My Dad's 50+ Year Collection - Where Do I Start?

My dad passed away recently. He wasn't a big collector, but he started collecting match and medicine stamps in the early 1960s. He was pretty good about keeping receipts and keeping an inventory, so I have a pretty good idea what he has, even though I know nothing about them. Looks like he has over 1000 stamps and spent more than $12k.

I need to get the collection appraised for his estate, but I don't know anyone I can trust with a collection like this or anyone who even has the expertise.

I live in Memphis, TN. Any advise would be greatly appreciated.

*** Moved by Staff to a more appropriate forum. ***

Go to the American Philatelic Society web site. Under the "stamp collecting" tab (top left) search for local stamp clubs and dealers near Memphis. If unsuccessful in finding what you want, The Nashville Stamp Show is March 10-11 in Madison, TN. There will be dealers there that may help you.

https://stamps.org/services

http://nashvillephilatelic.org/

You can also post some scans of some of what you have here and get some advise from others on this site regarding some direction for getting the appraisal.

If it is a specialized M&M collection and you don't mind roughly a 4-hour drive, I would recommend going to the St. Louis Stamp Expo, being held March 16-18. Eric Jackson and Richard Friedberg, the two foremost revenue stamp specialist dealers in the U.S. will have booths at that show.

http://www.stlouisstampexpo.org/

An excellent suggestion, both are good dealers who will give an honest appraisal.

Andy69 welcome to the forum. Sorry for your loss. I'm not an expert on sta mps but I can tell you that you came to the right place. There are some very very knowledgeable collectors here am I'm sure some of them will reply to your post.

I will say that depending on the stamps some collections are worth only a small amount while some are worth much more which the condition of the stamp places hugh part as well as the demand and scarcity.

So take some pictures and upload them here so we can see them as this will help everyone to better understand what you have as this will help them explain things to you.

I hope this helps and good look on your collection.

I was writing and people were already posting.

Pix would help a lot, m&m's are not like other stamps. Condition is not looked at the same as most other stamps and must be done on a company by company basis.

A match & medicine collection is not your average type of collection. A very special remembrance of your father. A visit with Eric & Richard is a must if at all possible but start here with scans to be sure.

Wow, thanks for the info. Dad bought from both of those dealers in the 2000-2004 time period. Unfortunately I won't be able to make that show in St. Louis but I can certainly give one or both a shout.

I'll get some pictures in a bit. It won't be everything but I'll try to get a representative sample.

This isn't all, but I think someone knowledgeable can tell by that album and how full it looks by the sample pages what is there.

He also collected a lot of ephemera. This isn't really the forum but I think they're interesting.

More pictures to follow

With all of the ephemera and collateral material, IMO you want to take this to a revenue specialist dealer for an offer, not a general dealer.

I know next to nothing about these so all I can say is that they look very nice. Thanks for sharing the photos.

I love them! Almost all are listed in the Scott's Specialized catalog, and some have values as high as $110 or so, but condition may count. It looks like some of the sets are missing the key value piece, but a pretty nice selection anyway.

Agree that you need a revenue specialist dealer with this collection.

Thanks for posting.

The Scott's Emulsion card took me back fifty years, as, in a throwback, to her childhood in the 1920s, my mother shovelled this stuff down my throat each day before I went to school.

I remember him making s comment about how there were some higher priced ones and he didn't want to spend the money in them. those must be the valuable ones that are missing.

I used to sell ephemera like some of this stuff. They usually sold pretty quickly .