How to Become Unhinged

A perennial problem with removing hinged stamps from old albums is that some will be stuck to the page and those that come off may well leave hinge remnants. The technique I use was described on several websites including Linns. It consists of first using tongs to hold the stamp as far off the album page as it will lift without tearing. I then lightly wet a small artists brush with water (a Q-tip would also work). I slowly move the brush back and forth between the hinge and the album page while simultaneously pulling the stamp/hinge off the page using the tongs. I like the brushes with slanted bristles. It is just like the sport of curling but without the skates. I suppose you could wear skates while you do this but I don't think it would help.


In cases where I have the stamp successfully detached but the hinge remnant refuses to separate from the album page, I brush a small amount of water directly on the remnant, wait a short amount of time, and then pick at the hinge with tongs. Generally it will come up without damaging the paper.

While this works for me most of the time, a recent thread on the Virtual Stamp Club forum suggested another approach. While the thread is devoted to separating stamps from envelopes it would appear applicable to album pages. The poster noted that a retired chemist he knows "uses and recommends common mineral spirits. Takes about 3 seconds, then slide tongs between stamp & envelope; lay stamp face down on paper towel, use Q-tip and fresh spirits to further clean back of stamp. Use talc, not talcum powder, to finish job." If I were going to try this, I probably would use oderless mineral spirits for artists.

Please let me know if you've tried mineral spirits and if it works more reliably than water.

Improved Coverage in the Later Editions

I've had a chance to make a better comparison between the 1947 edition of the International and the 1969 version. As mentioned in a previous post, I was pleasantly surprised to discover that the 1969 edition had improved coverage for some issues over the 1947 edition even though many stamps and even complete countries were dropped in the later version. The most dramatic improvement in the '69 was for Libya. In all cases, I do not know whether the additional stamps were added for the first time in the 1969 edition or had previously appeared in the 1955 or 1965 versions. At some point, I want to check this list against the latest version of the Blue (of which I only own part 1 of 4) to see if the changes "stuck." Here are my notes:

BRAZIL. The '69 has better coverage of postage dues than the '47.

CAMEROONS. The 1938 semi-postals are in the '69 but not the '47.

CONGO. More spaces in the '69 than the '47 for the 1930 and 1934 airmails.

COSTA RICA. Twice as many spaces for officials in the '69 than '47.

CUBA. Twice as many spaces for postage dues in the '69 than the '47.

DENMARK. Twice as many spaces for airmails in the '69 than the '47.

FRENCH EQUATORIAL AFRICA. Twice as many spaces for airmails in the '69 than the '47.

GRAND COMORO ISLANDS. 17 spaces for this country in the '69 vs. 8 in the '47.

FRENCH GUINEA. Better coverage of pre-1913 regular issues in the '69 than the '47.

FRENCH GUIANA. Better coverage of pre-1925 regular issues in the '69 than the '47.

INDO-CHINA. The '69 edition has 45 spaces for postage dues versus 35 in the '47.

ITALIAN COLONIES. The 1947 edition is missing the 1932 Dante overprints (8 values). However, the 1969 has only 4 spaces for the Garibaldi overprints versus 8 in the the 1947.

YUGOSLAVIA. The '69 has 17 spaces for postage dues versus 11 in the '47.

KUWAIT. 1969 has spaces for 4 additional values in the 1937 overprints (Scott 45-57).

LIBERIA. There are 7 spaces in the '47 for airmails vs 10 in '69. However, the additional airmails in the '69 is because Scott deleted spaces for the 1893 postage dues and the 1903 registration stamps.

LIBYA. The '69 has almost 3 full pages of semi-postals vs. 4 spaces in the '47! Also, the '69 has twice as many spaces for airmails.

MALAYA: PERAK. The '69 has better coverage of 1938-40 than the '47.

MIDDLE CONGO. The '69 doubles the spaces for 1933 regular issues but drops 13 spaces for the 1936 surcharges.

PERU. The '69 has 7 spaces for airmails missing in the '47.

POLAND. The '47 is missing the 1933 and 1935 officials that are in the '69.

SAAR. The '69 has more spaces for the 1927-34 regular issues and the 1922-23 officials than the '47.

SAN MARINO. There are a few additional spaces in the '69 vs. the '47.

SPANISH [WESTERN] SAHARA. There are 25 spaces for this country in the '47 vs. 43 spaces in the '69.

SWEDEN. The '69 adds 10 spaces for 1918 semi-postals missing from the '47.

SYRIA. The '69 drops three spaces for the 1920 overprints (Scott 64-81) but adds 2 stamps from 1940 not in the '47.

