Show Me Your Airmail Covers, Envelope Designs

The theme is not the flight or the cachet, but the envelope design. Rules are US usage pre-1950. The barbershop border is too common. Let's see unique and different. If is blue and red we want to see it. Any details on the manufacturer is encouraged.

First up a Trans-Atlantic flight

An eye catching border design

A circus like theme with a Zeppelin to boot

I like the cover with the FT-820. Very Nice!

I can't say these are particular eye catching, but do meet the OP's request...blue and red and aren't barber shop. I like the home made one.

gslaten's cover with the arrows is a one of five different designs by J.W. Stoutzenberg of Maplewood, Missouri. If you flip the cover over you will see his name and address and an abbreviated copyright statement. Stoutzenberg was a printer and cachet designer in the late 1920s and into the 1930s.

I've been collecting these different airmail borders since the late 1990s and Stoutzenberg's arrow design is the first that I collected.

I also like his home made border. Below is another home made from my collection. Back in the 1930s, collecting cancels from unusual place names was popular. This cover falls into the unusual place name genre designed to play on Four Corners, Wyoming. The sender realizing that four 1 1/2 cents stamps made the then current airmail rate, added what is an unusual set of airmail borders.

Don

I like it, send more

These are the kinds of covers that spurred my interest 40 years ago when I started to collect airmail. I fear that the romance for new collectors is gone but we can still enjoy - tfp.

That what this thread is for, recruitment

Variation on the cover above with triangle corners. This cover design was copyrighted in 1929 but still in use in the 1960s.

Hi docgfd:

I like your Carl Becken stars and Thunderbird cover. It is also an association cover of sorts. I couldn't help but notice it is addressed to Russell Sabor. He an his brother were responsible for the Sabor of the Midlands cinderellas. These cinderellas were issued as a souvenir sheet and sheets and singles in multiple colors, different colored papers, perforated and impert.

I can't say why he is addressed as commodore on this cover. Russell may have been a chemist. The Midlands refers to his place of employment, Midland Laboratories in Dubuque, Iowa. Midland made and distributed industrial cleaning products. He was, obviously, a collector.

Don

Did Becken design any other envelopes?

DonSellos,

Thanks for the information about the arrow designs by J.W. Stoutzenberg. I have several of these covers but none have any information on the back of the envelope, so thanks for educating me. I am always amazed at the information that members of this forum have and are willing to provide, regardless of the subject.

Gary

In response to zepman's post of a variant of the Carl Becken design, I would like to note that besides the different corners (triangles vs the blocks on the Becken cover), this cover has a different attribution as well. I have posted only the reverse, to show the different copyright notice. This design is by the Johnson-Clark Stamp Co. Both Becken and this stamp company are in Minneapolis and may well be the same one and the same. I don't know.

Don

Hi George:

I don't remember seeing any others by Becken, but maybe some other posters will turn one up.

Don

Don - Thank you for the historical perspective. Note that a play on the word 'commodore' was used to change it into the tongue-in- cheek 'commairdore.'
This cover is currently listed in my HipStamp store...but your post has me having second thoughts on selling it. I may need to stick it into my collection...