Additions to my airmail collection

Some new airmail purchases:




The Honduras airmail officials are from 1933. They are Sanabria 119d (red) and Sanabria 121d. Scott lists 36 stamps for this series -- CO15-43. It lists no varieties. The 1972 Sanabria lists 60 main numbers and 160 varieties! Both of these stamps are varieties (imperforate between).

There is a vast number of varieties in older Honduras airmails. Scott lists most, but for some reason did not on this issue.

The printing quality on the pictured stamps and others I have from this series is poor.

The Aegean Islands stamps are CE1-2, airmail special delivery from 1932. The Canadian semi-official is CL13, from 1926. And the two Nicaraguan airmail officials are CO2b-3b, issued in 1929.

I bought the Honduras stamps from a fellow in Taiwan, on eBay. The rest came from Eastern Auctions, in Canada.

Auctions occasionally offer homemade studies of early Honduran airmail overprints with a huge range of varieties. Most are unlisted, and many are typographical. Honduran postal authorities of the day must have been appointed for their political reliability. Just sorting out the listed varieties will make you grind your teeth.

Newfoundland C2 and (especially) C3 show that overprints can move all over the place on the same sheet. Whether a particular overprint variety is significant is probably dependent on collector interest. On 121, Sanabria lists 14 varieties! But the one you note is not included. Newfoundland is more popular, and people are probably more inclined to jump at the different settings. Unitrade seems to list everything it can possibly find. In the case of this Honduras set, Scott simply notes, "Varieties of forgoing surcharges exist." No kidding.

Varieties throughout that period in Honduras include inverted overprints, misspellings, missing letters or numbers, screwed up dates, wrong colors, etc. I don't see any typesetting varieties. The catalog authors have to draw the line somewhere, I guess. But they would probably include typesetting errors if collectors made an issue of them.

Newfoundland produced a fair number of varieties, but it's not in Honduras' league. 

At the top, we have Brazil Scott 3CL1-3, issued Nov. 9, 1927, by Varig, Brazil's first national airline. Bottom is Germany Sanabria 34a, a se-tenant pair from a booklet issued July 14, 1931. 

Varig is now part of Gol Airlines, according to Wikipedia. Its full name was Sociedade Anônima Empresa de Viação Aérea Rio-Grandense, which Google translates as Anonymous Society of Air Traffic Company Riograndense. An alternative translation for Anonymous Society is Joint Stock Company. That makes more sense. 

The Brazilian stamps came from Paradise Valley Stamp Co. in the United States. The German pair is from Sandafayre, in Britain.

Nice additions. I'm a sucker for the semi-official airmails.

Nice additions. I love airmails.

If I were "starting all over again," I wouldn't collect any USA except Back of Book because I do love the US Airmails.

And then I'd focus the rest of my energy on the Commonwealth.

I probably have 95 percent of Scott's major numbers in my classic airmail collection. I'm missing quite a few spendy stamps, many of which I will never get. I'm also missing a number of common sets that I just never see. Last week, I found three such sets in the APS stamp store and snapped them up. The cost: a grand total of $4.50!



From the top, we have Paraguay C36-38, French Guinea C1-5 and French Guiana C1-8. All common stamps.

I still need about a dozen low-priced sets. WHO'S THE PERSON HOARDING THESE STAMPS?!

Ed, create a thread in the forum's want list section so we can try to help you. Have you set up searches for them on ebay?

Three more stamps have been added to my airmail collection:


Left to right, Newfoundland C2c, Ecuador CO6a, Mexico C93A

The Newfoundland stamp was issued for the Alcock-Brown flight to Ireland in 1919. They made the trip in a Vickers Vimy bomber, an open-cockpit aircraft. It was the first nonstop trans-Atlantic flight. The pair won a £10,000 prize put up by The Daily Mail of London.


Statue of Alcock and Brown at Heathrow Airport

This stamp is one of three varieties of C2 listed in Scott. All are shifts in the overprint. In this case, The "A" of Air is under the "a" of Trans. It was supposed to be under the "r." So there!

