Postage Stamp Chat Board & Stamp Bulletin Board Forum
 

Folks,

I am considering as a sideline to Kangaroos putting together a couple of usage sets of a paticular issue. I thought a good place to start would be something like the first decimal issues.

Are there others out there who are doing this sort of collecting or would have material for sale?

I would like as a part of that to get some cross over covers from £SD to the decimal era. Any one have any of this sort of items for sale.

I think this would be a fun though challenging area that would not be all that expensive.

Any help would be great.

Tim

Folks,

I know I should always read my posts before hitting the send button. By cross over covers I mean commercial covers that had by pre decimal and decimal frankings.

Thanks,

Tim

And again! I assume you mean "had both pre-decimal and decimal frankings"?

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Always looking for KGV British Commonwealth, mint, used, covers, anything

Sherro,

I am glad that one of us can type english. Yep I am looking for nice decimal early commercial covers and commercial covers with pre-decimal and decimal frankings.

Tim

I have a VERY strong recollection that pre-decimals Aust and AAT stamps of ANY kind (and the Cocos 1963 set) were legally possible to use on mail until Feb 14, 1968 .. i.e. 2 years after Decimal stamps were issued.

In my 30 years dealing I can barely recall seeing any such covers - even totally philatelic ones - which is pretty strange when you think on it!

Presumably decimal and pre-decimal could be used together on one cover in this period if one wished?

Indeed using old hinged States stamps or KGV heads was legally possible I think, as late as Feb 1968.

Oddly almost no-one seems to have done so. Most strange.

The rates were set the same as for coin -

1d = 1c

5d = 4c

1/- = 10c

etc

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Click HERE to see superb, RARE and unusual stamps, at FIXED low nett prices, high rez photos, and NO buyer fees etc!

Glen,

I think they are scarce but apparantly there are some out there. Do you have any decimal commercial covers at all?

Tim

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Click HERE to see superb, RARE and unusual stamps, at FIXED low nett prices, high rez photos, and NO buyer fees etc!

Glen,

I guess thats the common thing to do because they are not worth that much. Keep some for me next time that you see them.

Perhaps A 1 Stamps may have something.

Thanks mate,

Tim

I have a 1966 definitives FDC with a 1959 2s3d Wattle on it going spare. Not a commercial use, but interesting all the same.

I have also received stuff from Australia in the last few years where the sender has sneaked the odd pre dec stamp on to the cover.

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Always on the lookout for Australian pre decimal First Day Covers.

Pom,

Thanks for that. I would like to try and stick to commercial usage though.

As Glen said probably scarce as well.

Tim

Folks,

Here is a nice decimal cover. Is it commercial or philatelic? $8 franking on a small decimal cover registered. It seems like a lot of money to me.

Tim

Tim .. about $2 covered Reg'd and post then .. as you say rather odd as it SEEMS to be 100% commercial!

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Click HERE to see superb, RARE and unusual stamps, at FIXED low nett prices, high rez photos, and NO buyer fees etc!

Currie is on King Island IIRC, so why they'd be writing to Telecom Burnie on the other side of the island is also odd.

Some kind of sticker has later fallen off under Reg'd label .. possibly Express Handling or Messenger Delivery, orsomething expensive .. but they were paper labels too IIRC, larger than this, and this looks like a sticker has fallen off.

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Click HERE to see superb, RARE and unusual stamps, at FIXED low nett prices, high rez photos, and NO buyer fees etc!

Glen,

I agree but I am struggling to see how it could be philatelic as well??

Not addressed to anyone in particular but what could it have been to attract that sort of rate.

Nice spot that it has come from though. Had a couple of nice meals in Curry flying over Bass strait to Burnie.

Perhaps that was where Telecoms head office was??

Tim

Folks,

This is the sort of item that I am looking for. Its a 4 January 1968 usage of the 1967 25 cent Christmas stamp. Its paying the postage rate of 5c and the registration fee of 20c. I think it would be a lot scarcer than most people would give it credit for.

Anyone have items like this that they would like to sell?

Tim

Folks,

Here are another couple of decimal usage covers. How many first day covers have we all seen of this stamp? Probably hundreds. When I was collecting FDC's the Small Cook was one that was keenly sought and very scarce but how many of us have seen the Cook series commercially used. These two are both 30c Cooks paying the 5c letter rate and the 25c registration rate. One mailed on 3 June 70 and the other on 5 June 70. The stamp was on sale for about 12 months. These two were both used within that timeframe.

Tim

Hi Tim,

Great covers.

