About Stamps History of Philately Stamp Collecting History of Ukrainian Postage Stamps Postage stamps and postal history of Russia Stamps Terminology

Stamp collecting is fun, relaxing, and popular for many reasons. You can collect stamps at no cost, as they come in your mail every day. And even if you buy new stamps in sets they are quite inexpensive. Another way people get stamps is to swap with friends, or ask friends and relatives to save any special ones they get in the mail.

In addition to your local Post Shop, many stationery shops sell inexpensive collectors packs of overseas stamps. There are also special shops that specialise in selling old stamps. The people who run these shops are called stamp dealers and several of them publish special catalogues that list all the stamps ever issued and the cost of the stamps if you wish to buy them.

One of the easiest ways to start a collection is to get an old collection. Perhaps a relative or friend have one they no longer want.

Or you can buy a modern stock sheet stamp album, a packet of stamps, and join the local stamp club where you will find lots of people willing to show you how to sort out where each stamp comes from and exactly where it should be mounted.

You'll have many hours of fun in the hobby of philately, as stamp collecting is called, seeking out stamps; sorting out where they come from; placing them in your stamp album; and carefully noting underneath the stamp what it is, where it comes from and anything else interesting you know about the stamp.

Buying Stamps. It is a good idea to decide to spend a small amount each week on stamps so that you can get stamps regularly. Just a few dollars a week will soon build up a very impressive collection.

Recent stamp issues are available from any Post Shop or you can buy stamps issued over the last 12 months by mail order from Post Stamps Centre. Recent and older stamps can also be purchased from stamp dealers.

Joining a Club. A great way of learning about stamp collecting is to join a stamp club. Most big towns and cities have a stamp club.

Stamp clubs usually have regular meetings at which information about stamps is exchanged and stamps themselves are swapped. The clubs also often put out newsletters and magazines which have a lot of stamp information in them.

Stamp clubs hold Stamp Competitions and Exhibitions and club members love to show off their stamp collections at these events. By listening to what the judges say about the collections shown at these competitions, you can often get new ideas for improving your own collection.

What Sort of Stamps. When they start saving stamps, most people start saving what is called a General Collection - a collection of all sorts of stamps from all sorts of countries. But, since the countries of the world every year issue between five and eight thousand new stamps, a general collection can soon become much too large for comfort.

That is partly the reason why many collectors become interested in one type of stamps and start a One Country Collection or a Thematic Collection.

One Country Collection. One Country Collections are where the collector collects as many stamps as possible from one country only. Many people who decide to start a One Country Collection don't think about collecting their own country's stamps.

Many people who collect stamps from just one country also collect such things as Plate Blocks, Perforation and Watermark varieties, flaws, missing colours, paper and printing changes, and other things of interest.

Thematic Collection. When the stamps that you collect are all on one subject, such as space, paintings, transport, sports or animals, this is called thematic collecting. And you can specialise even more than this. For example, sports is such a big subject that some collectors only collect stamps on certain sports subjects such as the Olympic Games, Water Sports, or Ball Games.

People who are interested in a particular subject only collect stamps on that subject. Keen gardeners often collect flower stamps, motorcyclists collect motorcycle stamps, and car fans collect stamps with cars on them.

Other people specialise more in things connected with stamps. Some people collect Cinderellas - stamps that are not official stamps issued by a country's postal administration.

Others collect postal stationery, postmarks and postal markings of a country. In order to do this, these collectors must also know quite a bit about the postal system of the country or group they are collecting from and this requires a lot of study.

The main thing to remember when deciding what to collect and when, is that it should be what you want to do.

Stamp Albums. While almost anything will do as a stamp album when you first start collecting, if you get serious about stamp collecting you will want to do it the way the professionals do.

Most large stationary shops and bookshops have stamp albums for sale. The old type of stamp album was a bound book where the pages are bound together by sewing or staples as in a normal book. These books had a separate page for the stamps of each important country. The pages could not be removed from these albums and the stamps were stuck into the book with stamp hinges.

