The Revenue Society (originally The Revenue Society of Great Britain) was formed in 1990 and is the only international philatelic society which covers revenue stamps of the whole world. The society is also noted for the particularly high quality of its journal which has published many articles on subjects about which little or nothing has previously been written.
In 2007, the name of the society was shortened from The Revenue Society of Great Britain to just The Revenue Society in order to make the international nature of the society clear.
The first committee meeting took place at the East India Club in London on 3 March 1990 and the first open meeting followed on 10 May 1990. [1] Founder members included Robson Lowe, Gary Ryan, Clive Akerman and Ronald Butler.[ citation needed ]
There had previously been no revenue stamp society in the UK since the Fiscal Philatelic Society ceased to exist in 1928 and the only similar society in existence was The American Revenue Association. A revival of interest in revenue stamps had started since Robson Lowe began specific revenue auctions in the 1970s and the founder members of the society felt that the time was ripe for an organisation devoted just to revenues.[ citation needed ]
The objects of the society are:
The membership of the society is approximately 300 from 40 countries. Approximately half the members reside outside the UK. [2]
The first president of the society was Robson Lowe. [3] [4] and another former president of the society was the late David Springbett.
The society is particularly noted for the quarterly The Revenue Journal (originally The Revenue Journal of Great Britain) under the long-time editorship of Clive Akerman which has won several awards at philatelic shows including Vermeil medals at España 06 and China 09.
The society awards The Revenue Society Research Medal for research into revenue stamps and a Competition Medal. The Research Medal was first awarded in 2007 and the winner was Peter Mansfield for research into British and Northern Ireland key type revenue stamps. [5]
A revenue stamp, tax stamp, duty stamp or fiscal stamp is a (usually) adhesive label used to designate collected taxes or fees on documents, tobacco, alcoholic drinks, drugs and medicines, playing cards, hunting licenses, firearm registration, and many other things. Typically, businesses purchase the stamps from the government, and attach them to taxed items as part of putting the items on sale, or in the case of documents, as part of filling out the form.
John Harry Robson Lowe was an English professional philatelist, stamp dealer and stamp auctioneer.
Walter Morley (1863–1936) was a pioneering English philatelist, stamp dealer and philatelic author.
Bertram McGowan (1874–1950) was a Scottish solicitor and philatelist who specialised in Chile and the Postage stamps and postal history of Great Britain, especially Great Britain used abroad.
Adrian Albert Jurgens was a South African philatelist and signatory to the Roll of Distinguished Philatelists of Southern Africa in 1948 and the Roll of Distinguished Philatelists in Great Britain in 1952.
Geoffrey Clive Akerman was an English philatelist. In 2001, Akerman and Gavin H. Fryer won the Crawford Medal from The Royal Philatelic Society London for their work "The Reform of the Post Office in the Victorian Era and Its Impact on Economic and Social Activity". He won numerous other awards for displays at stamp exhibitions. In 2009, Akerman won the Revenue Society Research Medal.
Gary Sidney Ryan (1916–2007) was an eminent philatelist who specialised in the stamps and postal history of Hungary and later in revenue stamps.
Alfred J. Forbin was a pioneering French stamp dealer who wrote an all-world catalogue of revenue stamps that has never been surpassed.
Key type stamps are stamps of a uniform design that were widely used by colonial territories in the 19th and 20th centuries.
Martin Erler was a German philatelist who was an expert on the revenue stamps of Germany who with John A. Norton wrote the only comprehensive catalogue of German revenue stamps.
Percival Loines Pemberton, was a British philatelist and stamp dealer who signed the Roll of Distinguished Philatelists in 1921. He was the son of Edward Loines Pemberton (1844–1878) who was also an eminent philatelist.
The Davies Collection is a collection of Libyan revenue stamps from 1955 to 1969, formed from material from the Bradbury Wilkinson Archive, and presented to the British Library Philatelic Collections by John Neville Davies in 1992.
Albert W. Hilchey was an expert on the revenue stamps of South America and Liberia. He collected during a period when revenue stamps were not well appreciated in the philatelic world and produced several important stamp catalogues of neglected areas. His The Revenue Stamps of the Dominican Republic was the first catalogue of its type since Walter Morley's work of 1904. His 1966 Guatemala Fiscal Handbook was privately produced and circulated and formed the basis for James C. Andrews' posthumously published work of the same name published by the International Society of Guatemala Collectors in 2000 after completion by Cecile Gruson. In 2010 Clive Akerman produced a new edition of Hilchey's 1968 The Revenue Stamps of Bolivia.
The Booth Papers are a collection of philatelic research documents of Roger Booth FRPSL used for the preparation of his catalogues of British and Irish revenue stamps. The papers form part of the British Library Philatelic Department Collections and were donated to the Library in 2004.
Roger G. Booth is a British philatelist who is a Fellow of the Royal Philatelic Society London and an expert on the revenue stamps of the United Kingdom and Ireland.
Argentina has been one of the most prolific issuers of revenue stamps. Stamps have been issued by both the Argentine Republic and individual Argentine provinces and covered a wide range of duties from taxes on documents to hat taxes. The stamps form one of the most complex studies in revenue philately and have been exhaustively catalogued by Clive Ackerman in six volumes. However, new discoveries continue to be made.
Bolivia has issued revenue stamps since 1867.
A printer's sample stamp is a label produced by a printer resembling a postage stamp, but with no postal or other validity. Often it will include the name of the printer and demonstrate their printing capabilities. The stamps are not intended for use and are therefore to be distinguished from test stamps, though both test stamps and printer's sample stamps are dummy stamps in the broadest sense of that term.
Ezekiel Victor Toeg FRPSL was a British solicitor and philatelist who specialised in the postage stamps and postal history of the British West Indies (BWI) and Caribbean. His collection of Antigua won two gold medals at international stamp exhibitions and included a 1693 letter to London that was described in 1990 as the earliest known letter from the island. He wrote a book on the adhesive fees stamps of the Leeward Islands (1991) and completed a survey of the stamps and postal history of the island of Dominica to 1935 (1994). He was president of the British West Indies Study Circle (BWISC) from 1968 until his death in 2010.
John Barefoot is a British philatelist, stamp dealer, and publisher, best known for his catalogues of revenue stamps which are known collectively as the "Barefoot catalogue".