Poodle_Mum
Member 
Inactive
Posts: 252 
What I collect: WW to 1950; All German Eras; Imperial Russia & USSR; All Occupations and Colonies of Germany and Russia; Canada; QV and Belgian Railways
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Post by Poodle_Mum on Oct 8, 2017 9:20:29 GMT
I am creating a WW set of Albums. I have a dilemma. My collection is 1840 to 1949.
My question is how to create it. I have six Scott Junior International Albums that I will be taking apart and creating my own pages.
My dilemma is how to set it up.
Thoughts:
1. Divide it into Continents - creating pages for each country and colony within each Continent.
2. Alphabetical Order - dilemma here is the fact that countries identified in my SG "The Ideal Postage Stamp Album" of 1914 album will be consolidated with my 1943 Scott Albums and countries changed tremendously during this time period. A good example is that neither has a separate section for Ethiopia, they are simply housed under "Abyssinia." Despite my 1914 album identifying Abyssinia which was later divided into Ethiopia and Eritrea, it has a separate section for Eritrea. Canadian Provinces are spread out alphabetically in my 1943 albums which consolidate British Empire with "Foreign" whereas the 1914 has two separate albums British Empire is Vol 1 (I do not have this one) and Worldwide "aka Foreign" is Vol 2.
I want to do a short write-up on each country during the time frame of my collection.
Ideally I would create a section for Canada and then divide it into Provinces and then the Dominion. Likewise with my German collection I would create a Germany section and then divide it into States, Confederation, Empire and Third Reich. The same would be true of Russia - Empire and USSR.
There are so many periods of occupations in almost every country, I'm baffled as to how to actually set up the albums.
If you were in my position, would you create it according to Continent? If so, how would you create the terms of "Asia" which in these albums include countries we would consider Middle East (is this part of Asia?)
All advice is welcome as I set off on this new adventure. I would like to keep it as "old country" as I can which is why I am leaning towards creating it by continent rather than alphabetical. For the most part, none of these countries gained independence from colonial occupation during my collection period although there is a a great deal of cross-over with war occupations.
I am really looking forward to creating these albums which is my planned focus for the next few months. Many of my countries will be "complete" as the time frame is limited (with the exception of extremely high values which will never reach my paws).
The continent system seems to be the most ideal set-up as I can then place within those - such as North America, all of Canada as stated in the above explanation. Of course then I have difficulties with the United States because I have countries that fall under the US during a certain time frame but then also Central America.
Since I'm starting from scratch and creating my own pages, once I settle on a system, it will be ideal.
Rather than having North America, perhaps it would be better to create it as The Americas which would then allow me to create countries that once were under the US but later became its own country, such as Cuba.
I welcome all advice as this is quite an interesting experience. I know many of you have created WW collections, for those of you who have not used a pre-printed page set-up, how did you decide the method to create your albums?
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Jerry B
Departed
Rest in Peace
Marietta, Georgia USA
Posts: 1,485 
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Post by Jerry B on Oct 8, 2017 9:50:44 GMT
Hi Poodle Mum
If I was a WorldWide collector that is how I would do it. Regarding a country's change in occupation and/or name I would keep everything pertinent to that country together. One possibility in this case is to organize the country pages by periods and/or political periods.
If you e-mail me at jerrybemail-stamps "at" Yahoo "dot" com I can send you a copy of Gerben van Gelder's EXCEL spread sheet that he used for organizing his Web pages. It might help with starting the project. I will also make and send a list that I am using for a little project.
Jerry B
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scb
Member
Inactive
Now at 100,000+ worldwide stamps, and progressing one stamp at a time towards the 200K
Posts: 313
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Post by scb on Oct 8, 2017 11:37:35 GMT
Personally I've opted to by-continent, and then by geopolitical/historical connections. For example my Hawaii section sits tightly with US, whereas my Cuba sits as separate section (including both the colonial and post-colonial eras as separate sections)... But this is not a strict rule, and I can and have done exceptions where something else feels better. This was one of those decisions that SWH(Gerben) and I used to talk about when he was building up his spreadsheet.
Possibly the best thing I can say is that don't be afraid to change things if something does not feel correct. Everything is always subjective to ones (often times limited) knowledge and understanding of the history.
-k-
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Anping
Departed
Rest in Peace
Posts: 533
What I collect: Hong Kong, Aden & States & odd stuff I like.
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Post by Anping on Oct 8, 2017 12:38:17 GMT
There are probably so many organisational permutations, you may start off well enough but then become frustrated as it proceeds.
I think the key to organising your collection, is not so much how you subdivide your continents/regions etc., it is how you cross refer them to catalogue listings. Abyssinia, for example; would need a cross reference to Ethiopia and Eritrea and perhaps album notations as to when these were divided.
I think I would try to work through the planned divisions on paper (perhaps a tree diagram) and then see how these work out. This would I think show up any potential difficulties. Just make it it convenient and easier for YOU to find the corresponding catalogue entries (Scott/SG/Michel etc.).
Your reference to countries in Asia/Middle East (were you thinking of Turkey ?). If you were, this is now regionally classified as Eastern Europe and Western Asia. But I don't know if this is really that significant, other than wanting to divide it into early Ottoman Empire and post 1922 (Ataturk era).
