Album pages common designs - 2a. 1978 25th anniversary of the Coronation

In the series of my self made albums, a new entry on the common design stamps.
In 1978, the world, and the British Commenwealth in particular, celebrated the 25th anniversary of the Coronation of Queen Elisabeth II.

20 (21) countries participated with a strip of 3 stamps, issued in sheetlets of 6.

Common Design 326

Christmas Island and Cayman Islands

Many more countries issued stamps in regards to this anniversary, but some had a totally different design, (Great Britain for example) and many others used another 'common design'.

25th anniversary Great Britain

other 'common designs' for the 25th anniversary

The other stamps with a common design, will be topic of another post.

For this issue, the following countries each issued a strip of 3 stamps, always with Queen Elisabeth II in the middle, and two royal symbols left and right.

1. Ascension Island : Lion - QE II - Green turtle 
2. Barbados : Griffin of Eduard III - QE II - Pelican
3. Belize : White lion of Mortimer - QE II - Maya jaguar
4. British Antartic Territory : Black bull of Clarence - QE II - Emperor penguin
5. Cayman Islands : Yale of Beaufort - EQ II - Screech owl
6. Christmas Island : White swan of Bohun - QE II - Abbott's booby
7. Falkland Islands : Red dragon of Wales - QE II - Hornless ram

Fiji and Falkland Islands

8. Fiji : White hart of Richard II - QE II -  Banded Iguana
9. (The) Gambia : White greyhound of Richmond - QE II -  Lion
10. Gilbert Islands : Unicorn of Scotland - QE II - Great frigate bird
11. Mauritius: Antelope of Bohun - QE II - Dodo
12a. New Hebrides Condominium (BR) : White horse of Hanover - QE II - Gallic cock
12b. Condominium des Nouvelles-Hebrides (FR) : Le Cheval blanc d'Hanover - QE II - Le coq gaulois
13. St Helena : Black dragon of Ulster - QE II -  Sea lion

British and French New Hebrides

14. St Christopher/Nevis/Anguila : Falcon of Eduard III - QE II - Pelican
15. Samoa :  King's lion - QE II - Pacific pigeon
16. Solomon Islands : King's dragon - QE II - Sandford eagle
17. South Georgia : Panther of Henry VI - QE II - Fur seal
18. Swaziland : Queen's lion - QE II - African elephant
19. Tristan da Cunha : King's bull - QE II - Tristan crawfish
20. British Virgin Islands : Falcon of the Plantagents - QE II - Iguana

British Virgin Islands

Download the album here : Common Design 326

to be continued ...

Call me by your number - 01c Black, red and blue pennies

From 1858 on, till 1869, new plates were issued, with red pennies, and blue 2 pence stamps.

Now the four corners have letters BA-AB for row A, column B.
There are 240 stamps in each plate, going from AA to TL.

For the 1 penny red:

Row R (18), stamp B (2)

Plate numbers are now mentioned in the left and right border decoration of the stamp.

The 1 penny red and perforated with 4 letters (one in each corner), had an extended life span.
They were printed from 1858 till 1879. Therefore, many plates were used, re-used, and retouched during those many years.

They started with plates 69 and 70, but due to many defects on the plate, those stamps were never printed. Same goes for plates 75, 126 and 128 - plate 77 was also rejected, but very few of the printed stamps did get into ciruclation and are therefore extremely rare.
A "77" is most likely a "117" or a "177",  or a completely forged stamp.

A much more challanging collection, is the compilation of a red penny (perforated) of each plate.
The total amount of issued, perforated red pennies, is 13,434,000,000 (55,975,000 sheets). 
So the amount of stamps is not the main problem.

But, first of all, plate numbers are not always very clearly printed, and greasy cancels will not make your search easier either. Plate numbers exist from plate 71 till plate 225.

Plate 225

With some help from the computer, the colours of the image can be altered, so that the contrast becomes more useful to determinate the plate number.
The stamp above leads me to plate 225 (or the last issued plate).

Two albums for possible collections :

plate numbers 1p

plate reconstruction 1p

For the 2 pence blue:

Row H (8), stamp F (6)

Plate numbers are now again in the left and right border decoration of the stamp.

Plate 8

The stamp above is from plate 8, the second plate used to print the 2 penny of this new series.
Plates 7, 8, 9, 12, 13, 14 and 15 can be found.

These blue pence stamps are still affordable, and although 'old', they were emitted in such high quantities, about 196,824,000 (820,100 sheets), that they still can be found in (older) albums.

A full collection (240 of each plate), requires 1680 stamps.
More common is to compile a mixed sheet, with all plate positions.