Rod Perry writes an interesting regular feature in Stamp News on covers - often discusses commercial usage of decimal stamps. For example, November 07 issue covered the decimal Navigators. Examples of covers he's collected are featured throughout. Certainly worth reading (if you haven't already that is?) Certainly made me appreciate the scarcity of the early decimal issues used commercially.

Seapaw,

I have read Rods articles and really enjoy them. His article on first decimals probably inspired me to have a go at an early decimal collection commercially used. I will buy a few covers from him to help get me started. He is pretty keen to encourage new starters in this field. Still trying to get some material wherever I can get them from.

Tim

Didge, I actually have a within period of use (not first day)imperf strip of the 5 cent Cook and the imperf 30 cent from the Minature sheet which appear to have been postally/commercially used (they have separate, different cancellations - probably philatelic in origin but who really knows?).

Unfortunately they are not on cover, or piece (they came as purchased from a NZ auction many moons ago). Mine are not worth much, but they are fun things to actually own.

Norm

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Geelong, VFA Premiers 1878, 1879, 1800, 1882, 1883, 1884, 1886, AFL Premiers 1925, 1931, 1937, 1951, 1952, 1963, 2007, 2009, 2011, .

Norm,

They sound interesting. Would not have been a lot of them cut out of the sheet and used. Shame they did not stay on the cover so we could see how they were used.

Tim

When I was in high school I cut up a Cook mini sheet and affixed the 6 stamps on covers and mailed them to myself .. the 30c was Registered.

In 30 years of dealing I have seen only 1 or 2 similar useages - which amazes me.

Same with 1969 Flight blocks 9, and 1971 Xmas blocks 7 and 25 etc.

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Click HERE to see superb, RARE and unusual stamps, at FIXED low nett prices, high rez photos, and NO buyer fees etc!

Glen

They would be nice now. I guess they disappeared years ago.

Tim

Tim .. sold long ago for a few dollars the set.

The 1953 Food Blocks 9 are the same as the above .. even a FDC of those is VERY rare.

WHY collectors did not create them is weird. Seems just SO obvious.

As you know only a dozen FDC of Australia's first stamp exist .. the 1d Roo, one of which (the best of which actually!) you own, and near all of these were ordered from a dealer by one collector.

Heck at a penny to create it was hardly a big investment.

And worth 5 figures each now, a very wise one, that much is for sure.

Why 100s of collectors did not buy these in 1913 is anyone's guess.

A FDC of the 1971 Xmas block 25 is also VERY rare .. I have a couple now but usually see one each decade or so.

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Click HERE to see superb, RARE and unusual stamps, at FIXED low nett prices, high rez photos, and NO buyer fees etc!

Glen,

I think you recently had a small Cook FDC on your site as metioned in my comment. That is also a very rare decimal item. I chased one for years before getting one. Did you sell it? It would be close to the key to the decimal FDC set to my thinking.

Tim

Folks,

I have got the scanner working again. Here is a lovely decimal franking group. It has all navigators on it except for the $1. Its paying some sort of a bulk postage buy I think. Can anyone comment? I will post a copy of the back of the card as well.

Tim

[/img]

Folks,

Here is the back of the card/tag.

Tim

Ive also been adding a few decimal commercial covers to the collection - a bit more affordable than the roos on cover! I dont have the postage rates info for this era yet or know what stamps are scarce on piece but am looking forward to learning more and digging deeper - they make for some interesting and attractive pieces in between the older covers. anyway, heres a few you may enjoy... (Ialso recently posted a few decimal commercial covers in that Tatts thread in scans section...)

Kris,

Nice mate. The 67 Cristmas 25c is a rare stamp on cover.

Hows things?

Tim

cheers mate

am good - how are you? good to see you back on here and sharing some scans

heres another couple - the first features a solo franking of the 25c Wool stamp from the primary Industries series - Rod Perry recently wrote about this series on cover in Stamp News, for those interested

couple more early decimals on cover...

I sold today 27 cartons of this kind of stuff to a member of this board who came and collected it and gave me my garage back!

The largest hoard of this stuff ever seen Ii'd say.

Glen

And even these simple-looking things are nice

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Always looking for KGV British Commonwealth, mint, used, covers, anything

Folks,

Looks like my decimal cover urge has attracted a few followers. I think that they are hugely underrated and much rarer than most would give credit for. Covers worth a few dollars today I think will be worth a few hundred dollars when people start to get into this interesting area. Those boxes look very interesting Glen. I would have loved to have been able to stick my nose into them.

Tim

I've been going through the box I bought from Browny. I'm amazed at how many "ordinary" looking covers have ACSC values of $5-$15 on cover, but if removed, 0.15c on a very good day!

