New Zealand: Air Mail Stamps and Covers

One the other factors driving growing interest in stamp collecting in the 1930s was FDR.  The US president was, and perhaps still is, the most famous stamp collector in the world.  He had picked up the hobby as a child and maintained it while in office.  Such was his love of stamps, he reportedly instructed the US State Department to collect interesting items from incoming mail to add to his collection.  He was also frequently photographed with his stamps, which apparently was an integral part of his carefully crafted public persona of being calm and in control.

The letter's arrival in Washington was also reported:

Savage died in 1940, and from what I can find online, there was no further postal correspondence between Savage and FDR.

So, what happened to the letter?  As many collectors know, FDR's collection was auctioned in 1946 after his death the previous year.  There was, according to the US Postal Museum, some contention at the time that FDR's stamps should have been the property of the state given that he collected so much of it from official mail, but the auction proceeded nonetheless.  

Much of the material was of limited philatelic value, but its association with FDR created significant interest.  Most of the items were marked by the auction agent - H.R. Harmer of NY - with a handstamp authenticating them as having come from FDR's collection.  It is fairly common to come across these pieces today.  I picked up a couple of NZ-related items in 2022, which was how I first came to know of FDR's collection and its history. I was, nevertheless, a bit surprised when Savage's letter, along with the FFC, came up for sale on eBay in November from a US dealer.