However, feel free to collect them both : a reconstructed plate with all letter variations, and / or even more specific with stamps  .

Two albums for possible collections :

plate numbers 2p

plate reconstruction 2p

to be continued...

Call me by your number - 01b Black, red and blue pennies

A third variation of the Victorian pennies: are the perforated red penny and blue 2 pence.
They come in two variations, watermark small crown and watermark large crown, and perforation 14 or perforation 16.

As for now, all stamps mentioned here and in my previous post, have only two letters in the bottom of the stamp, and no plate number in the left and right margin.

These stamps are also called the red and blue 'star' penny.
The upper corners of the stamps don't have letters yet, but a decoration in a 'star' shape.
Again here, the specificy font of the alphabet, gives you an indication of the plate the were on, but plate numbers are not written on the stamps.

Also here, a sheet reconstruction is possible, compiling all 240 stamps from AA to TL.
It is also possible, to start two plate reconstructions for stamps with a large or a small crown watermark, as well as two plate reconstructions for stamps perforated 14 or perforated 16...

Red star penny plate reconstruction 

Blue star 2 pence plate reconstruction 

to be continued...

Call me by your number - 01a Black, red and blue pennies

A penny for your thoughts, but which one...
The 'first' (black) penny is unperforated, and has letters in the bottom corners only.

There were 11 plates, and plate I was divided into plate IA and IB.
It takes a whole study on its own, as the differences are found in the use of different fonts of the alphabet.

1 penny black

The total number of 1p blacks distributed in 1840 is recorded as 63,561,840... this isn't a low number, but in 1840 there were hardly people collecting stamps, and lots of stamps were lost.

2 pence blue

A 2 pence stamp was also issued in 1840.

It has the same features as the 1p, unperforated, letters in the lower corners only -> AA to TL

The total number of 2d Blues recorded as sold in 1840 is 5,382,240. (plates 1 and 2)

This 2p was issued again in 1841, now about 87,960,000 stamps (plates 3 and 4)

1 penny red

Second in line, are the inperforated 1p red pennies.

Total number issued over 2,588,000,000 of which it is estimated 120,000,000 were later perforated, leaving an approximate total of imperforate stamps of 2,468,000,000...

They were printed on plates 1 to 131, but the plate numbers do NOT appear on the stamps.

see link above for the album.

Therefore, I have made a 'basic' album for those who want to collect all letter combinations AA to TL, and another 'basic' album, for those who want to collect all plate number, regardless the corner letters.

full reconstruction of a sheet
source : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penny_Black_printing_plates

I once had the opportunity to see a full reconstruction of a red penny plate. This was collected throughout many years, by one senior member of our stamp club, Peter.

First downloadable documents, are blank album, for all 240 pennies, with letters in 2 lower corners (imperforated).
The reason for this 'odd' number of 240, lies in the fact that till 1971, the imperial system was used.
1 British pound (£),  was worth 20 shillings, and one shilling was 12 pence.
Hence, each row of 12 black/red pennies, was worth one shilling, and all 20 rows together made the cost of one full sheet 1£.

Plate reconstruction 1 penny black

Plate reconstruction 2 pence blue

Plate reconstruction 1 penny red

It can be used for black and or red pennies, and also for the blue 2 pence stamps.
As the first stamps had no plate numbers printed on the stamps, it's very hard to compile a full sheet from the same plate.

to be continued....

Call me by your number - 00 b Introduction

From the 'black penny in 1840, till the emission of 1883, plate numbers can be found on the stamps.
Each of the plates had 240 stamps. Most of them were issued on sheets of 20 rows and 12 columns.

An option would have been to 'number' those rows and columns, but letters were chosen instead.
Rows went from A to T, and columns from A to L; resulting in 240 stamps from AA to TL.

The letters to determinate, are the ones on the bottom of the stamp.
Below is a stamp (plate 22) - position K D (not DK !) - so row 11, stamp 4

plate 22 - position KD

One special version of the black penny, is with letters VR by the way.
These do not appear on a 'normal' sheet of 240 (nor does RV), they refer to the Latin Victoria Regina (Queen Victoria) and were used as service (official) stamps. 

Not only one can start looking for all possible plate numbers of one particular issue, (not always mentioned in regular catalogs by the way), but also the different positions of each stamp within the different plates.

For the depicted stamp above, there were 17 plates with a pink 2 1/2d stamp, and 7 plates (17 till 23) with the blue version. A total of 5760 'different' stamps to search for...

to be continued ...

