Lessons from a stamp album …… no. 1 ….. this is who we are

Now I know it is stating the obvious to say that postage stamps can and are political.

Like coinage they aim to say something about a country, whether it is the leader, its system of government or its achievements.

I still have a collection of British postage stamps to commemorate the Battle of Hastings and the Battle of Britain.

Although some may ponder on why Britain wanted to commemorate a battle in which the Norman French were victorious, but some one will have an explanation.

And that leads me to a short series based on the collection of stamps from our Stella, who having salvaged my stamp albums of the 1950s, went on to make her own during the 1970s and 80s.

Like many of the family treasures they came north from Well Hall after father died, and for a while sat in the cellar which on reflection was not the kindest of places.

Forty years in a dry but cold cellar allowed some of the lose stamps to get stuck together, but others fared better.

And so here are some of those stamps which she bought from dealers, coming in small packs which retailed at 15p a sheet.

To start the series I have selected some from the former communist states of Poland and the USSR, which carry a very overt political message.

That said I do have to confess I went for the Polish stamps first  for another reason than our Julia is Polish and along with our Saul lives in Poland.

Enough said.

Location Poland and the USSR,, 1970s, 

Pictures; stamps from Poland and the USSR, 1970s, from the collection of Stella Simpson

Lessons from a stamp album …… no. 2 ….. having fun

Yesterday I started the series on Lessons from a stamp album with the serious stuff, choosing Poland and the Soviet Union to explore the messages that states want to project.

So here were postage stamps about the victories of Polish arms in the Middle Ages and the heroicsacrifice of the Russian people in the last world war along with the achivements of Soviet space technology.

But today it  is fun.

And fun that comes in the form of stamps from Sharjah which my wikipedia tells me is is "the emirate Sharjah. 

The emirate shares legal, political, military and economic functions with the other emirates of the UAE within a federal framework, although each emirate has jurisdiction over some functions such as civil law enforcement and provision and upkeep of local facilities. 

Sharjah has been ruled by the Al Qasimi dynasty since the 18th century".

It is also the name for the capital of "the emirate", which is a centre for culture and industry, and alone contributes 7.4% of the GDP of the United Arab Emirates".*

Someone will know why it choses to go for a collection of stamps based on Walt Disney cartoon, but I am glad they did. 

Location; Sharjah 

Pictures; stamps from Sharjah, 1970s, from the collection of Stella Simpson

*Sharjah, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sharjah

The magic of collecting things …… a century and more of stamp albums … part 2

Now, today I have been trawling old stamp albums which belonged to me and our Stella.

The first was passed down to me sometime in the early 1950s and had already been lovingly looked after by someone else.

I can’t exactly date the album but there are clues that suggest it will have been produced some time in the 1920s and no later than the late 1930s.

So, one page refers to the Irish Free State, others to the British Dominions of Canada, New Zealand and Australia, and to the Italian Possessions and Colonies which were lost after the last world war.

Added to which there is no Israel, only the “British mandated territory of Palestine”

And I suppose it is of former European overseas empires, which help anchor it sometime before 1945.

India is listed as (British) with a separate section for the Indian Native States, and a whole swathe of modern African countries are listed under their colonial names, like Nyasaland Protectorate, Northern and Southern Rhodesia, and the Belgian Colonies.

Looking through it is to be confronted with several nasty dictators, including Hitler and Franco.

Although some of the stamps clearly postdate the interwar years and were added in a time when I was less aware of chronology.

But happily, there are enough to place the album in that time before the Second World War, making it a sort of history book.

Pictures; stamps from a stamp album, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

The magic of collecting things …… from stamps to loco numbers .... part 1

Now it is so easy to sneer and make cheap humour of people who collect things.

"embossed, unperforated stamp, issued in between 1847-54"

Of course, when the collecting is priceless art, or ancient objects that tends to be OK as if the quantity spent on an item makes it more acceptable.  

So, the acquisition of a genuine Picasso, or rare Roman funerary piece is seen as a legitimate hobby while standing on a railway platform recording the numbers on the side of locomotives is up for ridicule.

And that is a shame because train spotting could be a social event where kids got together, and shared knowledge, often in historic places. 

Not that I ever did collecting loco numbers because in the 1950s my bit of the Southern Region of British Railways was by and large about green electric trains which didn’t have the same magic as big and small steam locomotives.

But I did collect used postage stamps, helped by the fact one uncle lived in various bits of east Africa, and my grandmother was German and regularly received letters from Germany.

Added to this I had inherited a collection pf pre-war stamps.  To this my sister Stella added to over the years.

And these memories were reignited by my friend Ann who emailed me over some stampy pictures, commenting, “Yesterday we received a parcel, from a friend in England. 

He spends a good deal of time at car boot sales, and often picks up interesting things. 

He knows that I collect stamps, and over the last year has amassed an envelope of used stamps for me. 

I spent the afternoon sorting some of them out, and came across this little booklet, which I may have had since I was seven (1949), when my Mum gave me a small album, a packet of assorted stamps, and a book to help me start.

I thought you might be interested in the first couple of paragraphs on the inside cover. I think my Mum must have been ahead of her time!

I continued to collect stamps regularly, until about 1965/6, when the Post Office became more commercial, and began to produce 'Special' Issues several times a year and became too expensive to keep up.

That was also my first year of teaching, and in my enthusiasm, I held a small stamp club in my Art room.

Anyway, the booklet, inside cover page, also has some of my early stamps including this one which is an embossed, unperforated stamp, issued in between 1847-54. Not in brilliant condition, but quite rare”.

All of which has made me go look for my old stamp albums which span a century …. But that is for tomorrow.

Pictures; from the collection of Ann Love

Other people’s postage stamps ……. and the historian

 So, its nearly Christmas, which brings Christmas cards and other people’s postage stamps.

 

Nothing more exciting or profound, and the reason for the post is simply because I can …………..

 But there is a point.

 Sadly, in this electronic age, more of the family in Italy, Poland and Canada are beating postage backlogs and sending Christmas greetings down the line.

 Which is nice, quick, cheap, and reliable ……. but I think we lose something in the process.

Added to which not for the first time I have to reflect on how future historians will view our 21^st century love affair with ephemera, because however convenient using an email, Facebook Instagram or WhatsApp are, the messages are unlikely to be saved.

 And that means they are lost to the future, which reduces the possibility that a historian at the end of the century will have fewer letters, postcards or even documents to sift through and build a picture of an individual, or of how we lived.

 

Leading to that possible conclusion of future historians that the 21^st century was an illiterate and shadowy time.

 

Location; Italy and Belgium

 Pictures; other people’s postage stamps, 2020, from the collection of Andrew Simpson