The Waterbury Democrat., 1938-02-05

For the benefit Of stamp col 1ectors, the government has pass ed a law to permit the printing of black and white illustrations of United States and foreign post ae stamps. The final step in the fifteen-year contest to liberalize the laws respecting the reproduc- tion of United States postage in newspapers and philatelic publi- cations was taken last week when President Roosevelt signed the bill.
 The worlds rarest stamp, &C., cording to the Philateliste Beige is the 3 skilling Bank of Sweden adhesive of 1855, printed in yellow instead of green. Only one copy is known to exist, having been dis covered by schoolboy in lot of un5orted stamps in 1885.
 A short time after it's discovery Ferrari bought it from a Vienna dealer for S1,500. When the Fer rari collection was sold at auction in 1922 the stamp brought S3,50O. Since then it has been sod several times, the price mounting rapidly to S6,0OO; S10,0O0; and finally S25,O0O; which was obtained for it recently by farmer of London, from an unnamed buyer. This IS the highest price on record for a stamp, except the S26,70O obtained for the lc. British Guiana of 1856 by Ferrari.
 A startling number of price re- visions in the Scott catalogue have . been announced in the January issue of Scott's Monthly Journal. A great many of the decreases were made in the stamps of Be- livia, China, Italy and the Italian colonies, especially the sets of the later group numbered from 12 to 16.
 Stamps i'll general were featured on the souvenir cards distributed at a recent dinner of The Virgin ians. A small card was used, with a four-cent army stamp stuck in the center, fianked with the cross ed Confederate and United States flags. Across the bottom was the inscription, Souvenir of the Ma tion's adoption of two of Virginia's heroes. The stamp, subject to an earlier controversy, features Gen. Robert E. Lee an Gen. Jackson.
 Latvie A block of two stamps was issued in Januarywith a face value of 2 lats. There were 100000 issued. One stamp shows the new location of the Ministry
 Justice at Riga, and the other shows a view of the electric sta- tion at Kegums, now under con- struction.
 Switzerland Information received from Switzerland places the number of Pro Juventute" sheets at 34O,OO0 instead of the of the 50,0O0 originally annOunc- ed. It is reported that 100000 are being reserved for the Pro Juv- entate chil welfare committee.
 Methods of printing stamps have been changed by the Bureau of Engraving, due to request of many stamp collectors and repre- sentations by the stamp division of the Post ffice Department. Many complaints had been loded with the department by philate- lists that when stamps were per- forated the process used cut into the plate numbers, thus making them worthless from a collectors standpoint. From now on it is the intention of the bureau to move the numbers on stamps far enough out to the margins to prevent such disfiguration of plate numbers. Plate number 21,584 is the first one made under the new system and all new plates hereafter will be thus treated.
 Vatican City .. It has been announced that the 25c. value of the Catholic Press Exposition set is nearin exhaustion, and henceforth will be sold only with the complete set.
 Announcement has been made by Leo August editor and publish CT of the United States Specialize ed Catalogue of First Day Covers,