ArtStamp
27 Apr 2021 02:35:14pm | re: 1949 i still remember my first stamps
Stories About Stamp Collecting for Children of All Ages
by R. G. Brito-Santaló
September 14, 2020
The Adventure Begins, Story No. 1
When I was a small boy, 10 or 11, an older school friend, Ignatius, showed me his stamp album. I became hooked, fascinated, immediately. His album pages, which he created, showed his precious stamps carefully organized in rows. I cannot remember the stamps themselves but the lasting impression they made on me. I saw their beauty, the colorful illustrations, their variety, as small, framed paintings. I decided right then and there I was going to collect postage stamps.
Many of the stamps on Ignatius album were brand new. Others were used. They had postmarks. Ignatius inserted sheets of onion paper between each page to protect the stamps. His album was a black three-ring binder. The sheets of paper were white, and the pages had holes so they could be inserted in each ring. He drew, with black ink, a border, lines, and small rectangles to frame every stamp. The rectangles were horizontal or vertical, some were square, every stamp had a frame. I saw triangular stamps too, which I had never seen before. He wrote the name of the country at the top of the page. He also wrote dates above many of the rectangles. After looking through the stamp album, Ignatius showed me a cigar box with the inscription: Duplicate Stamps.
Inside the wooden box, with its strong tobacco aroma, were dozens, perhaps hundreds, of postage stamps. The stamps were separated by cardboard partitions he made. He started taking out, using special tweezers, a few stamps he wanted to show me. I remember the Netherland’s Queen stamps, a Mexican Aztec Pyramid, some Cuban stamps, four or five stamps from the United States, a few stamps from Spain, and two or three from France. I still recall, after all these years, the sense of discovery when I saw so many foreign stamps for the first time. I felt they were magnificent. He carefully placed each stamp on a white sheet of paper, using the special tweezers with flat ends. He did point out that this special tool helped not damage the stamps. “Stamps are fragile, and one must be careful,” he said.
Ignatius then told me that every stamp had a story. The young Queen of the Netherlands was Juliana. Her mother abdicated. I did not know the word, so he explained that to abdicate is when a king, or a queen, leaves the throne. The stamps had a drawn portrait of the queen and were of different colors. Each had a different number. The Mexican stamp showed an Aztec Pyramid. He told me it was a sacred place, a place of worship, where captured people were sacrificed to the Aztec Sun god. The Cuban stamps had a portrait of a patriot, a plane flying over palm trees, and a building. The United States stamps were rectangular, showing soldiers, flags, trees, forests, an airplane, and a tree. The Spain stamps had General Franco’s portrait, like a king. Ignatius explained that Franco was not a king, but he ruled the country. The currency of Spain was the “peseta,” he added. The French stamps showed a beautiful palace, the famous arc of triumph in Paris, a monastery, and a church surrounded by the sea. When he finished, he told me I could have the stamps as a gift. That is how my postage stamp collection began. Or, I should say, how my adventure in the world of stamp collecting began.
NOTE: Ignatius (Ignacio) is no longer with us. He came to the US right after the Castro revolution. He had a successful philatelic business on Miami's Eighth Street (Calle Ocho). His passion for Cuba's stamps, and worldwide stamps, was recognized by hundreds (thousands) of philatelists in the US and around the world. He wrote about philately for Mecanica Popular, the magazine's Spanish edition. We certainly miss his insights and philatelic enthusiasm. He was a wonderful mentor.
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Bobstamp
28 Apr 2021 05:40:08pm | re: 1949 i still remember my first stamps
In 1949, when I was just six years old, my family moved from the village of Savona in Steuben Country, New York State to the even smaller village of Arenas Valley in Southwestern New Mexico. When I was 10, a new friend introduced me to stamp collecting. We were both in Boy Scouts, and I soon started working on my Stamp Collecting merit badge. My main source of worldwide stamps was Boys' Life magazine, which always had a full page or more of offers for approvals. But I also bought stamps at our local post office.
Arenas Valley can't have been home to more than 30 or 40 families, so the fact that it had a post office (long since closed) is surprising. The postmaster, Hazel Moore, had taken over for her husband, who had recently from TB. Hazel obviously liked kids; she had two of her own and always seemed interested in our lives, even after another friend and I innocently showed her a large bull snake we had caught. Her scream scared us and the snake more than we scared her! Anyway, she proved to be a great ally in my quest for new U.S. stamps. When I went up the road to get the mail, she would show me any new stamps she had received, and was always careful in removing plate blocks for me.
I no longer have those plate blocks, but recently I bought several of the stamps that were issued during that period:
I did get my merit badge, but it wasn't long before I started collecting girls rather than stamps. I soon learned that kissing girls was hands down better tan licking stamp hinges!
For stories of my days in Arenas Valley see Box 28 and Remembering Arenas Valley.
Bob
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