The stamp on the right honored Francisco Sarabia, who flew from Mexico City to New York nonstop in 1939. Sarabia made the trip in less than 11 hours, breaking Amelia Earhart's 1934 record by 3.5 hours.


Francisco Sarabia

On his return, Sarabia stopped in Washington to have his plane serviced. On takeoff, his engine stalled and he plunged into the Potomac River. Sarabia drowned. Investigators later found a mechanic's rag in a carburetor. It had apparently been left in the engine compartment and was sucked into the carburetor.

Only 2,100 of these stamps were printed, 400 of which were overprinted "Muestra" and sent to the UPU. The low numbers made the stamps expensive, and their sale financed the flight. Many were placed on covers and carried by Sarabia. These also were sold. The same game was played by Earhart in 1934. Collectors were not happy.

There's no particular story behind Ecuador CO6a, as far as I know. However, "OFICIAL" is upside down. Whoops! That raises the Scott value from $4 to $240.

Three more additions to my airmail collection:


Nicaragua C9, France C15, Venezuela C74a

I discovered months ago in a thread on Stampboards that I had France C15a. It has reversed burelage (or burelé, if you please). Till then, I was unaware of the variety. I have since been watching auctions for C15. But almost all copies offered as C15 in the U.S. are actually C15a.

Scott does not offer a picture of the variety. So probably few American dealers know what to look for. Sanabria does not even list the variety. Fortunately, someone posted a comparison from an old Yvert catalog in the Stampboards thread.

The above stamp came from a Kelleher auction. It included seven copies, all listed as C15. But five were C15a. I got one of the two true C15's.

I'll post both stamps later.

BTW, I understand that this stamp covered the one-ounce rate from Paris to Raratonga!

More efforts to close the spendy holes in my airmail collection. These are from the nation of Colombia (note the correct spelling, JerryB):


C17


C20


C53 & C54


Sanabria 125a

The two top ones were issued in 1921. I got them from Rasdale, an auction house in Chicago, for low minimums. No one else was after them that day.

C53 and C54 were issued in 1928. They commemorated a goodwill flight by Lt. Benjamin Mendez from New York City to Bogota. And the last one is a double overprint variety of C82, issued in 1930. All three came from Sandafayre, in Great Britain.

These were issued by SCADTA, the air service that provided most early airmail stamps. The government took over that chore in 1932.

I used PostmasterGS's program to level these images. That is a great program, Postmaster!

And here's a batch from Chile, which completed the major numbers from that country:

       
C6, C6A & C6B

       
C6C, C6D & C6E

   
C7 & C8

These stamps are from 1928-29. Certainly a distinguished looking group of gentlemen.

I purchased this set from A to Z Stamps, a shop in Tempe, AZ. They travel around the country to major shows with their Great Wall of Stamps. Nice people, and they have loads of stamps!

I've wondered about that, too. That is a lot of inventory to tote around. On their site, they note the shows they're attending. I saw California, Texas and Maryland, among others. They cover a LOT of ground. When they are in town, they open their store.

A to Z's store is crammed with stamps and albums. I asked Michael Ball how he found the collections that he buys. He said they mostly walk in the door. There are a helluva lot of retirees in the Phoenix area. Ball calls this area God's Waiting Room. Pretty humorous guy.

There aren't many stamp stores left, especially with so much inventory. A to Z is only 10 minutes from my house!

I think we're in agreement. The stamp in my post above (Feb. 22) is C15. I already had C15a. I have another post that shows the differences. I could not find a way to copy that post to this thread.

Hi Ed

If you ever want to get rid of the Sanabria 125a I will send you my address.

A to Z is near you house? I'm jealous. My friend here has a stamp store and I have pretty much culled out the Colombia items I want.
A to Z would have the more modern issues I need.

BTW, have you ever bought anything from Neiser? He has some items I need, at ridiculous prices, but if needed price should be a small issue.

Jerry B