Stamp Column Archives

The Glassine Surfer Column Archive

This column originally appeared in the American Philatelic Society's monthly magazine, "The American Philatelist." Since then some of the information may be out-of-date depending on how far back you're reading.

March 2002

Philatelic Museums

Museums aren't archives, but related. They're interpretations of data arranged in such a way as to preserve and tell a story to the public, and the best philatelic museums likewise research and cultural centers. There are many, many postal museums and libraries on the Web, all worth knowing, but generally scattered and encumbered with 18-word long URL's.

Thankfully, Graeme Sherman has collected most of the Web's stamp museums, from Albania to Zimbabwe, on one easy to use page. Some resources don't have sites, but then Sherman provides the street address in case you'd like to send an old fashioned letter.

Philatelic Museums & Libraries
http://dspace.dial.pipex.com/town/square/ac752/museum1.htm

While you're there, you should note the World Postage Rate list on the site (Andorra to USA).

And while we're on the subject, let me mention a newer site called Museum Stuff. It's a portal to the world's museums, covering art, history, science, etc. A tidy resource for school projects.

MuseumStuff
http://www.museumstuff.com/

Weeds Redux

Stamp forgeries were mentioned here last month, and in the interim I've been spending more and more time at a few other sites about faux philatelic items.

I enjoy the Helsingfors Frimärkssamlare Förening site, though not for its reading material because it's in Swedish, but for its collection of links to pages of material around the Web on stamp forgeries.

The linked sites are a motley and sundry group, but extremely useful.

Stamp Forgery Links
http://www.geocities.com/Augusta/5525/forglinks.html

The "Comparative Philatelic Forgery Identification Site" is another terrific online resource to learn about various fakes and forgeries. It starts off with a simple country list (Afghanistan through Uruguay) and branches off from there to individual studies and comparisons of stamp issues.

For example, click "United States" and then "1860 90 Cent (Scott 39) (comparison)" and you'll wind up at a page of comparison scans. In this case there is a genuine stamp along with seven forgeries.

Webmaster Bill Claghorn covers Sperati, Fournier, Spiro, Oneglia and others and the site is intended to informer users of common forgeries by showing their characteristics through comparisons with genuine stamps.

Comparative Philatelic Forgery Identification Site
http://www.geocities.com/claghorn1p/

In the same vein, the Swedish language Helsinki, Finland, stamp club maintains a hefty section of about 1300 philatelic experts searchable by name and by country of expertise.

These are dealers and collectors who you may recognize by their expertization marks on the back of some issues or by their expertization certificates. This is a very helpful list.

Philatelic Experts
http://www.geocities.com/Augusta/5525/experts.html

Informed collectors and buyers who frequent the Net also ought to know about a small site in Australia with the ungainly name of "eBay - forgeries, fakes, dodgy sellers, scams: The Tip of the Iceberg."

The site is a Web site has information gleaned from a bulletin board at eBay, where eBay users ask and answer questions. It seems that the board is very attentive to information regarding ethical practices among buyers and sellers on eBay.

There are links to helpful articles on dealing with troubled transactions on the online auction service as well as some examples of previous cases.

eBay - forgeries, fakes, dodgy sellers, scams
http://www.pcug.org.au/~sheryll/Forgeries/Forgeries_article.htm

Part I :: Part II :: Part III