TRIPOLITANIA. Something of a mess. The '69 is missing regular issues from 1933-34 (14 spaces), a number of semi-postals, and 2 spaces for airmail special delivery that are in the '47, but has 20 spaces for semi-postal airmails versus 6 spaces in the '47.

UGANDA. There are 4 spaces for this country in the 47 vs. 10 in the '69.

In a later blog I'll summarize where the 1947 edition is superior to the 1969 version.

International Blue-per #3: Canada 1897 Jubilee Issue

"Blue-pers" is my silly name for mistakes, errors, inconsistencies, etc. in the Scott Volume 1. My first two examples represented two categories: 1) what I can only assume was a practical joke at the expense (pun intended) of collectors; and 2) an orphan--i.e., a stamp that was in the Scott Catalog when the album was originally compiled but has been delisted. I suspect that this second category will account for most Blue-pers. But with the Canada 1897 Jubilee Issue, we have an example of a mistake by the editors.

At some point after the 1955 Blue ("Thanks John for this info") but no later than the 1969 edition, Scott revised the first page for Canada. In doing so, the editors left two spaces for the 1897 Jubilee Issue, one illustrated with a cut for the 1/2c black (Scott 50) and the other a blank. The problem is that on the next page for Canada are eight spaces for the exact same series, this time with illustrations for Scott 50, 51, 52, 53, and 54 plus 3 blank spaces for the higher values.


What probably motivated the remodeling of the front page was to remove a space for what had been Scott 35, the 2c blue green Small Queen. In later catalogs this color been demoted to a minor listing as Scott 36d. In the photo, 36 is on the left, 36d the right. Here's a link to a very informative website on the Small Queens.



You have to wonder whether no one brought this duplication of the Jubilees to Scott's attention over the past 50 years? Their editors have been rearranging other pages and surely could have corrected this Blue-per with little effort.

So what's a stamp collector to do? You can't have a complete volume 1 if you have blank spaces, no matter how legitimate the reason! So do you duplicate two of the stamps on both pages? Put the first two stamps from the set (the 1/2c black and 1c orange) on page 1 and 8 of the remaining stamps on page 2? Put something on page 1 to cover up the two erroneous spaces? A major factor is that the 1/2c is not a cheap stamp as you might expect--in 2007 it cataloged $100. And the higher values of the Jubilees are even more pricey.

I guess we should be grateful that, as far as I know, Volume 1 doesn't have the problem that occurs in one or more of the later Blue Internationals of spaces for stamps that were announced but never issued.

New Years Resolutions

There has been a thread on the Virtual Stamp Club devoted to resolutions relating to stamp collecting, so I might as well post mine:

1. Prepare five "duplicate" albums for sale on eBay after verifying that I've transferred all stamps of interest to my "Blue" Volume 1. I've actually completed one album, a 1947 edition of the "Blue," and used this as an opportunity to make notes on differences between the 1947 edition and my 1969. I'll post these in a couple of days.

2. As a corollary to my first resolution, buy a nice fat 1840-1940 collection with the proceeds to continue to build my Volume 1.

3. Count the number of stamps issued between 1840 and 1940 based on the Scott Classic Catalogue. While I've seen several estimates for the number of stamps issued to the present day (500K, give or take), I'm surprised I haven't been able to find numbers for the first hundred years of philately--a much simpler task. Anyway, I'm now in the "C's" with this project, but at the rate I'm going, it will probably be the Spring before this resolution is accomplished. The count will also give a rough breakdown by regular postage, airmails, semi-postals, etc.

Well, that should be enough to keep me busy. Vis-a-vis Resolution #1, below are pictures of my workspace for transferring stamps between two albums. I'm using the plastic drafting tables made by Ikea. These raise the albums enough to make them easier to browse and I like the round holders for keeping track of hinges (in the Ziplock bag), tongs, etc. My only "complaint" is that I wish the lips on the bottom of the drafting tables could be a little higher to hold albums more securely.

If you haven't read it, check out reader Zenabi's comments on why he likes the computer created album pages produced by William Steiner on his Stamp Albums Web.