 

Call me by your number - 00 a Introduction

Numbers have always been appealing to people.
But for once, the question is not 'how many stamps do you have'... but which numbers do you have.

Collecting different images on stamps, and later discovering errors in those images, is already a very pleasing activity.
But what if it was made 'simple' ... just collecting the numbers appearing on the stamps.

In the beginning, british stamps were printed on numbered plates. Those numbers were however not printed somewhere at the top or the bottom of that sheet, but on the stamps theirselves.

On US stamp sheets, the plate numbers can be found in the border frame of the sheets.

Plate 170, with the name of the printing company

Only stamps with a certain part of the border paper, will reveil the plate number.
You need to be lucky somehow, to find the different plate numbers, as they are not part of the stamp, and might have been thrown away long time ago.

The british stamps however had their plate numers printed ON the stamp itself.
As there were many prints of the same stamps, over the years, identical looking stamps, had possibly different plate numbers.

a red penny - plate 107

Some plates got distroyed, due to failiures, damage, ... so various plate numbers became more rare than others. 

The perforated red penny, was first printed on plate 69, and ended with plate 225.
Plate 69 and 70 however were rejected (not issued), and also 75, 126 and 128 were destroyed.
3 more plates, 226, 227 and 228 were prepared, but never used.
The most notorious plate, plate 77 was also rejected, but some of the printed stamps did manage to come into circulation. Their value is now sky rocketing.

After the black, red and blue pennies, plate numbers restarted from 1 again.
Some of them are very visible, others are more difficult to find, especially on used stamps.

Other examples :

plate 14

plate 22

plate 14

plate 8

plate 18

 

plate 15

plate 1

plate 2

 

plate 13

 

a difficult one ... plate 13

to be continued...

Theme : 1st issues : 12 Guatemala

Guatemala is a Republic, located in central America.

In the North, it has a border with Mexico, in the East with Belize, in the South East with Honduras, and in the South with El Salvador.

It is the native land of most of the Mayan culture. Until 1821, it was under Spanish rule, till it became 'independent' as part of the Mexican Empire.

Together with Costa Rica, El Salvador, Honduras and Nicaragua, they formed thé federal Republic of central America.
Around 1839, this republic was dissolved and Guatemala became it's first own constitution in 1841.

Although the national bird, the Quetzal, is on many stamps, the first issue of 1871 depicts the coat of arms.

1 st stamp of Guatemala, 1871

Guatemalan stamps are in general not expensive, and certainly worth collecting.

Odd stamps : 06 q Stamps on cotton / silk

In 2017, Hong Kong emitted a set of 6 stamps, dedicated to fashion of the 1920's to the 1970's.
The stamps came as single stamps, but also as a sheet, with 3 of each.

set of 6 fashion stamps Hong Kong 2017

Hong Kong fashion 2017 sheet of 18

For this post however, I need to show the two addional values of this set.

The first one, a $10 stamp was issued on an another miniature sheet, holding only that one stamp.

Here we see a lady, and the stamp is in the shape of a dress.

$10 stamp fashion week

Finally, also a $20 stamp was issued, again in a souvenir sheet, but this time, the issue is emitted on silk. The shape and design are identical to the $10 stamp, but with a silver, glowing image.

$20 souvenir sheet

odd shape, odd texture

Odd stamps : 02h Silver / golden stamps

Another gold foil stamp came to my attention, right at the moment that a good friend of mine was in Luxemburg.
In 1923 a statue was inaugurated, as a remembrance for the victims of the first world war, in Luxemburg, and those who volunteerd for Luxemburg in that time.
However, during the second word war, the nazis took down the momument.

It was fully restored in 1984, and is now a symbol of independence for the people of Luxemburg.
The sculptor, Nicolas (Claus) Cito, born in Luxemburg, and educated in Brussels, never saw the complete restauration, as he died in 1965.

Claus Cito, by August Macke (1906-1907)

The figure, a golden lady ("Gëlle Fra", in Luxemburgish), is inspired by Niké, the greek godess of Victory, it is a gilden bronze statue, on a 21 meter tall granite obelisk.

Gëlle Fra (Golden Lady)-monument

100 years after the first inauguration of the monument, the Luxemburg postal office, emitted a stamp to commemorate and honour the statue and the scultor.

No better way to do so, was to emit a stamp with golden overprint.
Thanks to my friend Eric, I got a postally used stamp.

postally used Gëlle Fra-stamp

But even greater was my surprise, when we met for real, and the gave me a commemorative sheet of 4, with a certificate of authenicity.