The next type of album is the loose-leaf album. This is a folder type of album and you can take the pages out of these albums so that you could work on them easier. The pages are held in these albums in a number of ways but most have two or three rings that go though holes in the pages to hold them in the book. The advantage of these ring binders, as they are called, is that they allow the pages to lie flat when opened.

It is possible to buy pages for these albums that have the names of various countries printed at the top, as with a bound album. It is also possible to buy blank pages headed with titles such as 'Fish', or 'Ships', or 'Space' for collectors who are concentrating on collecting one type of stamps in a 'Thematic' collection.

If you decide to collect the stamps of just one country, in a "One Country" collection, you may even be able to buy some blank pages already printed with that country's name. These pages have a space for each stamp issued by the country and the space often holds a picture of the stamp.

Information about the stamp is also printed on the pages. All you have to do is collect a stamp for each space and mount it in the correct place.

Today, many collectors are using stock sheet albums. These are loose leaf folders with special plastic pages in them. Each plastic page has several strips of plastic running across it. These strips make a number of wide pockets into which you slip your stamps.

The plastic is a special sort of plastic that doesn't go yellow and sticky in the sunshine and protects your stamps should you accidentally spill anything over your stamp album.

There are two sorts of plastic page. One is single sided, having pockets on one side only while the other is double sided - it has pockets on both sides of the page.

Preparing Your Stamps. Whenever you touch a stamp, you should always remember that, one day, it may be rare and worth a lot of money. So you should always handle your stamps carefully.

When you first start stamp collecting you will probably get most of your stamps from pieces of envelopes. Firstly, when cutting the piece off the envelope, take care not to cut the stamp.

Once a stamp is cut, torn or damaged it is almost worthless. The easiest part to damage on a stamp (and the most important part not to damage) is the perforations around the edge of the stamp.

To get the stamp off the piece of envelope you 'soak' them off. To do this, you place the pieces of envelope with the stamp facing upwards on the surface of a bowl of warm water or on a cloth dampened with warm water.

Leave the stamps on the water or the cloth until you can slide the stamp gently off the envelope. Never be in too much of a hurry or try to force the stamp off the envelope. If the stamp won't slide off easily, put it back in the water or on the cloth and try it again later.

When you have got the stamp off the envelope, dry the stamp by placing it face up on a clean and dry piece of blotting paper.

Remember, never hurry the job. If you damage the stamp it will be worthless and you may never find another like it.

When the stamp is dry, it is ready for placing in your stamp album. Very old and rare stamps are best left on the envelope they came on as they are likely to be worth more on the envelope, even if the envelope is torn or dirty.

Handling the Stamp. A basic rule of stamp collecting is try to avoid holding the stamp in your hand. This is because holding a stamp in your hand makes the stamp dirty, and the grease and sweat on your hand can damage or mark the stamp after a while.

The best way to hold stamps is to use stamp tweezers. These have wide pinchers (thin ones will crease and damage the stamp) and are small enough to be comfortable to use.

Try not to fold the stamp as this may make a crease on the paper and this makes the stamp less valuable.

Checking the Stamp. Once you have the stamp you will want to study it more carefully and see the fine detail of the stamp design. To do this you will need a good magnifying glass. There are a wide range of magnifying glasses available and if you visit a stamp dealer, stationery shop, or book shop you can choose the one that suits you best.

Perforation Gauge. The jagged edge of a stamp is called the perforation. Some stamps look the same but they have a different size of perforation. A perforation gauge measures the perforation on the stamp. Perforation is measured by the number of holes in every 2 cm of perforation. If there are 14 holes in 2 cm then the perforation is said to measure 14.

Because it would be annoying to have to count the number of holes each time you want to know the perforation of a stamp, you can buy a perforation gauge which you can match up against the perforations on the stamp you are looking at and find the perforation measurement.

The gauge has on it rows of black dots. Each row has a different size of black dot. When you place the stamp on the rows you can see which row of dots fit into the perforation holes on the stamp and the number beside the row of black dots on the gauge tells you what the stamp's perforation measurement is.

On some stamps the perforations on the side of the stamp and the top of the stamp are different sizes and a perforation gauge will help you check this.

Watermark Detector. On some stamps you can see a design by holding the stamp up to the light and looking through it. This design is called the watermark.

