Specimen Stamps ~ A Celebration.

I am not a collector of specimen stamps, but things do accumulate in my albums and this forum is a delightful excuse to go digging and see what I can come up with.

Here is a variation on the theme. Two sets from Curacao with the stamps demonetized (I think that's the correct term - if not, it's a good word that I just made up) with neat circular punches through the stamp.

And yet another. Who knew that I actually had these between the pages. An attractive set from New Zealand but I think I kept the Post Office Folder because of the intended use for revenue from the set.

Would these be true "Specimens" or do they actually belong as a Charity Stamp? Or Charity Label since they cannot be used as Postage? Or are all Specimens actually Labels, as they have absolutely no Postal Validity, and therefore should be categorized as Cinderellas?

I sometimes think that I missed my life calling and should have been a Librarian. And not a modern one either, out and dealing with the public, but one who spent an entire career immersed in the Dewey Decimal System in a dusty back room somewhere.

And I promise that this is the last addition to the thread. These are the Aussie stamps I have with a specimen overprint. These do not appear to have been shown earlier.

The celebration continues....

Super contributions from Curacao and Oz
and the presentation pack from the land of the long white cloud.

Thanks everyone!
Great stuff, images purloined :)

Thanks for showing the Curacao stamps..i don't think I have seen them before....another long lived thread !!

A bit battered, I know, but I like them:

These stamps were completely unnecessary. They did not commemorate Nelson, but rather a statue erected in his honour. The claim on the stamps that the statue in Barbados was the first is false, as a statue had been erected five years earlier in Montreal in 1808.

The statue was also not situated in the middle of a field of sugarcane, but rather on the docks in Georgetown.

Never mind the inaccuracies, I still like them!

Another KGV, this time a one-shilling example from the Leeward Islands

Rod222, I remember when Australia's highest commemorative stamp value reached or exceeded $1, for a short while these were Overprinted SPECIMEN - which on some was very hard to see due to stamp design/color.

Being undecided about purchasing singles or Blk's of 4, ended up getting them in sheet format.

Tuvalu overprint on Gilbert and Ellice Islands.

I have few Japanese sumiten dot and mihon overprints with Mihon printed 4 different ways.
60,63

A couple scott #64 with different mihon printing. a little smaller hopefully.

84 with tear



and finally some clean fresh looking 521 and 521b.