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Always looking for KGV British Commonwealth, mint, used, covers, anything

Tim - they were all from around 1980 from News Limited and came from Rupert Murdoch's driver - who got first pick of head office mail!

Working on lotting up another lot from another source over Easter.

Webmaster is loading up this afternoon on my rarity page, a small selection of photos from a large heavy SUITCASE of neatly snipped complete cds cancels from the same source!

http://www.glenstephens.com/rarity

All circa 1980, culled from some 100,000's pieces of commercial mail.

The Aladdin's Cave for postmark collectors. Totally unsorted and never looked at by anyone, until my 60 second glance. Lots of these offices are long closed down now.

Glen,

Nice. I would be interested in the new lot that you are putting together. The postmark lot looks very interesting as well.

Tim

Folks,

I think this post gives me a different colour star. Wow. This time its an unusual commercial decimal cover. Apparantly the English and Australian Governments had some sort of a deal in relation to military forces mail rates. THis cover is an example of that. The cover has been sent airmail to the UK at the normal local letter rate. Its nicely stamped such as well.

Tim

I am also very interested in that lot, to add to my postmark collection.

I have just looked at your Rarity page and they aren't listed.
What is the asking price?

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Waroff49

The last chapter of the Never_Ending Story is being written.

Folks my Perth webmaster will load that large cds lot when he gets email - not sure if he is working over Easter.

It is $300 for a large suitcase full.

Very many 1000s like that handful I fished out to scan.

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Large SUITCASE of superb strikes NSW steel postmarks on piece: An incredible lot. All crammed into a very heavy and very full expensive Paklite "Million Miler" suitcase. The owner was Rupert Murdoch's personal driver in the 1980 era. He had first pick of all the News Limited Sydney inward mail. Accounts and competitions etc, of which there were many 1000s of pieces a week.

He pulled aside only envelopes with clear crisp cds strikes. He said only about 1 in 100 covers qualified. Then later nearly snipped them off on single paper, leaving only a COMPLETE cds strike as you can see. And he meant to arrange them into a collection "later on" - but never did. 25 years later he sold them to me all jumbled up, and unsorted in any way. There are very many THOUSANDS here. This selection I pulled aside at random when flicking through it.

In this day and age of fuzzy pink rubber hand-stamps you will never again have such an unpicked opportunity. Many of these offices will have long closed. And NONE of these steel cds have survived from any of them.

Near all appear to be from NSW which makes sense given the source of the mail, but a smattering of interstate sighted on my quick peek. Near all cancels look to be around the 1980 period. A once in a lifetime opportunity to secure such a hand-picked and untouched lot - for just pennies each. $A300

I've just listed these for sale

http://www.stampboards.com/viewtopic.ph ... 866#188866

"As there's a lot of discussion around commercial covers at the moment, I thought I'd list these. If they don't sell as as a group, I'll break them down into $10 lots via my website. As per scans, which are representative of the lot. These are the decimal remnants of a box of covers I bought from Browny. I kept the pre-decimals. The count is approximate, and they seem to cover the decimal period to about the early 1990's. There's many covers rated at $1-$3 by the ACSC catalogue, but also many rated at $5-$15. At 25c each, they're a steal.

They're all from the one family, who apparently never threw anything away, and condition is mixed, but mainly very good. There's many basic defins and the usual level of duplication, but some nice mixed usage. There's no Navigators and only one decimal bird that I can see.

Payment by bank deposit preferred, but PayPal OK if needs be. Postage at cost, likely to be $25-$30 "

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Always looking for KGV British Commonwealth, mint, used, covers, anything

Didge and Sherro - yep, is an insteresting collecting area - I fell into it by accident - got a few decimal covers in with a lot of pre-decimal covers a while back and each time I look at the decimal covers they gain a bit more appeal.

Glen - wouldve loved those 27 cartons to go through but distance/delivery was the problem on that one

Andrew it is sold already to someone here.

However the large lot allows the buyer to get the largest range of different cancels - smaller lots would not. It is a one in a lifetime hoard of this era, and I would hate to have broken it up.

Maybe the buyer will sell off the duplicates and that will still be a great lot.

Great thread.

I started reading Rod's articles a while ago and became an avid
collector of commercially used covers and postacrds.
I usually buy using Rod's advice but i do impulse buy as well

Too many to show here but I have scanned a few inot a photobucket album.

http://s22.photobucket.com/albums/b336/mstary1/

Post up a few goodies.

Andrew,
I'm sure if you keep your eagle eyes on the nice postmarks thread, some will appear in the next while.

Some may even be offered for sale on the Board.

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Waroff49

The last chapter of the Never_Ending Story is being written.