Finally Able To Return To Ww Collecting.

Hello Everyone,
I wanted to introduce myself as a new member of this community. Like many of you I started stamp collecting as a child in the 1970's. My Grandfather introduced me to the hobby and my mother also fed the habit on occasion. I had the typical starter Harris Traveler album and can still remember going to an actual brick and mortar stamp store in Missouri.

I collected up through High School and then set aside the collection in my college years. I inherited my Grandfather's collection in 1981 and just made sure it was stored properly.

About 2010 I took two of my daughters to an actual brick and mortar stamp store in Oklahoma City (Alexanders) hoping to get them interested in the hobby. The seeds were planted anyway. It was at that time that I decided to pull out Grandad's collection and mine but didn't really have a lot of time to invest in the hobby. He had 3 Citation Albums and a Regent Album through 1962 plus multiple stock books. Also, a large box of unorganized material that he had purchased in the 1950's. At that time I just simply organized the stamps by country and placed them into glassine envelopes. I also started making a few stamp purchases here and there.

Fast forward to present day. The kids are grown and I finally have time to learn about stamp collecting. I have returned with a passion for collecting world wide. I tried to narrow down to a few countries but just couldn't do it.

I have to admit that I lurked here for quite some time before joining. I have appreciated reading and learning so much about the hobby from all of you. I still have so much to learn but am greatly enjoying the process. I have made some mistakes along the way. Oh well such as life goes right?

Recently, I just finished placing Grandad's and my stamps into a set of Minkus Supremes newly printed from Amos that cover the 1840-1976 period. I don't really have a cut off date as I do have several thousand stamps from the 1980's on up. However, my main focus is on the classic period thru mid 20th century. If I find Minkus pages that are in good condition I will add them to my album, otherwise I plan to use Album easy or Steiner pages to supplement the years that I do not have.

I believe I have rattled on long enough. I look forward to reading future posts and sharing pages as I complete them.
Sincerely,
Genifer

Welcome to SCF, Genifer!!

Thank you!

Welcome Gbgolf! Mid 20th century is a good cutoff. My collection ends mid 50s. Still lots of great engraving going on at that point.

Welcome Gbgolf!! I grew up in OKC and went to Alexanders often. Bought my first stamp with my own money there. It was a used Scott #296. Its still open I hear and run by his son I think.

Regards,
harper1249

Welcome aboard Genifer.

Making mistakes is normal. Half the battle is not repeating them!

Any questions just fire away, there's plenty of knowledgeable folks here

Gbgolf,

Collecting for the enjoyment of collecting, whatever that might be, is the name of the game. Don't hesitate to ask questions especially if you need basic information and especially more advanced sources of information for any possible topic. You should be able to find folks on this board a little further along on their collecting journey glad to share experiences.

My personal bias is a used stamp loses the story of its journey in the postal service when it is removed from the cover it transported to its destination. Collecting postal history adds a whole new aspect to your journey in our hobby.

Wishing you many enjoyable future days in our hobby. Russ

Thank you everyone for the warm welcome. I look forward to learning from everyone. Right now I am trying to decide upon the best place to purchase stamps. What is the best strategy for building a WW collection? Any suggestions would be welcomed.

Well, I think it really depends on what you enjoy, Gbgolf. I myself hate the look of a mostly-empty album, so I'd probably look to online or an auction to pick up a started WW collection, or some good country collections. But I've found the in-person connection at my nearby brick-and-mortar stamp shop to be most satisfying in terms of being able to examine the material first and learning from someone knowledgeable.

If you like sorting through things, a large miscellaneous packet of Worldwide can be extremely pleasurable.