About Stamp Memories

Overrun nation stamp set. Always thought it was gorgeous, and as kid in the late 70s, saved up to buy a mint set. To this day, I cant bring myself to use one on postage.

When I was starting, my primary reference was the Harris catalogue. In later years, I used the Minnesota Stamp and Coin price list. I also had a Blackbook pricelist that I used as inventorying since it easily fit in the pocket after you removed the color images section and taken it to shows. I did not get my first Scott catalogue until about 12 years ago.

Back in 1943 (I think) my mother brought home to me a packet of stamps & I've been hooked ever since, though there have been times in my life too busy for stamps.
I was particularly taken by Great Britain's King George VI stamps in that packet. This all sparked in me a lifetime interest in geography, history & stamps.
Wish I could say the same for my kids & grandkids.

After I started collecting in 1974, my mother bought several USPS commemorative mint sets for me from 1972 through 1975. The National Parks issues of '72 always give me the fondest memories. I decided at that time, at 10 years old, that I would visit them all if I ever got the chance. So far, I've been to Cape Hatteras (Scott 1448-51) and City of Refuge (Pu'uhonua O Honaunau, Scott C84). Eventually, I'll see them all.

Another fond memory from that time was receiving the USPS "Stamps and Stories" books from mom at Christmas. I still have both of the original 1975 and 1976 books.

Around the late 1950's as a young boy I asked the P.O. clerk for a 7c stamp and got a surprise. Whenever I see a #812 Presidential I think of that event. Nowadays I suspect the clerk chose it among his stock to see a kid's eyes get big!

My father brought back some Indian stamps from the war. That got me started along with the purchase of one of the "Big Orange Bags" of stamps at the dimestore. I was about 10 and I used glue to put the used stamps in my album and LICKED all the unused ones! To this day I can see the large Romanian purple stamp that tasted so bad I couldn't believe it. That cured me from licking stamps. Later I learned about hinges and even later, mounts. It's been quite a 60 year journey. My mother was a clerk and my father a postmaster in the early 50s. She got in trouble constantly with the inspectors because when they came to audit, she had dozens of partial sheets left from selling people blocks etc.

I too had a paper route and wanted to buy the $5.00 Hamilton, but my parents (mom particularly) thought it would be a supreme waste of money and made me put it in my savings account....

One that keeps me smiling is the $1.00 Parcel Post. A number of years back I bought an accumulation which had a large glassine full of one cent stamps, not in the best of condition from a rough glance.

I finally got around to looking through it one snow-day when I was home from school (teaching, not a student) and was very pleasantly surprised to find that that glassine held a dozen $1.00 Parcel Post stamps mistakenly placed in there, no doubt thinking they were 1 cent stamps! Here's the one I kept:

A simple flea market combined with my grandfather and a stamp. You can say I was raised by my grandfather as I spent nearly every weekend at my grand parents. This meant going to flea markets on most weekends. It's funny because I never remember him buying anything. However I will never forget him buying me my first stamp. It was the 1967 Scott 1331/1332. I was so excited that day was better than Christmas. Even today it is the most special stamp I own and is priceless. I was lucky I had my grandfather around for 26 years and this stamp brings back so many wonderful times spent with him. Funny how a stamp can do that.

When we lived in Ashtabula Ohio, my Sunday School teacher, Wade Cudeback, knew I had an interest in stamps, and he gave me several color cacheted FDCs from Japan. I cannot part with those lovely covers. Wade was an avid letter-writer and corresponded with stamp and post-card collectors from all over the world. When he passed away, in about 1995, his widow sold me the remnants of his huge collection. He had sold the treasures some years before to support himself and his wife after retirement.

It's the US Rural America set of 3 from the 1973-1974 that always takes me back (Kansas Hard Winter Wheat issue shown here as it features the train). This and other issues of that time got me started, and then when I got to the state flag issue of 1976, I was all in trying to get decent copies of all 50. My mom used to bring home the envelopes from her office...and boy, did I go through a lot of 13c Eagle and Shield stamps.

My first United States Scott #1 was special. It took a long time before I could afford. Less expensive favorites that take me back are the 50 states flags and the Apollo-Soyuz pair.

I remember when I bought the 551-573 USA set. It happened when I got back into the hobby. They were too expensive when I was collecting the first time.

Jack Kelley

When I was about 14 my grandmother gave me a one cent Franklin on a post card sent to her by her cousin postmarked at her father's table top post office at his general store in rural Indiana. Still have the card and others from the area.

I don't remember specifically going to the post office to buy a particular issue but when Philadelphia had its main post office opposite 30th street station, it did maintain a philatelic window and occaisionally you would have a clerk who was simpatico with collectors and actually show you what stock they had in the drawer. Like Jack Kelley, the stamp we are talking about was the $5 Alex Hamilton ( Scott 1053) but here we were talking about a corner plate block on a partial remaining sheet. I was relatively young at the time and this was in the days before credit cards, at least for me, and I had only $15 in my pocket. I remember the apprehension over the night as to whether it would still be there the next day when I returned with the remainder. This would have been almost 20 years after the stamps first issuance.

What shines through in all of these wonderful stories is not just the memories of the stamps but the memories of the people who were important to you in a simpler time when something as simple as sharing a love for a hobby, or bringing home stamped letters from the office to soak off the stamps etc could leave such a deep impression that it is remembered fondly 50 or more years later.

funcitypapa,

I clearly remember purchasing a $5- Hamilton down at our local post office. Just a single and that was a lot of money for me. Still is. And I still have the stamp.

Interestingly, it resided in a Crystal Mount for decades. When I liberated it to a Showgard about five years ago, it thankfully didn't show any damage.

Jack Kelley