Dealers I Have Known

Rod222:

Very useful list for me. Thanks for posting it and the citation for its source.

Don

If any one collecting in the Scandinavia area has any knowledge of the dealer in Iceland I mentioned in my OP would appreciate an update.

Stamps1962, if you contact Jay Smith to ask about the dealer in Iceland you might well get an answer.

Thanks for your appreciation, Don.

I have the pdf if you need it, or cannot find it.

Also (and VERY detailed...3170 pages) you may wish to consult.........

http://www.fipliterature.org/birch/...0Dealers.pdf

Interesting topic. I'll answer by picking one from whom I bought some very nice material, very early on for me as a collector, around 1985. That was - John Salomon.

He was one of the few dealers who would come to the small local shows in my town and actually have some nice early US classic material in his stock. So, I rewarded him well.

One whom I remember fondly is Samuel Shaskan of Stamford, CT. I built up an impressive collection of used US Officials largely through him. He passed away in 1996, I believe.

I use to buy regularly on Zillions of Stamps. I remember Connections, Georgia and Birmingham Stamps, Michigan.

One of my favorite stamp dealers was JOHN ROSS ,he had a store in downtown Chicago . I remember sneaking on to the subway train so I would have a extra 15 cents to purchase stamps. He would let me sit at the end of the counter and look thru his worldwide inventory and pick out a $1.50 worth of stamps from his Black Binders which held thousands of dollars worth of stamps It truly was a learning experience of seeing real stamps that I only seen pictures of, in the catalogs that were at the library .
MOVE AHEAD 30 YEARS ----I read in LINN'S that John had died and his stamp inventory was up for auction in NEW YORK CITY . I closed out all my trading positions at the Chicago Board of Trade ,flew to NYC to bid on John's material . Those Black Binders were sitting there . They came up and four or five dealers were bidding on them . REALLY, did you think those binders were going home to any one else . I didn't have to figure out what was in them ,I just knew who was going to take them back to Chicago , today those binders are sitting right next to my desk as I type this .....money ? investment ?.....not a chance they are one of the WOW factor in my childhood .They will sit here ,the rest of my life .

John Ross wrote an investment tip column for Stamps magazine for years. He was knowledgeable on the market. More often than not, he was right when advising what to buy and to avoid.

Took the bus,"L" and subway every Saturday downtown. Marshall Fields frango mints and then to John Ross. Always busy and several Nuns pulling wads of cash from their Habits purchasing Vatican City. Sure kept the prices sky high back in the day.

All those nuns must have died off. The Vatican market went south a long time ago and probably wont be back. That must have been late 50's through the 60's. Vatican was 'hot' then and so were Israel and (!) Ghana.

In my youth, one of my favorite dealers was Harry Blue in New York City (116 Nassau?) He used blue stationery, blue envelopes, and a blue typewriter ribbon. Postage was always paid with blue stamps.

I remember Harry Blue as well as his brother Ben. Both brothers ended-up working for Jacques Minkus at Gimbels Stamp Department in New York City; with Ben being the department manager. Ben originally had his office in his home in West Chester (?) and then shared the office on Nassau Street with Ben. Jarnick, I remember the office well --THANK YOU for the memories. My father was friends with original "BLUES BROTHERS" and they taught me stamps and the stamp business as a kid. If I remember correctly both were Golden Gloves champions in the 1930's in Brooklyn! And yes, they used blue stationary.

Potomac Stamp Company
Washington DC

Before my time, and when hinging was normal, but I give thanks to the dealer anyway:





For me, it all started with the Parker Hayden Co., Globe Stamp Store, 2125 Center Street, Berkeley California a block or so west of the UC Berkeley Campus. Mr Hayden Jr., second generation owner and Karl Haas, later of Superior then Colonial in Southern California. It is all their fault.