One of my many hobbies is "stamp collecting". I started collecting as a teenager, sticking them into paper albums using Stamp hinges, the way most people start. Though I've gone for decades at a time without ever looking at my collection, I've never wanted to part with it.
Although I have a few stamps 'of interest' none of them have any real value. Many stamps these days are commemoratives and can be quite large, glossy, and colourful works of art. These are great ways of learning about World History as most significant events around the world are commemorated with an issue of stamps.
These days my stamps are stored in Stock Books, which allow the stamps to be stored loose without attaching them to the page. I have just over 10,000 stamps from 202 countries and I believe this to be what 'real collectors' would call a small collection.
I once asked an online group of stamp collectors what stamps I should collect, which was a silly question, because the answer came back "whatever interests you". Duh!! Why didn't I think of that? But that answer explains exactly why my albums contain many old and damaged stamps that most collectors would throw in the bin. I am much more interested in the age of a stamp than it's condition. I marvel at how a small rectangle of paper can have been licked, stuck on an envelope, man-handled over land, sea and air, stuffed into bags, thrown from container to container, poked through letter boxes in all weathers and eventually discarded ... yet still be intact today, over 150 years later. So if it has a corner missing, a tear, or damaged perforations, so what? It's still worthy of having a place in my collection. Sure, it has no value, but to me that's not the point.
John this certainly seems like a wonderful hobby. I work in an office where some folks use up their oldest stamps on their bills and I cut them off and keep them for future mixed media pieces. Great point though at how such small pieces of paper manage to survive down through the years. Thanks for sharing some of your collection. Hope you are having a great week. Hugs!
ReplyDeleteUsing old stamps for mixed media pieces sounds like a great idea Debbie. What a novel way of giving them a new life.
DeleteStamps are really so interesting. The designs and the locations they came from, the history they are representing, all teach us something about our world. As a kid I had a stamp collection, but I have no recollection of what happened to it. I know we would get excited if mail came from out of the country. Relatives in Poland corresponded with my grandmother, and I had a pen-pal that lived in England. Enjoy!!
ReplyDeleteYour recollections brought back some memories for me Joan, of letters from Australian relatives and my teenage American pen-pal. Thank you.
DeleteMy grandfather was a collector, and so was my mother. She collected stamps with a theme. Flowers for instance. I love the old ones though, with the history attached to it.
ReplyDeleteI've often thought about starting another collection based on a theme, but can't settle on a subject. Thank you Judy.
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