Minkus Supreme China Pages

My collection is housed in a 3 volume set of 1966 Minkus Supreme albums. I also have the supplemental volumes (Nos. IV, V, and VI) issued by Minkus with pages to 1976. I have been searching for years for the China supplement issued by Minkus in 1973 which included pages for communist China back to 1950. My search has been unsuccessful.

I'm writing this post in the hope that someone out there may have an old Minkus Supreme or Master album that was updated with the China Supplement that they'd be willing to sell. I don't care about any stamps on the pages, I just want the pages in reasonable shape. Can anyone help me out?

Also, I know Amos has reprinted this supplement. But they've only done so as single sided pages (intended for their China speciality album). I want the supplement on double sided pages.

Finally, to my knowledge, Minkus never made similar supplements with pages for North Vietnam and Cuba stamps from the early communist era. If anyone knows otherwise, I'd like to hear about it.

Hi, I too collect in a Supreme Global to 1976 though mine is built from a 1956 edition and all the annual supplements. With the same problem.

I have the one sided PRC pages sold by Amos with stamps up to 1972, they are in 72 sheets. Everything is the same as you would get with the double sided ones except there are twice as many pages. And spaces for Souvenier Sheets which are probably deleted from the double sided ones.

Minkus at one time did have a double sided set of China pages but they were sold separately from the Minkus Supreme. And it seems like not a lot of people bought them. I have only seen these once. I was lucky to get a dealer friend to sell me the 1972-83 pages from an old collection since they were empty. He kept the older part that had stamps mounted.

You didn't mention it but Mongolia is also in the same category. There was a printing of Mongolia pages in double sided format that were not part of the Supreme albums but separate. I was able to find a used copy of these pages on ebay.

Also at the end Minkus gave up on including Trucial States in the Supreme Supplements and sold them separately.

The following was printed on the Letter from the Publisher sheet for the 1973 Global supplement:

Collectors interested in certain areas are advised to use the special Supplements now available from Minkus Publications: Mainland China, Mongolia and Trucial States.

I also would be curious about whether Minkus ever printed pages for North Vietnam, North Korea or Cuba, but since their original policy was to abide by the embargos, we would only be likely to see Vietnam published post-1995.

Thanks Electroprecancels, for the info regarding Mongolia and Trucial States. Now I have two more supplements to look for!

You can purchase the pages printed for you for the any country for the exact years you want with Steiner page layouts. They will have no stamp images on them, but only blank boxes with labels plus a country heading. They will come with the standard two-line Steiner border. They will fit your Minkus album perfectly, and once you have stamps on the pages the lack of stamp images, etc. will make no difference. It's a good and very easy solution when pages for a Minkus album simply no longer exist. The same can be done for Scott Specialty and Scott International albums which can be printed on paper in the size of those albums. The pages are available printed for you (one-sided) on whatever size paper you want from:

http://www.albumpages.net

It's also possible to print your own pages on blank Minkus pages with the Minkus border. It is possible to print on one side or both sides of the pages, though printing will be one page at a time. Buy Steiner's page layouts on CD or access them on his website. Save them using a PDF to Word conversion file (accessible online for free) which will convert them to a Word document. Then delete the borders page by page (highlight the border and hit "delete" or "backspace"). Now you have borderless page layouts which you can print out as your "originals". You can also alter the type font, move around stamp boxes (a little awkwardly, I find, but it works) and so on. Buy as many blank Minkus pages with Minkus borders as you'll need to print on. Then photocopy from your borderless pages onto your blank Minkus pages. You may need to experiment on a few pages to get the layout centered properly on the blank page by moving the original around on the glass, then keep using that location for all the other pages. The result will be very good looking Minkus-like page layouts on real Minkus pages which will look like they belong in your album.

These are not salable which is part of Bill Steiner's agreement when you puchase his page layouts. They are for you own use only.

If anyone is following this thread - I recently found a set of Minkus 1986 supplement pages still in the box. I discovered that Minkus included 43 double sided pages for Mongolia. Forty of the pages provided spaces for stamps issued from 1924 to 1975 And the remaining 3 pages provided spaces for stamps issued from 1984 to 1985. It appears that, regardless of what was stated in the 1973 supplement, Minkus did include pages for Mongolia in their supplements from 1976 through 1983.

Was that large number of Mongolia pages Minkus' way of catching up after not including them for all those years? Was there an embargo on Mongolia stamps for that entire time?

Based on their not including pages for Mongolia from 1976-1983, you assume they did include Mongolia pages in their annual supplements for those years. That seems like a likely assumption, but the lack of something might not be the strongest argument they exist. If you see what I mean! Does anyone have Minkus pages for Mongolia for these years?

I repeat my previous suggestion that it's perfectly easy to print yourself -- or have printed for you -- Minkus-sized pages for any country you want covering any number of years. This is based on using Steiner (or other) page layouts as the "originals" you print from. They would go right into your album and look just fine. If you wanted the Minkus page border instead of whatever border is on your originals, you would have to photocopy them onto Minkus blank pages one by one. You'd also have to either cover up the other page borders or remove them. That would take some time, but I'd done that and it's entirely doable. Then you end up with pages that pretty much match what you have.

I also wonder if it's acceptable (I mean "legal") to photocopy Minkus pages that are no longer in print. If it is, you could copy whatever China, Mongolia, etc. pages you find and resell them to other collectors. If not acceptable, you could give them away . . . but that may not be quite as appealing. Borrowing a set of pages and photocopying them would actually be very easy to do. To do this, Minkus-sized all-blank paper is available from the source I noted previously.
You obviously can't do this with Minkus blank pages or you'll end up with two borders on your pages! For that, you have to remove whatever borders your originals have on them, also easy enough to do either digitally or with a paper shield that covers the border as you photocopy. Either works fine.

Sorry I am four years late to the party, but I did make it. I'm a newbie that defines my hobby as collecting "Minkus pages and binders". One day I lucked out on an ebay sale of early PRC pages, double sided, and a binder of steiner regionals, barely used.

I learned the hard way that I should have made copies first and preserved the originals for later use or sharing. The earliest pages are mounted and a little buckled and I can't get the mounts off off. Just ordered some stamp lift fluid, don't know if it will get the mounts off. They have the old yellowish glassine strip that won't come off the page. Any Hints?

I've been using an all in one Epson work force to produce the larger format and non standard size pages. I also have to make copies for color matching the old ivory pages as well as making improvements in the paper strength and pH.

Somehow I don't thing the Federales are gonna show up for making a copy or sharing a page or two. But I don't have enough posts to find out. When I am able I'll share some copied pages and see what others think.

To make a photocopy of a page with mounts on it, it's not really necessary to remove the mounts. Just make a copy of the page at Fedex printed on paper of the size you need (on paper with a matching border if you'd like), and any stamp you later add to it, with or without a new mount, will cover up that space nicely. You'll have pages on brand new paper, and the condition of the mounts on the old pages will not matter.