Hi, all! Long time, no post, so I thought I'd drag out my rusty html skills and try to post on this weekend's meeting topic.
At first, I couldn't imagine how the subject of the relationship between currency and stamps had any implications for Japanese stamps, which I have collected from time to time, and I was about to let this meeting topic pass me by. Then I had a Homer Simpson "d'oh!" moment:
There's an early series of Japanese stamps that are often referred to as the "koban" stamps. (1876 - 1892, Scott #55-84). Well, "koban" is the name for a type of Japanese coin, and the stamps' design was thought to resemble that coin.
Here's an
illustration of the koban coin (the one in the middle).
And then here's an
illustration of the koban stamps.
Now, as it happens, there's a footnote in the Scott catalog that says some of the stamps in that series are found with telegraph or telephone cancels, used to pay for that service. So, I suppose that's another tie-in to the meeting topic: stamps used as currency (for very specific services).
Scott also says that those telephone and telegraph cancels sell "at considerably lower prices than postally used copies". Unfortunately, they don't illustrate or describe the cancel, so there are a lot of telephone cancels floating around out there being priced at regular catalog values. So I thought I'd turn this into a learning opportunity. In the
stamp link, the 3rd stamp on the bottom row (orange, 20 sen), has a nearly full-on telephone cancel. (And they look kinda like the old-fashioned telephone dials.)
Thanks for letting me chime in! (And I'm keeping my fingers crossed about the html ...)
Best to all,
-- Dave
|