100 years of the 'Golden Lady'

this certificte states, that real gold was used

Odd stamps : 06 p Stamps on cotton / silk

Recently I was lucky to find a stamp that emitted in Switzerland in 2000.
It is the world's first embroided stamp, face value of 5 Swiss Francs.

Even in 2000 it was not easy to obtain the stamp, and even collectors with a subscription to the new issues of Switzerland, sometimes had to wait to get this particular stamp.

the world's first embroided stamp

The 'stamp' is auto-adhesive and rectangular, without perforations. It has a flower design and the word HELVETIA (Latin name of Switzerland).
The stamps were emitted in blocks of 4, forming a sheetlet with an additional embroided border.

One week later however, my joy was complete, as a full sheet of this stamp also came to auction.
There were no bidders (although not many Switserland collectors have the full sheet in their collection), so I obtained this piece of art, for a very affordable price.

Full sheet of the embroided Swiss stamp (2000)

to be continued...

Odd stamps : 06 p Stamps on cotton / silk

Once again, a new smooth stamp/sheetlet from Thailand.
Depicting two pets, a dog with a cat on his back, and printed on velvet paper.
Touching the stamp/sheetlet, it feels like petting the animals for real.

This sheetlet of 25 baht, is only issued on 300,000 copies. A rather small number for a country with almost 70 million people (2024).
It was issued on February 2024 to commemorate the 'Love your pet - day'.
The stamp was printed on velvet paper, to promote philately.

In the bottom corner of the sheetlet, we see a qr-code which leads to the website of the Thai post.
For those who don't speak phasa Thai (Thai), the site is also available in phasa Ankrit (English):

Thailandpost.co.th

to be continued....

Theme : 1st issues : 11 Great Britain

I have posted many nr 1's so far, but the absolute 1st number one is of course the famous 'black penny'.

Issued on May 1, 1840, changed the whole postal system in use at that time.
No longer the one who received the mail had to pay, but the sender could buy a 'stamp' to pay for sending a message over mail to another person.

The first stamp did not bear any name of country, as it was issued in the UK only.
This privilege is still valid until today, as the United Kingdom, is the only country in the world, that has no country name mentioned on it's stamps.

1840 Black Penny

In the image we see Queen Victoria, designed by Charles Health, after a sketch made by Henry Corbould. He was inspired by an engraver named William Wyon, who made a medal for the Queen's visit to London in 1837.

The first stamp came in sheets of 240 stamps. 24 rows of 12 stamps. Nowadays, stamps are often printed in sheets of 100 or an equivalent of 100's. But in 1840, the British were not using the decimal system yet.
A 'pound' (£) used to be the value of a pound of silver (= 0.45359237 kg).
1 pound was devided into 20 shillings, and one shilling devided into 12 pence each.
Although the decimal system is more logical (we have 10 fingers), this predecimal system had many advantages too, as 240 can be divided by 2,3,4,5,6,8,10,15,16,20,24,30,40,60, 80 and 120, where '100' only can be divided by 2,4,5,10,20,25 and 50.

The sheet of 240 stamps of this black penny, have letters in the lower corners. Each combination depends on the position on the sheet.

position of black pennies in a sheet

Each row of 12 makes one shilling, twenty rows of 1 shilling, make one pound.
The letter left on the stamp, indicates the row, and the one right the column.
The stamp shown above (B J) is therefore in position 22.

Although each stamp on the sheet has the same value, the ones in with double letters, i.e. AA, BB, CC, ... are sought. Stamps in the border of the sheet, often have better margins, some even with extra information.

From this issue, 286,670 sheets were printed, good for over 68,8 million black pennies. Estimated is, that about 1,3 million of them survived time.

Theme : 1st issues : 10 Nepal

This 'first issue' is a special one.

Nepal 1885

What is on the cover?

The stamps on the cover are genuine (Michel nrs 1Bc (light blue) - 2B (dull lilac) and 3B (yellowish green). The stamps were issued in 1881 on European paper. The cancels are genuine as well.

But the back side has handwritten text speaks of 1885.
We are talking about a registered mail with stamps from the 1st issue of Nepal (1881), and there are 3 different stamps on the cover, used in 1885...

This is what the experts say (CH - October 2022):

"The stamps are stuck at the bottom of an envelope with a handwritten departure stamp Parewadada March 12, 1885 on the back, and an entry registration of March 24, 1885. They do not belong on this cover and are intended to simulate an extraordinarily rare registered postage from the first edition."

Were the stamps added later on, to make it more valuable?
Never the less, the three stamps are real and postally used, which makes it a rare document in my collection.

Nepal 1Bc (blue) and 2B (lilac) according Michel

Nepal 3B (green) according Michel

to be continued...