Evening star., 1933-05-07

type envelope: Il associates the cover
with a given event in q more direct way.
''The Government has issued many
cachets, but I have yet to see single
one that was produced by the printing
press. All have been Of the rubber
stamped class. Those issued by the
Government are attractively designed,
clearly impressed and squarely placed
on the envelopes. showing that It can
be done. Dealers should be willing to
accept the style chosen by the Govern
ment."
John G. Adams, 124 Broadway. Port
lard, Greg, has prepared a mimeo-
graphed pamphlet on "How to Organize
q Stamp Club It will be sent gratis
to any collector forwarding postage for
mailing.
E. J. volz, 935 Fulton street, Brook
1yn, N. Y, has in his collection a cover
which is franked with stamps from
every country in Central and South
America, as well as several West Indian
governments. 1t was one Of SO covers
carried on the first pan-American flight
of the United States Army Air Corps,
starting from Kelly Field, san Antonio,
Tex, December 81, 1926, and ending at
Washington, May 2, 1927. Five planes
set out, three returned. The cover Is
signed by each of the eight flyers who
completed the tour of more than $4,000
miles. Cancellation marks provide a
history of the enterprise. The countries
visited were Mexico, Guatemala. Hon.
duras. Salvador. Nicaragua, Costa Rica,
Panama, Canal Zone, Colombia, Ecua-
dor. Peru, Chile, Argentine Republic,
Uruguay, Paraguay: Bolivia. Brazil,
French, Dutch and British Guiana
Venezuela. Trinidad, Grenada. Mar
minican Republic, Cuba, Haiti, Puerto
Rico and the Virgin Islands.
Richard Mop. Cabeen, writing in the
Chicago Tribune, says: "A cancellation
Is a postal mark intended to render a
stamp unfit for further postal use, but
the word is somewhat confused with
postmark, and collectors therefore
sometimes call the cancellation an
obliteration or more concisely killer
In the early days foreign countries US
ually followed some orderly method of
cancelling stamps so that 1t was pos
sible to tell, without seeing the town.
mark, where the letter originated.
Norway, Denmark, France, Great Brit
ain and many others have assigned a
is usually impressed squarely on the
stamp.
THE United States had no system
in its early cancellations, and at the
introduction of stamps the postmasters
were forced to use whatever was at
hand. These include many marks
which were applied to 'pre-stamp'
covers, such as free or paid and
rate marks such as 3, S, 6. ETC., which
were useful when no stamps were af-
fixed but meaningless on letters bear
ing stamps.
After several years the use of such
markings ceased and a new series be-
gan in which the postmaster purchased
lockwood dies or used his jacknife on
the ink bottle cork There were almost
as many varieties of these as there
were post Offices. and some ambitious
postmasters cut special designs for the
various holidays. or designs to show
their lodge Affiliations, and some just
cut seemingly to test the Imagination
of modern collectors
Uniform hand-stamps were grad
ually issued to postmasters. SO that by
1880 the use of the homemade de-
vices had almost ceased, and in the
next decade the introduction of ma
chine cancellation still further cut
down their use, but even today an oc-
casional mark shows up which may
have been in continual though infre-
ouent use in some village since the
Civil War.
These cancellations are generally coll
lected on covers where possible but
are equally desirable on the stamp alone
where there is enough Of the design to
be distinct"
In 1927 the government of Siam au-
thorized surcharge on the airmail
stamps of the 1925 issue. The overprint
consisted Of three lines of Siamese
script signifying ''Siamese Government
Exposition-2468," the figure being the
date in the Buddhist calendar. The
celebration was to be in honor of the
fifteenth anniversary of the coronation
OF King Vajiravudh. but the sovereign's
death prevented the event from taking
place. The stamps. therefore, never
were used. but it is possible that some
specimens OF them passed into the
hands OF collectors. A search is being
made.
The letters GA M" found on several
OF the provisional philatelic issues of
Greece for 1900 are an abb-eviation for
aka metallika," meaning value in
coin. The stamps were sold for hard
CASH only, not for deprecated paper
money.
The Estonian Red Cross stamps of
I93! were not success. About FIVE
sixths of the total number prepared
were left unsold and now have been de-
stroyed. The figures of those actually
placed in circulation are given as: Is
STAMP DEALERS.
SPECIAL TODAY
100 different u. S. stamps, only SO cents
rs Irving st. NV.