept as a contest? Any suggestions philatelic family?

Phil---wouldn't work ,first your already at 90% before we start. Second there have been a few #1 collections at the stamp auction firms ,I think one collection went for close to $10,000.

Another problem is the #1 stamp listed in Scott Catalog isn't always the first stamp issued by the country .

Then how do we judge who wins ,I got a #1 Basel Dove which cost thousands and you got 5 sand dune
#1 's which you paid two cents each ,so who wins?

Then some countries have a revenue stamp as their first issue ,does that count .

Floortrader, I should clarify:

I have only a small fraction (possibly 1%) of number 1's representing every country.

What was intended to be conveyed is that I have at least one stamp from (hopefully if I am not being too optimistic) 90% of countries existing or dissolved.

You bring up many valid points concerning what would be considered as the first stamp etc. I would defer that question to more seasoned philatelists than myself.

However, my proposal for a contest would not concern all the number 1s, it is proposed for a representation of a single stamp from each country, regardless of the year issued.

If there are any worldwide collectors who feel they may be able to present a stamp from each country, I would be willing to participate in kind.

Phil, it would be great to see your ASFE havelist or wantlist. The more wantlists are available, the better is the chance to determine which countries are rare and which common.

Do you mean you have 90% of stamps according to books I uploaded ? It would mean 90% out of 780.

If it is the case, do not compete. I know 100 collectors who are over 90%.

Pete,

Im actually still in the what seems endless process of cataloguing and completing an inventory list of all stamps possessed.

Right now many (7-10k or so) are in 102b display cards, sorted by country in alphabetical order.

Look forward to posting the inventory of at least countries/entities represented in the near future.

Wish that I could spend more time on the hobby but at 34 years young, working full time with a young child it leaves me far too little time to spend with this daunting amount of stamps acquired in part via inheritance, purchase of albums, lots and collections etc.

Guess this will be a lifelong quest, only pray that my son will appreciate and learn to love what I plan to leave for him when he is much older.