US Airmail Stamps
Will an Inverted Jenny Turn the Stamp World Upside Down Again?
By Ben Marks — This weekend, on Sunday, September 22, 2013, the William H. Gross Stamp Gallery at the Smithsonian National Postal Museum opens to the public. The gallery has been in the works since the fall of 2009, when Gross, who made his billions (yes, plural…) as the founder of the Pimco Total Return bond fund, donated $8 million to the National Postal Museum. "Robey saw the discrepancy right away.'" Among the 20,000-plus items on display in the 12,000-square-foot space is a block of four 24-cent...
Cheryl Ganz of the National Postal Museum on Inverted Jennys and Burning Zeppelins
By Maribeth Keane and Ben Marks — I’ve been a lifelong collector, even as a kid. There are just certain people for whom collecting seems to be part of their nature. My mother always tells the story about when I was three years old they’d give me dolls. I never played mother and baby. Instead, I put my dolls on a shelf and spent every day rearranging them. Collectors not only care about acquisitions; they care about organizing their stuff and figuring out what’s missing and how to make a good story of their collection. And...
In Postal History, Every Stamp Tells a Story
By Maribeth Keane — I have a stamp collection, but I don’t consider myself a collector. I have a collection of my initials on stamps from Great Britain. I’ve been collecting those for a long time, but I’m a dealer and a consultant for postal history more than a stamp collector. My interest started with boy scouts when I was 12 years old. I needed a couple of merit badges to complete my eagle scout, so I borrowed some of my sister’s stamp collection and mounted them because I thought it would be an easy...
Stamp Collector Bob Allen on Stamp Design and Production Techniques
By Maribeth Keane — Like many collectors, I collected when I was a child, and then I became interested again in the ‘90s. I think eBay and other Internet auction sales had a little bit to do with it. I just started playing with stamps and got interested again. Living in Hawaii, you don’t have the option of going to dealers all around the country, and a lot of the bigger ones are on the East Coast. There are a couple of stamp dealers in Hawaii, but not that many. Collectors Weekly: Do you specialize in specific...