New York stamp deals

Just getting started...after 45 years of collecting. My first endeavours were as a child on E 7th Street. The two other boys in the building also collected. I often wonder where they are, Darryl and Willy. Many fond memories of them and our Minkus pages.

Back in the day, there were many places to shop for stamps, even department stores had their philatelic booths. Macy's, Gimbels, I used to love to go. And going further back in time, the Bowery was the hot spots for stamps. High rents forced out many a dealer, but the passion remains in the city. In fact, we are looking at the rarest stamp in the world, the British Guiana one cent magenta, the only stamp absent from the collection of the British Royal Family, after they missed it at the bidding in the 1920s. A New York businessman took it in the 1920s, and it went to John Eleuthere du Pont some time later. This month, on the 17th, the Queen of England will have a chance to complete her collection, and others with similarly deep pockets will be competing to complete theirs. And they may win. I know at least that I will not, and I content myself with the Guyana 5c stamps of 1966 that has the image of this rarity. Interesting to note that this sought after stamps is both canceled and the low denomination of the set; in collecting, canceled 1p stamps are the scourge of dealers who sometimes throw them out. Or use whole boxes as kindling. And one wonders what happened to the other magentas that were issued. Did they help light a fire somewhere in South America two centuries ago, or are they still knocking around, maybe at the bottom of the cigar box I just acquired? Hope springs eternal. These days I am a topicalist, and if I were into ships - this stamp depicts one - I would be saving my pennies and heading for the auction house. Instead, I will be happy just to view (and blog about it here). My themes are orchids, falconry, bats, bromeliads and cactus - some of which come up on British Guiana (as it was until 26 May, 1966) and Guyana stamps.

The postal history of this country is most interesting, starting with the 'cottonreels' - and then going into more stamps that were produced locally before the printers in London could deliver. 

The world's rarest stamp has a unique history, about which more to come; the nation in which it was produced is still producing collectable issues, as it is small, with a population of one million and an area of  83,000 sq mi. Currently its output is mainly topical (fitting as the early stamps were thus), especially in the realm of orchids, of which it has no less than 500 stamps, including hundreds  with images from Reichenbachia, collected for their beauty. A singular trait with the Guyana Post Office is the making of overprints, and collectors of this country are challenged with an excessive amount of surcharges and overprints that would drive most philatelists to the brink of madness. Recently I purchased the 1990 set of 8 orchids, after spending two years trying to acquire it; each effort I made was met with offers from dealers who had an endless array of overprints (and none recognised in the catalogues) honouring a plethora of famous people; one suspects that an unscrupulous dealer merely overprinted them himself to charge a premium on the set. Glad I was to acquire the set without an overprint, which may prove to be the rare (and only genuine) state. [Scott 2359-66]. And I will cherish them until the day that Sothebys sees fit to auction them too! At least if I do not have the 1c magenta, I have 8 beautiful and long sought after stamps that I genuinely enjoy, one of them being vanilla, which appears on around 100 issues worldwide.

So enough about me and a stamp that none of us will ever own. This blog is about stamps in New York - where to go to get them - posts from NY collectors and dealers - and I hope to bring back some of the feeling that existed in my 1960s childhood. Darryl, Willy, you reading this? If you are, perhaps we crossed paths a dozen times without even knowing it - maybe at the Holiday Inn on 57th Street at the Metropolitan shows, or upstairs at the New Yorker Hotel? Or every weekend at the Chelsea Antiques Market on 25th Street where Terry sells stamps indoors or the outdoor one where a group of Russians and Armenians by the Serbian church between B'way and 6th? Who knows. So a big hi to everone, I'd love to hear from you if you care to leave comments do so - and stay tuned.