The truth is within and only you can reveal it 25 Apr 2017 10:21:51pm
Starting a new thread today with the king of Semi Postals; Belgium. I don't have a late catalog but as of 2006 Belgium had issued 1,172 Semi Postal stamps making it the most prolific issuer of these types of stamps.
Shown are the first three pages, the seventh and 15th
The truth is within and only you can reveal it 26 Apr 2017 11:38:48pm
re: A-Ra's Page of the Day (Semi Postals) Part II
Rrraphy, Yes they are quite kewl! I see them at auction ocasionally and they draw quite a bit of bidding. If you are lucky these two sets can be picked up for around $30.00 each.
In addition there are 4 souvenir sheets and a set of 5 Waffen SS plus one overprinted Waffen SS overprinted stamp. The latter ones go for much more. If you'd like more info Google Waffen SS
The pages for today are for Danzig.
Rather attractive stamps, shown are the only pages issued for Semi Postal use.
The truth is within and only you can reveal it 05 May 2017 12:24:33am
re: A-Ra's Page of the Day (Semi Postals) Part II
Most of the time the charity, disaster relief or what ever the cause, will be inscribed or overprinted on the stamp. Of course if you don't speak every language it becomes much more difficult. Best option is using Google translator. If you have catalogs, they will also usually state the cause in their listings.
The truth is within and only you can reveal it 05 May 2017 12:41:11am
re: A-Ra's Page of the Day (Semi Postals) Part II
Most Semi Postals for the major country colonies will print similar issues for most of the colonies. Today I'm showing a few different Fr Colonies; Fr India, Ivory Coast and Madagascar. Most French colonies had one to two pages of Semi Postals
Wow, it is almost weird to see pages that are not completely filled, like those for Netherlands Indies. Even weirder is that I just sold a few of the missing ones here on Stamporama.
That's the personal note. Other than that: great selection, as always.
The truth is within and only you can reveal it 09 May 2017 12:37:25am
re: A-Ra's Page of the Day (Semi Postals) Part II
Jamison, I have lots of pages like that. Usually it's because I haven't concentrated on an area like Dutch colonies. I've been working on them lately but still havequite a way to go.
Argentina is the page of the day today.
Shown are the first 3 pages.
The truth is within and only you can reveal it 11 May 2017 10:21:12pm
re: A-Ra's Page of the Day (Semi Postals) Part II
I've been getting several better stamps for my collection lately, so today I wanted to show one of them. It is the high value of a set of two from Peru in 1899. It is one of the most difficult issues to get from Peru and one I did not know if I'd ever get. It is missing from most all collections and I've only seen it offered at auction twice. As it often goes the second one was up for auction last week, the week after I won this one.
Peru is one of my most favorite countries to collect, I often just like to look at my collection because I find the stamps so beautiful. I'm waiting on 15 or twenty stamps of the 1880-95 overprinted issues as well as postage dues that I've recently won at auction so those areas will be looking better quite soon. Here is a link to the collection: http://mitch.seymourfamily.com/mward/collection/samerica/peru/peru.html
Finally the Netherlands (I am not prejudiced, no sir! )
Interesting combination for the first set of Tuberculosis stamps: postally used (pretty difficult to find), CTO (you can pave the road with these) and mint.
Being Dutch, I have of course started collecting the Netherlands and I can still remember the excitement when my grandfather and I found some old letters with provincial arms semipostals on them in boxes at my grandparents' attic. Of course we soaked them (little did we know that keeping stamps on letters can be better).
The truth is within and only you can reveal it 12 May 2017 11:50:04pm
re: A-Ra's Page of the Day (Semi Postals) Part II
I've already gone thru over half of the countries that issue Semi Postals including most of the main ones. There are quite a few countries that only issue a page or less and I'm not going to show most of these. On the other hand countries that only have one page of them but are quite interesting, I'll show. Today is one of those. This is the only set of Semi Postals from Mozambique and they are somewhat unusual. There are rather crude lithographs but the designs and colors make for an attractive page. I just got the set last month.
The truth is within and only you can reveal it 18 May 2017 08:39:43pm
re: A-Ra's Page of the Day (Semi Postals) Part II
I've been starting to wonder if I'm losing it. Last week I found two stamps in my U.S. collection that I cannot remember ever seeing before. The first is No. 36 and the other is #113, both with full gum. I've looked thru my past purchases but cannot find anything on them. When I get new additions, especially valuable ones, I add them immediately to the collection and rescan the pages. However neither of these had been rescanned.
Today I was looking thru my French collection and found a set that I have no idea how it got there. It is one of the main sets I have been searching for for France for a long time. I looked at me need list and the stamps had not been removed from it and niether had the page been re-scanned. I always remove items from my needlists as soon as I have bought them and usually before I even get them. Again I searched my past purchases and find no record of them. After this set had been at the forefront of my mind of needs for France I cannot fathom how I would not have erased them from my list and not have scanned the page as soon as I received them. This set catalogs for $240 and almost always sells for no less than $80. The set is the 1931 set at the bottom of page of the day below. I generally have a very good memory and can see no way I could have missed these, I'm starting to wonder if my fairy god mother is helping me out here.
The truth is within and only you can reveal it 20 May 2017 10:59:28pm
re: A-Ra's Page of the Day (Semi Postals) Part II
Lately I've added many items to my Italian Colonies collection. I'm still waiting on some lots but have started scanning the newly updated pages. I just scanned the pages below for the Page of the day country; Libia.
Shown are the first 3 pages of very attractive Semi Postals of Libia.
Interesting Ruanda-Urundi stamps. Named Rwanda and Burundi now, and the last footsteps of civilization before entering the Democratic Republic of The Congo. Anthony Bourdain did a show on Belgian Congo recently, and showed the contrast of leaving Rwanda to go into The Congo -- drastic.
Also, there is an episode of Vice on HBO about European pot growers visiting the Congo looking for the perfect marijuana plants to extract seeds from. One of the guys in the show contracted malaria and died before the airing.
Post war inflation. I have noticed many country's postal rates spikes just after WWII, as their currencies plummeted. They slowly recover, as their GDP improves.
The truth is within and only you can reveal it 25 May 2017 11:14:55pm
re: A-Ra's Page of the Day (Semi Postals) Part II
For today the Semi Postals of Norway.
I haven't done anything on any of the Scandinavian countries in nearly 30 when I had them almost completed. I need to take some time to do some searching for the few items I still need, like some of the stamps missing below.
Shown are the first 3 pages.
The truth is within and only you can reveal it 28 May 2017 10:21:55pm
re: A-Ra's Page of the Day (Semi Postals) Part II
I've pretty much gone throgh all of the countries that have more than a page of Semi Postals. What is left are mainly colonies that only have a page of stamps similar to other colonies that have already been shown. There are also several countries that only have a few stamps that I'm going to skip. So , I'm going to make this the last of the Semi Postal showings and get on to Air Mail issues of the world.
For the last Semi Postal showing it is Finland.
As usual the first three pages are shown.