This edition of Canadian Stamp News contains a report on covers created by Ottawa’s Irv Osterer, a prolific collector with an artistic side. Regular readers will probably have figured out this isn’t the first time Irv’s work has appeared in CSN, not even the first time this year. The reason is that Irv is prolific,... Continue reading →
So far communities in four Canadian provinces know they will lose home delivery in 2015.
Canada Post has not formally announced which communities will lose home delivery in 2015, but the word is leaking out through local announcements. While the corporation has yet to work out all its details for the next year, some communities in Ontario, Saskatchewan, Alberta, and British Columbia know their turn is next. Canada Post has... Continue reading →
It took me quite a while to get my head around exhibiting, but I think it was worth the time and effort. The concept of exhibiting is deceptively simple: you take some stuff, and make a display. Afterwards, some judges check it over, and if you’re good enough you get an award. Then I discovered... Continue reading →
Quebec conference delegates are featured in the photo on the first-day cover honouring the founding of Canada.
Canada Post’s tribute to the path of Confederation continues, with a commemorative envelope to celebrate the Quebec Conference. Along with the Charlottetown Conference envelope issued this past September, it continues the story of the first steps in the foundation of our country, through archival photographs, art and documents. The envelope showcases a photograph of the... Continue reading →
Canada Post is committed to a plan that will see, among other things, the elimination of door-to-door delivery across Canada. I’m not taking sides on postal transformation, but I figure that the corporation has done a good job of getting support from the government, and with the current government’s combination of a top-down approach, and... Continue reading →
I remember the days when stamp collecting was simple, well sort of simple. By that I mean that the hobby has always had a technical side. I’m pretty sure that even in the days of Rowland Hill, inventor of postal services and stamps as we know them today, some of the very first collectors were... Continue reading →
One of just a few plate blocks of four inverted Jenny stamps has become the second-most valuable philatelic item in the world.
Donald J. Sundman, of Mystic Stamp Company in Camden, New York, has reported the sale of a plate block of the famous Jenny invert 24-cent airmail stamp (Scott #C3a) for more than $4.8 million, a record price for a U.S. philatelic item. The sale took place by private treaty, with the purchaser requesting anonymity. “At... Continue reading →
An 1871 letter mailed to Scotland from Victoria. The cover has a five-cent overprint on a British Columbia three-pence stamp, to pay for mail leaving the colony, but was carried express by Wells Fargo to the U.S. and then delivered from there. It has a cancelled six-cent U.S. rate to pay for delivery to the U.K.
Eastern Auctions has two collections heavy on postal history coming up in the Oct. 16, sale, the Harvey Poole collection of Canada and British North America, and the Jack Wallace Collection of British Columbia and Vancouver. The Poole collection, first started in the 1950s, has expanded for several decades. As with his Newfoundland collection, sold... Continue reading →