A really, REALLY lame tribute to a landmark event/era.
I'll probably keep the sheet header for an Air Mail album.
-Paul
On further inspection, I *do* like the superimposition of the wingtips on the frame. Makes it look like the plane is flying off the stamp. That's my one concession.
The truth is within and only you can reveal it 15 Jan 2019 08:51:14pm
re: Worlds Ugliest Stamp
nranderson, It is not a postage stamp because postage stamps except Great Britain have a country name and a denomination. I'd guess something like milk ration stamps from Bulgaria mid 60's
Pig doc. I could not disagree more, I just purchased another couple sheets today to use on my outgoing stamp sales. I like it better than any other stamp available from the P.O. right now If it is not engraved I must have finally gone blind. The design is nostalgic of many countries first airmails. I must be old fashion but the only modern U.S. stamps I care for are 19th and early 20th century reprints or stamps that are reminiscent of them.
Good point about all stamps having their country of origin on them, except England. I'm puzzled by the whole damn thing. The 5~20 gets me and it's so overstated. I was about 8 when my father bought that big box of loose stamps at a police auction so can't be newer than 1963. I'm keeping it. It's too ugly not to keep it! Maybe I could find a proof!
Antonius, your comments motivated me to dig a little deeper into the printing processes used to produce the 2018 Airmail Forever stamp. It was produced by the intaglio process, which involves incising a metal plate that is used to transfer the ink to the paper. So, in that sense, the process is identical to that used to print stamps from engraved plates.
I am making a distinction between "incising" and "engraved". Looking at the website of designer and typographer(?), Dan Gretta, his biography states, "When Dan is not in front of the computer, he is most likely found in the dairy aisle at the local grocery store." And, under "Capabilities", engraving is not listed.
I am guessing that the plates used to print this issue were produced using a process akin to CNC machining from a template drafted on a computer screen by the designer, using a mouse and a keyboard.
Kind of pales in comparison to the artistry and technical prowess of a master engraver like Czeslaw Slania, for example, and that is the gist of my 'beef' about this stamp, and other similar modern issues. Presumably, true engraving is on its way to becoming a lost art, thanks to the computer age.
To each his own.
Thanks for motivating me to learn something about modern postage stamp production!
.
Traditional engraving was by a hard hand tool into a softened (warm) metal, with gratifying results.
If you attach that hand tool to a computer-guided power-assisted apparatus, it is still engraving, and can still yield gratifying results.
The artisans who do either of the above to make a living will respect either process.
Hobbyists, and bystanders, not so much.
Photogravure uses light & chemicals to etch into metal (not unlike semi-conductor manufacturing).
These stamps have usually lacked the crispness of an engraving because chemicals will etch outwards as much as they etch downwards (into the plate), whereas the hard tool can be guided selectively downwards (dig, baby, dig).
Theoretically, you could do sequential chemical etchings from a specially-designed series of photo masks to achieve the qualify of engraving, but you'd need a really good reason ... and a computer to develop those masks.
Cheers,
/s/ ikeyPikey
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"I collect stamps today precisely the way I collected stamps when I was ten years old."
I do not consider the US Air Mail anniversary stamp to be the ugliest or even ugly. The simplicity of the design did not take advantage of the printing process. It was really a lost opportunity to make a much better looking product.
The truth is within and only you can reveal it 18 Jan 2019 10:06:34pm
re: Worlds Ugliest Stamp
Sorry, obviously I didn't think long enough before posting that. It is basically true that Great Britain does not have it's name on it's stamps in favor of having the reigning monarchs bust printed on it's stamps. There are other countries that have not used their names on their stamps but only briefly on mostly first issues. I have all the ones shown but it's a big world and memory isn't was it use to be.
I thought it was the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (previously UK of GB and Ireland). Is that not the stamp issuing entity? I just rearranged all of my "One From Every Country" Europe section and made the change from Great Britain to UK of GB & NI. Was that incorrect?
Lars
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It is a bit confusing now that you mention it, because Northern Ireland, part of the United Kingdom, is not, by definition, part of Great Britain. (Great Britain consists of the island mass of Scotland, Wales, and England). Stamp-issuing country-wise, United Kingdom would be more accurate than Great Britain, assuming one cares to acknowledge Northern Ireland.
I'm a Yank, so I am hardly qualified to opine on these matters. Hopefully a member of the Commonwealth will clear it up.
England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland all come under a single postal administration, namely Royal Mail.
Regional stamps are produced for these regions by Royal Mail. The regional stamps are not available in other than the "home" region. ie Scottish regional stamps are not sold in Northern Ireland and vice-versa. They are however available through the philatelic bureau.
