Evening star., 1935-06-02
dA

throne, he was president Of the Royal
Philatelic Society, and he Is now It's
patron, while his son, the Prince OF
Wales, is honorary president.
king George started to collect
stamps as most collectors have done,
In his boyhood days: he was collect
ing as naval cadet and subsequently
as midShipman On the Bacchante.
What started him on this pleasant
and intellectually recreative hobby
has not been divulged, but his sailor
uncle, the late Duke of Edinburgh,
was q thorough philatelist, and King
George may have been inspired by the
sight of his uncle's great collection.
Then as a great traveller, the young
prince had the stimulus of excellent
opportunities, and he early developed
q definite and very interesting policy.
THE collection Is strictly confined
to the stamps Of Great Britain and
the empire His majesty does not
collect foreign stamps; 1t Is task
too big for any one collector now
adays to try and amass all the worlds
stamps.
The Kings collection may now be
described as a series of specialized
collections. The stamps of Great
Britain alone occupy many volumes
and in these you may read the whole
history of the introduction Of the
postage stamp In this country eng
land.
"One early and rare item Is an
original rough sketch in water colOrS
of the first postage stamps which
Rowland Hill sent to the chancellor of
the exchequer in 1910 to show what
the new stamps would be like. He has
the artists original sketch Tor the
famous 'Mulready envelope speci-
mems of the earliest attempts at per-
forating stamps made by Henry
Archer, an Irishman, who introduced
the system, and who sold his rights
to the British government for 1000
pounds.
I'm addition to the regular stamps
issued by the British post Office, in
Guiding scarce watermark and grill
varieties, King George has a corner
pair unused and a single copy on
cover of the monocolored second stamp,
printed in 'tyrian plum which was
on the point of being issued when
King Edward VII died. The issue
was Immediately abandoned. The
used copy, the only one known, was
posted on May S, the day before
George v ascended the throne.
There are many exceedingly fine
copies Of the Mauritius issues in this
collection, including the two famous
post Office raritieS, and the pence
for pence error. The King possesses
beautiful copy of the I'D swan stamp
of Western Australia with the swan
inverted.
Having mentioned a few of the
high-priced stamps it should be added
that the royal philatelist has never
neglected the more modest priced
specimens which are as necessary to
collection as the rarities. An
Australian visitor calling on a we'll
known London stamp firm saw a fine
collection of Australian stamps that
had been broken up for sale. 1t had
been priced and had been inspected
by the King, who was the only pre-
vious purchaser from the lot. The
paper: I examined the blank spaces
with no little interest. and was de-
lighted to discover that the august
phil1telist did not despise stamps
priced as low as threepence.'
Junior Collectors.
A meeting of the Washington Fed
Grafton of Junior Stamp Collectors will
be held in the Board of Trade Room
in The Star Building Saturday after
noon at Q o'clock. Individuals as well
as school clubs are invited.
Members of the Stamp Club at the
Paul Junior High School are fortu-
nate in that their faculty adviser.
Daniel S. Coombs, is using the facili-
ties of the schools manual training
shop for the building of frames to
be used in displaying stamps at club
exhibitions. Each frame accommo-
dates nine album pages.