While Zenabi makes a good case for using computer generated pages as opposed to traditionally printed albums, I still have to come to terms with two concerns about any type of "comprehensive" album. The first concern, which I admittedly feel less strongly about than when I first started this blog, is that, whether it is the "Brown" Internationals or the Stamp Web pages, you can never complete these comprehensive world albums. More to the point, not only would they never be complete, my original assumption was that you would be forever reminded of the futility of your collecting choice by the many hundreds of empty or scarcely filled pages. While some collectors view this as a challenge, I worry it would be a constant reminder that no matter how much time or money I spent, the albums would look empty. But after studying scans on the Internet of some comprehensive collections, I realize that there are enough "common" stamps that most of the spaces in the albums will still be the ones in the "Blue" International and that one might very well feel a certain sense of accomplishment even if the "Blue Mauritius" and similar rarities were forever beyond reach. As Lawrence Block wrote: "When you collected the whole world, your albums held spaces for many more stamps than you would ever be able to acquire...You tried to fill all the spaces, of course--that was the point--but it was the trying that brought you pleasure, not the accomplishment." And in your quest you would be following in the hallowed footsteps of Ferrary, Hind, and other renowned philatelic giants of yore.

The second concern is more difficult for me to work around. The Stamp Albums Web Classic Era pages take up over 6500 pages. (His British Commonwealth pages follow the Scott Classics Catalogue by going through the reign of George VI.) Even stuffing 600+ pages to a large binder, this would require ten binders. Subway Stamp Shop estimates that their "Brown" reprints would take 19 binders to house properly. As Subway makes money from selling the binders, this estimate may be rather liberal, but still you will end up wanting something like a stamp den (stamp nook? stamp cave?) to house your collection as shown in this recent eBay auction photo.



While this type of arrangement would make it easy to cope with a large collection, my problem is I like the freedom of housing my entire holdings in two binders which I can play with on the couch while watching TV. You could argue that realistically one is rarely working on more than a single country at any one time, and, not that you would be so rude as to say this to my face, I could use the exercise of getting up now and then to switch albums. One of Zenabi's points is that you don't have to print all of the pages at once. What I could do is to print out the album pages one country at a time, remounting the stamps from my existing "Blue" before going on to the next country.

I've been meaning for some time to take out a subscription to Stamp Album Web so this has motivated me to do so. It will be fun comparing these pages with the "Blue."

Gratuitous December Post

I've been trying not to blog anything purely personal--i.e., stuff with no possible utility to anyone else. But being afraid 2009 would come and go with no posts for December, I'm breaking my rule to comment on why I haven't added more than a handful of stamps since the summer. My excuse is eBay. I'm still trying to secure one more International Volume 1 or its equivalent which is sufficiently comprehensive that I can extract at least a thousand stamps for my album, preferably more. Unfortunately, in spite of the complaints on some of the lists I read about eBay stamp sales tanking, the eBay market is hot this year for good classic era collections.

By way of comparison, for about a six month period in 2008 I kept a spreadsheet tallying the over 100 worldwide collections offered on eBay during that time frame that had significant coverage from 1840-1940. The most expensive item during that time period sold for $870.00. Just this month in 2009, there is an "Antique Stamp Collection in Scott Brown Album..." that sold earlier today for $3100. A 3 volume international (1840-1949) sold a few days ago for $1326. Two Scott browns sold at the beginning of the month for $2024 and $2950. Now admittedly these particular collections have Scott catalog values of 10 times or more the selling amount, but we're still looking at almost all of the large collections selling for over $1000 during the past few months versus none fetching above $1K for at least half of 2008. Most of the higher priced collections are being offered by NYStamps who provides an estimated catalog value (often in Euros for some reason) and generally a couple of hundred photos. This is contrast to the sellers in 2008 who usually did not give catalog values but often provided a ballpark count but not necessarily much in the way of photographs.

As I can't justify spending a couple of thousand at one time for a collection (even if I expect to recoup a fair amount of that when resold), this is motivating me to work through most of the albums I've accumulated to prepare them for sale on eBay. The reason I've been holding on to them is that these albums still hold stamps that are not in my edition of the Scott International and I've been dithering about whether to ignore stamps for which there are no spaces or save them on stock pages. I'm finally decided to go the stock page route, aided by Subway having a great sale on double sided black stock sheets (buy 5 packages at a reduced price and receive a 6th free). Hopefully, I can complete this project within the next couple of months and use the proceeds to help pay for one large collection. Then I'll switch over to bidding on single country/regional collections for awhile and see how that goes.

Bosnia & Herzegovina Addendum

In poking around the Amos Advantage site, I came across the following: "Scott International Album Pages: Bosnia & Herzegovina 1879-2007 (92 Pages / 45 Sheets, [Product Number 800BOH]). This addendum to the Scott International Album contains pages for Bosnia & Herzegovina. Coverage includes stamps released by the Muslim Government as well as those issued by the Bosnian Croat and Bosnian Serb Administrations." I can't find any information about this Addendum elsewhere on the web, so I don't know what is going on. The Volume 1 already has 5 pages for Bosnia & Herzegovina starting with 1879. Are these repeated in the Addendum? Has anyone seen these pages?