This Is Similar To My View On Stamp Hinges

I saw a post elsewhere their view on hinges matches this scene on hangers

Beneath the placid philatelic exterior lies your inner Joan Crawford waiting to be channeled, eh?

That movie creeped me out as a kid.

I did not like the movie either.

By contrast, it became a running joke between a friend and her Mum (newly christened "Mommie Dearest"). "No wire hangers" became a catchphrase for them.

I am pulling hinged stamps from a collection. Many of the mint were hinged but the entire stamp was stuck to the page. I will need to soak the ones I want to keep.

If you soak them just long enough to remove the hinge/paper, you can sometimes save a fair amount of the gum. Very frustrating, though.

Blame the dry cleaner - or seller

For me, hinges are archaic. I only use hingeless albums. If those are too expensive for the value of the collection, then I invest in mounts. But to each, his/her own.

To me using hinges instead of mounts is akin to having a rotary phone instead of a cell in 2023.

Philatelic malpractice

Hinges still have value to young and older beginning collectors, although stock pages and books are always encouraged.

In presentational terms, stamps, particularly used stamps, are more attractive when hinged. Much of the obsession with plastic mounts reflects neurosis or indolence.

Funny thing is there is another topic discussing why younger people do not get into the hobby, then we see this topic denigrating what people may be doing and actually driving them away from the hobby, or at least this forum. There will be topics about how crystal mounts are ruining the gum on your stamps but then other topics that say all your material and plate blocks from 1940 onward is only worth half of face value and you might as well use it for postage. So... what's the difference if it's sitting in crystal mounts or even on hinges if it's only postage anyway. This week I have been working on Netherlands and Denmark. I have 300-400 different stamps for each country and most of them are used. The catalog value on the majority of them is minimal. Why would I spend 15 cents to mount a 2 cent stamp. The $60 dollars for each country that would cost is prohibitive for many people and hinges make the cost acceptable. The $60 dollars doesn't sound like much but I have dozens of countries to go thru. Or perhaps in some peoples view I should buy a $400 hingeless album to put my $30 worth of stamps in? There are many levels of available capital people have to put into the hobby, all of them should be respected. (As long as your not glueing them loose to leaf paper of course)

Actually, it is called "expressing an opinion". Healthy dialogue allows all opinions. Echo chambers are so boring but there seem to be a lot of them around these days.




Hardly even close to what has been said or done here.