Stamp collecting is the collecting of postage stamps and related objects. It is related to philately, which is the study of stamps. It has been one of the world's most popular hobbies since the late nineteenth century with the rapid growth of the postal service, as a never-ending stream of new stamps was produced by countries that sought to advertise their distinctiveness through their stamps.
Postal service in the United States began with the delivery of stampless letters whose cost was borne by the receiving person, later encompassed pre-paid letters carried by private mail carriers and provisional post offices, and culminated in a system of universal prepayment that required all letters to bear nationally issued adhesive postage stamps.
The Royal Philatelic Collection is the postage stamp collection of the British Royal Family. It is the most comprehensive collection of items related to the philately of the United Kingdom and the British Commonwealth, with many unique pieces. Of major items, only the British Guiana 1c magenta is missing from the collection of British Imperial stamps.
The Hawaiian Missionaries are the first postage stamps of the Kingdom of Hawaii, issued in 1851. They came to be known as the "Missionaries" because they were primarily found on the correspondence of missionaries working in the Hawaiian Islands. Only a handful of these stamps have survived to the present day, and so they are amongst the great rarities of philately.
John Alexander Tilleard was a British solicitor and the philatelist who was the first curator of the Royal Philatelic Collection.
Sir Edward Denny Bacon, KCVO was a British philatelist who helped with the enlargement and mounting of collections possessed by rich collectors of his time and became the curator of the Royal Philatelic Collection between 1913 and 1938.
Sir John Mitchell Harvey Wilson, 2nd Baronet was a British philatelist and Keeper of the Royal Philatelic Collection from 1938 to 1969. He introduced the division of the collection by reign and, after World War II, loans from the collection to international exhibitions.
Sir John Brook Marriott was a British teacher and philatelist. He was the keeper of the Royal Philatelic Collection between 1969 and 1995.
Michael Richard Sefi LVO is a British philatelist and was the Keeper of the Royal Philatelic Collection from 1 January 2003.
Surésh Dhargalkar was a British architect. He spent all his career at the service of the British monarchy: first to maintain the royal castles, then to help manage the Royal Philatelic Collection after 1996.
Mauritius, a small island in the southwest Indian Ocean, is of towering importance in the world of philately for a number of reasons. Its first two postage stamps issued in 1847, called the "Post Office" stamps, are of legendary rarity and value. They were the first stamps issued in any part of the British Empire outside of Great Britain. The unique cover bearing both “Post Office” stamps has been called "la pièce de résistance de toute la philatélie" or "the greatest item in all philately". The cover was sold at auction, in Zurich, on 3 November 1993, for 5.75 million Swiss francs, the equivalent of about $4 million – the highest price ever paid for a single philatelic item up to that time. In addition, Mauritius is well known for the subsequent locally produced issues known as "primitives," also prized by collectors.
The Stamp Specialist is the title of a series of books on philatelic research written and edited for the advanced collector of postage stamps.
Charles Haviland Mekeel, of St. Louis, Missouri, was a well-known stamp dealer and editor. He figured prominently in the 1895 “find” of the St. Louis Postmaster Provisionals, which solved problems related to their authenticity.
This is a survey of the postage stamps and postal history of Trinidad and Tobago.
The British Library Philatelic Collections is the national philatelic collection of the United Kingdom with over 8 million items from around the world. It was established in 1891 as part of the British Museum Library, later to become the British Library, with the collection of Thomas Tapling. In addition to bequests and continuing donations, the library received consistent deposits by the Crown Agency and has become a primary research collection for British Empire and international history. The collections contain a wide range of artefacts in addition to postage stamps, from newspaper stamps to a press used to print the first British postage stamps.
The Tapling Collection of postage stamps was donated to the British Museum from the estate of Thomas Tapling in 1891.
This is a survey of the postage stamps and postal history of Grenada.
The St. Louis Bears are a set of Provisional stamps issued by the St. Louis Post office in 1845-46 to facilitate prepayment of postal fees at a time when the United States Post Office had not yet issued postage stamps for national use. St. Louis, whose postmaster, John M. Wimer, instigated the production, was one of eleven cities to produce such stamps. Bears were offered in three denominations: 5¢, 10¢ and 20¢; the earliest known postmark date on a stamp of the issue is November 13, 1845.
The U.S. Parcel Post stamps of 1912–13 were the first such stamps issued by the U.S. Post Office Department and consisted of twelve denominations to pay the postage on parcels weighing 16 ounces and more, with each denomination printed in the same color of "carmine-rose". Their border design was similar while each denomination of stamp bore its own distinctive image in the center (vignette). Unlike regular postage items, whose rates were determined by weight in ounces, Parcel Post rates were determined and measured by increments in pounds. The new stamps were soon widely used by industry, farmers and others who lived in rural areas. Partly owing to some confusion involving their usage, their exclusive use as Parcel Post stamps proved short lived, as regular postage stamps were soon allowed to be used to pay parcel postage rates.
