Ed Buziak / Postal History

Moules = Mussels

OK, that makes sense. Thanks!

Kelso, WA, wasn't a small rural town so I was wondering why the two double-ring oval 'blind' stamp cancels were applied, with the registered mark obviously on the front, but with dated Kelso backstamps?

Forgot to change my 'handle' when posting this from my iPhone so have re-posted it from my 'photo' stream on Bluesky. The 1912 card shows workers at a long-established factory in a local town which closed around 2004. Last year everything was demolished and since replaced by a solar farm.

Although I've never seen one like it, I did once have a GB cover where the 1909 date slug read 1906... the last numeral being inverted in error.

Looks like the US 1907 date slug hasn't been changed to 1908.

I did suspect that they were frame guide lines but then wasn't sure seeing they were imperforate on those two edges. I know nothing really about US stamps but used to look closely (on mail) at British Kings with an imperf edge since some from booklets could have been scarcer wmk.inv so adding value.

Oh-la-la... beautiful pieces.

I have a few covers with the French Cérès 20C noir but the design, like the Greek Hermes printings, is a minefield for the collector.

Interesting pair of stamps with the frame lines... would they be from a booklet?

Always interesting to see old stamps pen-cancelled. Unfortunately, many over-zealous postal officials cancel modern stamps with a ball-point pen if they've missed the automatic franking machines, which must be very disappointing for young collectors receiving multi-stamped birthday mail, for exmple.

Even before I read 'Paris' stamps I thought the border design looked familiar... and on checking realized they were designed by Albert Barre who did the first Greek Hermes issue of 1861, and of the same family J.J. Barre who designed of the first French definitives of 1849. Beautiful covers also!

At the far end of that bay is where the Golf Hotel (now the Cumbria Grand Hotel) is and where my maternal grandfather "Joe Walton & His Sparks Band" quintet used to play dance music in the 1930s.

A buff coloured envelope stamped with a George Washington 3c green stamp and postmarked Washington DC May 12 1882. The advertising information on the envelope indicates it was sent commercially by a pensions company. The letter it contained is opened-up and used as the background... I cannot read it because it is written in Pitman shorthand. The later Gregg shorthand was not released until 1888, a few years after this letter was written.

With postal history I'm generally more interested in envelopes with correspondence if viewing auction listings, and so bought this US Washington stamped and postmarked example from 1882, but I cannot read it because it's written in Pitman shorthand.

#PostalHistory #Philately #Stamp #Shorthand #USA

A stamped envelope mailed from the UK to New York, USA in November 1939 with nineteen George VI postage stamps paying the postage of 2/6d... twelve deep-brown penny 1/2d stamps, six deep-red penny stamps, and one sixpenny pale-lilac stamp. The envelope also carries a blue 'By Air Mail' sticker.

An attractive cover posted 6.Nov.1939 from Charlebury, Oxon to New York with nineteen George VI stamps making up a total of 2/6d. Several stamps have their lower perforations trimmed indicating from a stamp booklet... higher value inverted watermarks?

#PostalHistory #Philately #Stamps #GeorgeVI #GB

A cardboard luggage label which on this side has ten Swiss stamps bearing the head of William Tell and one with the figure of his son standing with a crossbow. The stamps have been cancelled with a date-stamp and the luggage - apparently with a weight of 13.8 kilos - would have been sent to the address on the reverse side.

A scarce piece of postal history, rarely seen in auctions or dealers stock-books; a luggage label stamped for a weight of 13.8 kilos according to the instructions on the reverse. It was sent from Dürrenroth in 1916, but I can't decipher the receiver's address.

#PostalHistory #Philately #Switzerland

Most of my pre-19th century postal history collection has mail folded in this way... the missives also being secured with a wax seal on the rear.

#PostalHistory #Letters #GB

An early 'filing system' for documents... now I know why some of my old hand-written documents from the 19th century have holes in them.

#PostalHistory #Archive #GB

An unusual ‘mourning letter’ …Intended to make the recipient cry laughing!

An unusual speciality of my postal history hobby is mourning covers, also known as 'trauerbrief' for obituary in German and 'lettre de deuil' for bereavement letter in French... the quite amusing 5-minute read about this cover is on Medium.

#PostalHistory #Philately #PostageStamp #Mourning #France

Returned / Non-Deliverable mail is quite collectible, often with double the amount of handwritten addresses and postmarks, official advice vignettes, red-line crossings-out and maybe tax stamps added for payment of the returned mail to the sender.

#PostalHistory #Philately #PostageStamp #Stamp #GB

I can’t read this handwriting… It almost made me cross-eyed in the end!

Another article from my Medium page... Cross-writing was done when a writer reached the bottom of a page then turned it through ninety degrees so it could be overwritten in continuation of a lengthy message... much easier to write than to read!

#PostalHistory #Philately #PostageStamp #Stamp #GB

500 stamps on a roll… But simply not long enough when hyper-inflation hit.

Here's a philatelic oddity from my collection which I wrote about on Medium... a century-old roll of German Reich 50 mark stamps (Michel Germany catalogue Nr.209 in dark green and matt violet) printed in 1922 for use in dispensing machines.

#PostalHistory #Philately #PostageStamp #Stamp #Germany

I've pinned this former post from my general photography stream as an intro to my latest Bluesky theme on Postal History which will feature on pre-1944 mail, or letters posted before my birth date!