ScottV Stamps

Here is a collection I finally got listed, from a stack of old album pages I meant to get to "some day."  I knew I had two pages of stamps from Hatay but was pleasantly surprised to see that it was the complete country -- every stamp they issued in their short history -- mint hinged. The individual sets list for $25 to $80 each. I always liked that they included a set of maps, showing where this mysterious new country could be found ... except that it's one of the least useful sets of maps in philatelic history.  I suppose the dotted line is meant to be the border, but there isn't a single named town.  It's just a bunch of lines. Wikipedia has a detailed article explaining this phase of history in the area.  The area was previously called the "Sanjak of Alexandretta", which stamp collectors will recognize right away.  That pictorial set says "2_Eylul_1938", and sure enough, 2 SEP 1938 is the date of the decree that changed Alexandretta to the

As my previous post mentioned, we have been trying to keep the international side of our hobby alive.  It has become incredibly frustrating, with USPS shipping costs having gone up x5 or x6 for small overseas parcels in the past decade.  We keep having to think about no longer shipping outside the USA.   We only ship lots under two ounces overseas these days, but we just had an order where a customer bought 8 items, which came out to be a 4-ounce large envelope.  I filled in the usual customs form, but then the clerk got involved. He said he can't put a customs form on an envelope without upgrading it to a small package, so the only options for tracking were $17 (package), $24 (add registered) and $37 (global Priority).  It was a $50 order.  I really wanted to offer a tracking number, but it could not be done without taking a 30-65% loss on the shipment.  OMG.  I have shipped over 15,000 mailings over my 40 years in business.  We used to put customs on large flat envelopes a

A cover from Latvia, 13-04-2009 to Escondido CA. Printed matter, registered.   The story behind this one: I was at a stamp show, flipping through thousands of covers, and found this one addressed to me from 15 years before.  It's funny how our little collectibles make the rounds. I used to specifically try and find eBay listings from sellers in the Baltic States because every one of them took such care making their mailings look good.  The hobby was always supposed to be an international one, bringing folks together from across the globe.  I also found covers mailed to my Dad.  I suppose the mystery is easily solved, since I have donated many boxes to the San Diego Philatelic Library over the years, and most of the local sellers go to the library sales to stock up on things...

We had a table at the Sandipex show again, down in Poway.  We don't have a van, or whole shelves of red boxes to bring.  I do have a knack for knowing what will fit into any space, so we set aside exactly enough plastic bins and boxes to fill my Toyota Corolla, and it turned out to be the perfect amount to spread out and cover the three tables. Here's a look at it: Anne and Dory were there helping out. It's funny how many different ways there are to collect things, and at least as many different ways to buy them.  We had some binders and folders full of country collections.  I sold one of my Dad's old half-empty volumes of USA for $100, a big binder of Norway (1966-2005) for $50, and other collections of Belgian Congo, Senegal and others.  When I price these, I am not going to sit there for hours writing every catalog value on the margin of every page: they're almost all going to be under a buck anyway.  I save a lot of time by just doing a count and eyeballing the