Sometimes, although a stamp has a watermark, it is difficult to see even if you hold the stamp up to the light and look through it. A better way of seeing watermarks is to place the stamp face down on a black tray and add a drop or two of benzine to the back of the stamp. The benzine shows up the watermark of the stamp for a short time until the benzine evaporates away.

The liquid to use is benzine. DO NOT use benzene by mistake! Special black trays and benzine droppers can be bought from any good stamp dealer.

Colour Guide. Colour guides help you match the description of a stamp given in a stamp catalogue. These guides are particularly important if a stamp has been printed in more than one shade of a particular colour.

Colour guides contain hundreds of different colours and shades and their names to help identify a stamp and its colour. They can be bought from any good stamp dealer.

Condition of the Stamp. Any stamp that is clean, not torn, badly creased, or made thin by having a stamp hinge or piece of paper badly torn off the back of the stamp, is said to be a stamp in good condition.

A collector also judges how good a stamp's condition is by how good the postmark is (it should not cover up most of the stamp's design), and how good the perforations are. A stamp in good condition is more valuable than a stamp in poor condition.

Sometimes you will get a stamp that you have been looking for but it is not in as good a condition as you would like. What you should do is put the less perfect stamp in your collection until you can find a better example.

Sometimes a stamp has brown spots on it and many new collectors think that, because of this, the stamp is in too bad a condition to be used. These spots are caused because the stamp has been moist for too long or there has not been enough light in the place the stamp has been stored.

In stamp collecting these spots are called rust. Sometimes it is known as foxing. If you look through your stamp album every month or so, your stamps should not get rust marks on them as turning the pages will 'air' the stamps.

However, if you have any stamps with rust on them, you can use some special chemicals to clean them up. Many collectors think that they have rust on their stamps but the marks on the stamps are either just dirty or the stamps have a water stain on them. Dirty stamps should be cleaned with a very soft rubber, while stamps with an old water stain can be cleaned with plain water.

Stamp Catalogues. Stamp catalogues are very useful for a stamp collector. A world stamp catalogue lists all the stamps that have been issued throughout the world, while a one-country catalogue lists all the stamps that have been issued for a particular country.

Using a Catalogue. When looking in a catalogue for a particular stamp, you look up the listings for the country which issued the stamp. Next, you look through that country's listings until you find a picture of a stamp similar to the one you are trying to identify.

Most catalogues will not have a picture of every single stamp issued as this would be an impossible task, but one stamp in each set is usually shown. You should find it easy enough to identify any stamp from the basic illustration in the catalogue.

Most stamps are issued in sets and the catalogue will list all the stamps which were issued in the set your stamp comes from. It will also tell you why the stamps were issued (to honour a famous person or to commemorate an event, for example), the year the stamps were issued, the denomination of the stamps in the set, and the colour of each stamp in the set.

Some catalogues will give you even more information, including the name of the person who designed the stamps, the name of the printer, and how the stamp was printed. Also listed may be information about watermarks and perforations on the stamps.

Sometimes catalogues will not list any reason for the issue of the stamps. This is usually because the stamps are "Definitive" stamps. These stamps are on sale for many years, unlike special issues such as commemorative or scenic issues which are sold for a limited time.

Prices. An important piece of information a catalogue gives is the price. A catalogue usually gives two prices for each stamp.

The first price is the cost of the stamp in an Unused condition, in other words, one without a postmark. The next price is for a Used stamp. A used stamp is one that has been through the mail and is usually postmarked.

Sometimes there is another price in a catalogue for a stamp in Mint condition. A Mint stamp has all its original gum intact as when it was first sold.

Sometimes a catalogue has different listings - UHM, M, and U.

UHM stands for Unhinged Mint. The stamp is in the condition it was in when first purchased.

M stands for Hinged Mint. The stamp has previously been mounted in a collection.

U stands for Used. The stamp is postmarked but not heavily.

The prices in the book tell you what the stamp will cost to buy. They are not what you would receive for the stamp if you sold it. However, they give you a general idea of what your collection is worth and, when you are looking to buy a stamp, the price in the catalogue is what you would have to pay to get the stamp.