The Isle of Man, Jersey and Guernsey/Alderney have their own postal administrations so produce their own stamps.
Of course the catalogue producers should not list the country as Great Britain but should list it as the United Kingdom.
Historically it was the partition of the island of Ireland in 1922 that caused the confusion of the catalogue producers as the stamps of Great Britain were used in the island before then.
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When it comes to the Scott Catalogue, I checked an old 1905 version and UK is listed under GB and there is no mention at all, even in the index, of Ireland. But that's just the silly Yanks, so I pulled out a 1960 Stanley Gibbons World catalogue. They should be more accurate one should expect. Believe it or not, the entry for Great Britain has:
"Consisting of England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland."
Wow! If SG can't get it right, no wonder we Yanks are confused! (At least the 2005 SG Commonwealth catalogue has "United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland" under the listing for early Great Britain).
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"Expanding your knowledge faster than your collection can save you a few bucks."
""Consisting of England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland."
Wow! If SG can't get it right, no wonder we Yanks are confused! (At least the 2005 SG Commonwealth catalogue has "United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland" under the listing for early Great Britain)."
I'm puzzled by the suggestion that the first definition there is incorrect. It is broadly accurate, although it omits mention of the smaller islands, as most definitions do.
The Commonwealth Catalogue, on the other hand, seems to have it wrong, if correctly quoted. It should read "United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland".
Brechinite above has it correct, although he may be dismayed to know that in English primary schools children learn at a young age that England, Scotland and Wales are considered, for simplicity's sake, to be "countries". In my classroom I always defined them as "football teams".
In my own albums and lists I always refer to "UK". The term "Great Britain" is an officially recognised abbreviation of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and was of course used in stamp catalogues before Ireland was divided into two entities. Catalogues do not like changes, unless they are of values, and so GB has remained. As, inevitably, has "Russia" even when the USSR subsumed various other political entities besides Russia. Convenience and convention, rather than strict accuracy, is the watchword of stamp catalogues and most stamp collectors.
Meanwhile, to revert to the original subject, here are two GB horrors from 1992. That the first was designed by a tiny child and the second by the renowned David Hockney does not in my view disqualify either from being ugly: the dismembered octopus (apparently depicting the ozone layer) and the prancing starfish (bizarrely purporting to depict the European Single Market).
Ian, definitely ugly but the octopus legs are, I believe, meant to represent the suns ray breaking through the ozone layer ( depicted by the broken white, snowflake like band).
As far as the other stamp goes I always thought it was a dancing clown, or maybe that's what a government is really.
Please note that at the United Nations our Ambassador is from the United Kingdom!!
England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are not recognised as individual "countries". Neither do they have individual representation on any other world body like NATO etc.
What the English teach in their schools is their problem, it just shows how poorly educated the English are.
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"StayAlert.......Control The Virus.......Save Lives."
Neddie, i gott a grate educashion wen i waz inna skool in londun, bak in ver fiffties en sixtees butt ad ter leav sose i cud ern munny two elp me pairents. layter I gott wurk inner insurants plaice whear wee rote leters an fings.
Wee aint awl fik inenngllundingglannd sarf off ver boarder an wee speeks proppar innglish knot vat garrlick stuf has wot der peepl upp norf.
nour ime ovr ear in ver sirrup trea plaice an dey speeks orl forn ann dunt unnerrstan wot ime syin.
Wots awl der read lynes meen, ennyway.
Red Lines:-
No membership of the Single Market, No membership of the Customs Union, No Membership of the Common Agricultural Policy, No Membership of the Common Fisheries Policy, taking back control of our laws, money and the end of Freedom of Movement AND leaving the European Union on the 29th of March 2019!
Therefore honouring the result of the referendum held in June 2016.
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"StayAlert.......Control The Virus.......Save Lives."
"Red Lines:-
No membership of the Single Market, No membership of the Customs Union, No Membership of the Common Agricultural Policy, No Membership of the Common Fisheries Policy, taking back control of our laws, money and the end of Freedom of Movement AND leaving the European Union on the 29th of March 2019!
Therefore honouring the result of the referendum held in June 2016."
This I agree is what is right and proper given the result of the referendum but I actually meant the red underlines courtesy of Microsoft when I was writing the above post, ow duz cocknees get on with spell check.
"... the prancing starfish (bizarrely purporting to depict the European Single Market)."
Starfish? I'm thinking that what we are looking at is a 5-pointed gold star on a blue background, which are precisely the design elements of the EU/EC flag.
The 'starfish' is, therefor, the UK's happy new star.
Cheers,
/s/ ikeyPikey
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"I collect stamps today precisely the way I collected stamps when I was ten years old."