Most Memorable Acquisition

What stamp is the one you'll always remember adding to your collection?

First some background on myself. I began collecting stamps (worldwide) when I was about 7 years old (1957) at the urging of my best friend, Steven Law. I actually went in hesitantly. I collected used worldwide for a year or so, and then went to U.S. which I think is a fairly typical route for many. I continued collecting until I was maybe 12 (mom would buy me plate blocks at the post office as there was a little post office in the grocery store she shopped at. At this point I just couldn't afford to add much to my collection so the album collected dust in my closet. Skip ahead about 20 years later. I've finished college and have a career and a wife. I start thinking about haw I could actually afford some of those stamps I used to dream about when I was a kid. Got ahold of a price list of a dealer who advertised in Linn's who had an entire pad of White Plains souvenir sheets he was selling. I had never even seen one outside of a black and white photograph in a catalog. I think I paid somewhere around $400 and got back a really nice example (one of the best centered copies I've ever seen). That souvenir sheet got me going again. 30 years later I've got a complete set of commemoratives (mint) and air mails and a pretty good representation of issues prior to 1890 (used).

I think for me it was when I purchased my US #1. Ever since I started collecting as a kid, I wanted to fill that first space. Took me the better part of 30 years before I was finally able to do so.

For me, it was back when I was a kid and I collected as well as my brother did (he did it for a short time). We had gone into the city, and I was around 7, maybe 8 and we stopped at an pawn shop or antique type store, don't exactly remember. We went in and were looking around and they had Disney stamps. most were 6 stamp blocks. All together there was 9 or 10 sheets and each stamp was different.

$5 Hamilton, MNH, Scott U.S. # 1053, which I bought at a stamp show from a specialist in U.S. stamps, twenty years ago. It was a superb example, flawless to my eye. I wish I still had it. I paid $100 for it, which seemed reasonable at the time, but now I see similar examples on the web for less. Maybe U.S. stamp prices have fallen???

There are a few pieces that I'm somewhat proud to own, but the most memorable one for me was finding a stamp cancelled the day I was born.
https://goscf.com/t/43251&SearchTer...ly,neat,find

Otherwise, I'd say perhaps my first stamp packet I bought when I was a kid of about 6 or 7 or so. It reeled me in hook, line, and sinker.

I could say my most memorable stamp purchase was buying the three MNH Zeps. Not so. My most memorable stamp purchase was when I walked into the West Acton, Mass post office to buy #1053; the $5- Marshall liberty stamp. Cost me $5-, a lot of money for me. I still have it. The P/O was right on Mass Ave in the center of town back in those days - It was small, maybe 12' by 12' square.

Jack Kelley

Most memorable was Spain #6. It's not expensive, but it was my first early Spanish stamp and it's what got me started collecting Spanish classics. 2nd most memorable was finding an unused copy of Spain #52 (19 cu of 1860), which is a high priced stamp, at a price a teenager could afford ($2). It was marked as a forgery and is what I bought it for, figuring I'd never get a genuine copy. a few years later, when I acquired more philatelic knowledge, I determined it was actually genuine. Not too long ago I wound up selling it. Sort of like losing a best friend.

The stamp I remember I only had for about 2 minutes. I bought a pretty US Sc #112 with a terrific star cancel on ebay for about $60. I remember receiving it, opening the package, admiring the stamp and I never saw it again. I searched high and low and never found it, I guess it's possible the dog ate it.

I've had thousands of stamps pass thru my hands since then but it's the one that got away that I can't forget.

I can offer two. The first is the US 1977 13c Marquis de Lafayette issue. A completely pedestrian stamp today, but it is memorable because it is the first stamp that I purchased over the counter at a post office in 1977 intentionally for the purpose of collecting. I can remember the face of the clerk, the smell of the gum, and the fact that he knew what a plate block was, when I requested one. I still have the stamps.

Fast forward thirty years and I am buying a Mauritius classic, one of the Dardenne issues, at live auction at Spink in London. That one was memorable because it was my first live auction "win," at an auction that I attended on whim because I happened to be on business a couple of blocks away, and I outbid two others. I probably paid a little too much, but I wanted the stamp - you know how that goes.

Chris

I forgot abount an interesting one for me. Its not exactly stamps but definitely related. Its a few postmarks from the 1930s.

This year, I completed my mint Jubilees by buying the $4 value. When I was many, many years younger, I had acquired the set up to the 50 cent but couldn't afford the high values. When the kids were born, I sold the Canadian collection to pay bills; so it has been a long recovery but I now have the complete set. I look at it every few days and think about the old days wandering around Montreal (where I lived at the time) - visiting the many dealers there and hoping to find a bargain.

This was fun to think about. I looked through my stamps and tried to remember specific buys. The one I picked was when I completed my set of US first Bureaus (through the color changes - so it was 246-284). This was the first set I really worked hard on when I started getting back into stamps again after a long absence. Getting that last stamp (I think it was #281 - the blue 5c Grant) was very satisfying. It took quite a while - I was going for centering at least VF-XF. Looking back I still enjoy looking at that set quite a lot.

Probably picking up these a couple years ago on ebay in an album for about 60 bucks. These were the highlights among a bunch of other nice stuff in the album

Hitting the USPS lottery for the Error Legend's of the West sheet with Bill Pickett cousin's picture. I remember forgetting about the entry then when I received it (1 of 150,000)admiring it for what my wife said was 'forever'. It was obtained for face value of the sheet plus an extra handling fee but no more than $8.50. I actually have the USPS FDCs and the postcards and it makes for a nice section in my 1994 album.

@Mike33:
Is that 1c a re-issue? (Based on the cancellation which would be unusual for 1869).

I believe it is the 1880 Special Printing and have it in that space in my album. It's not certified though