Getting a Catalogue. There are lots of catalogues available but many of the hard-backed ones are very expensive. However, most public libraries have copies of the bigger stamp catalogues or you may be able to buy an out-of-date catalogue at a very low cost. Used sensibly, the stamp catalogue is the most useful book a stamp collector can have.

Mounting Your Stamps. When you put the stamps in your album, this is called 'mounting' the stamps. If you do have a stamp album with plain paper pages, you will have to use Hawid Mounts or stamp hinges to mount your stamps.

Hawid Mounts are small plastic pockets in which stamps are placed for mounting in the stamp album. This protects the stamps and is ideal for mint stamps. You can, however, simply use a good quality stamp hinge.

Stamp hinges are tiny pieces of paper with gum on one side only.

Do not use glue, tape, or the selvedge from a sheet of stamps to mount your collection or you will never be able to get the stamps out of your album in one piece.

To mount a stamp with a hinge, you fold the top third of the hinge back. Make sure the gum is on the outside. Moisten the short side of the hinge. Fix it as close to the centre of the top edge of the stamp as possible.

Next, using your finger to avoid wetting the backing of the stamp, lightly wet the lower half of the larger side of the hinge. Now use your tweezers to hold both the stamp and the hinge. Carefully place the stamp in the correct position in your album. Gently press the stamp into place using a piece of paper. Remember not to touch the stamp with your fingers.

Don't forget that if the stamp still has gum on the back and you have wet it, the stamp will stick firmly by its own gum on to the album page and when you come to remove it, you will damage the stamp.

If the stamp has been mounted correctly you will be able to lift it up easily to examine the back of the stamp.

If you ever have to take a hinge off a stamp, never try to peel it off if the hinge is still wet.

Always let the hinge dry first. If the stamp is a used one, you should soak the hinge off but if the stamp is a mint one you should very carefully peel the hinge off once it is dry.

Mounting stamps properly is very important if you wish to keep your stamps in good condition and keep their value. People with expensive collections use a Hagner system type of stamp album as these protect the stamps the most. Hagner system albums are the most common type of stamp album sold today.

Arranging Your Stamps. Many of the stamp albums you can buy have the names of countries printed at the top of each page and, often, a black and white picture of a stamp from that country.

Also on the pages there may be squares printed for each stamp. If this is the case, as you get a stamp for the country, you can simply mount your stamps in one of the squares on the page set aside for that particular country's stamps.

On some albums each page has a pattern of tiny squares, called a grid. With this sort of album where you put the stamps is up to you. The pattern of squares is there simply to help you mount the stamp straight up and down.

As the grid pattern allows you to choose your own arrangement of stamps on the page you have to decide how to mount them. The main things to remember are not to overcrowd the page with too many stamps, to try to keep together stamps that were issued as a set, to keep the stamps in some sort of order according to the date they were issued, and to leave enough space between stamps to write in the information about each stamp.

Most collectors do not worry too much about the denomination of each stamp. You don't need to keep all the 40 cent stamps together. For example, your album will look nicer if you concentrate more on the shape and size of the stamps and keeping the shapes and sizes in balance.

One way of arranging the page is to place the stamps you wish to mount on the page and move them about until the page looks good to you. Try to keep the pattern of stamps on the left and right hand side of the page even and you can vary the number of stamps in each row to give your page some variety. It is often best to mount the longest row of stamps about two thirds of the way down the page.

Don't forget if you have looked up information about the stamps that you have and discovered that they are part of a larger set, you will need to leave enough room, if you decide you want to try and collect the set.

If it is a large set and you only have one or two stamps of the set, it is probably best to keep the stamps you have in your stamp stock book until you get more of the set, than just mount one or two stamps and leave lots of empty spaces on the page.

Once you have decided on the layout of the stamps on the page, make some light pencil marks to show where each stamp will go, to show where to place each stamp when you mount them.

Don't forget to leave room for the annotation that goes with each stamp. The annotation is the written description the collector puts into an album to describe each stamp, where it came from and how much it cost etc.

Finally, when you have arranged your stamp collection neatly, you'll have something special to show your friends and family and something to give you lots of fun and pleasure for many years.