From my experience of organising my own collection (and that is so very basic; being mainly one country), I can guarantee that something I categorised as X then needs to be changed to X and Y, as time goes by.
I hope this makes a little bit of sense.
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Post by classicalstamps on Oct 8, 2017 18:09:10 GMT
When I collected WW, I used the continent approach.
Then I organised it alphabetically after the current name of the country.
Under each country, I had all previous territories etc. listed. with short descriptions.
Example: Ceylon was under Sri Lanka.
I made special albums for British Commonwealth.
Worked very well.
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Ryan
Member
Calgary, Alberta, Canada
Posts: 2,720
What I collect: If I have a catalogue for it, I collect it. And I have many catalogues ....
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Post by Ryan on Oct 9, 2017 9:25:03 GMT
I think the key to organising your collection, is not so much how you subdivide your continents/regions etc., it is how you cross refer them to catalogue listings. In this regard, perhaps European collectors will naturally tend towards organizing their collections regionally since that's how their catalogues are organized. The Scott catalogues have limited regional organization, with countries like Canada, Australia, Germany, India or the U.S. having their listings ordered along with the various states / provinces / territories that are associated with the main overarching country. But a catalogue like Michel is much more regional with all the volumes organized according to geographical region. Sometimes I find that tricky. The Scott catalogue is my main source and the Michel catalogue is something I look at for extra info. When it's time to look at a stamp from Bulgaria, or Burma, or Burundi, I usually end up looking at more than one Michel volume before I find where it's listed, whereas I can always find it in a Scott catalogue without a problem. I'm more accustomed to the Scott listings which are almost strictly alphabetical and I seldom get tripped up by oddballs like Wenden or Lombardy-Venetia (these are oddballs due partly to the fact that I have approximately zero stamps from these places, so I almost never need to try to find them in the catalogue). Since my main catalogue is organized alphabetically, I would end up organizing my collection alphabetically. I'm sure that if my main catalogue was regional, then I would end up organizing my collection regionally. Like Anping says, the key thing for me would be to make my collection easily cross reference my catalogue - for me, that's most easily done by simply putting the collection in the same order as the catalogue. Be that as it may, when I finally get going again on sorting and cataloguing and organizing my collection (for the nth time in my life), I'm going to end up with a digital collection that allows me to easily insert stuff as I get it. Like Keijo, I store stuff in stockbooks. Right now, if I were to find a big pile of Afars & Issas, I would only have room in my stockbooks for about 2 rows of stamps before they run into my pile from Afghanistan. I have lots of Afghan stamps and it would be a big pain in my neck to move everything around to new stockbooks just to keep the Afars stamps together in one group. My digital collection will have all the scanned images together in one place along with markers that tell me what book I'm using to store the stamps - the first 3 rows might be on page 1 of the first stockbook and the remainder might be on the 10th page of the 40th stockbook. That would bother me a lot if the only way I had to see the stamps was to look at physical copies, but I will be able to avoid that by having scanned copies to look at easily, along with markers to tell me where I can find the physical copies when the day comes that I might want to do that. Ryan |
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Post by classicalstamps on Oct 9, 2017 12:05:43 GMT
Organising your WW albums offer a unique opportunity to learn about history. If you go strictly alphabetically you miss out on learning about interesting historical events.
And then there are the 'problem' with splitting things up like: [Russia --> Soviet Union --> Russia].
But to each his/her own :-)
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Poodle_Mum
Member
Inactive
Posts: 252
What I collect: WW to 1950; All German Eras; Imperial Russia & USSR; All Occupations and Colonies of Germany and Russia; Canada; QV and Belgian Railways
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Post by Poodle_Mum on Oct 9, 2017 21:51:06 GMT
I'm a history buff so I'm definitely leaning to the continent layout. With the write-up on each country at the beginning, there will then be information regarding occupations and name changes with years and then even though independence in most cases will have occurred after my collection period ends, it will be noted in the write-up.
I rarely use catalogues. When I'm sorting my stamps I use Stampworld because it identifies by issue date.
So the continent idea is the easiest and best for me, arranged alphabetically. So, for example, all the variances of Rhodesia won't be together but the write-up will cross reference them.
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bobby1948
Departed
Rest in Peace
"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing." - Sir Edmund Burke
Posts: 690
What I collect: WW to 1945; US mnh 1922-1990; US used and unused to 1922
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Post by bobby1948 on Oct 10, 2017 4:42:44 GMT
Kelly,
It sounds to me that you have hit upon your "comfort" format (continents using Stampworld as an organizational guide). Now comes the "doing" part. I know what a perfectionist you are, so I might add a note of caution here: do not let form consume substance. Remember, in the end, an album is merely the vehicle which carries your "cherished ones" on their journey through the years.
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Poodle_Mum
Member
Inactive
Posts: 252
What I collect: WW to 1950; All German Eras; Imperial Russia & USSR; All Occupations and Colonies of Germany and Russia; Canada; QV and Belgian Railways
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Post by Poodle_Mum on Oct 10, 2017 6:52:12 GMT
Thanks Bobby. It will be a labour of love as opposed to my ongoing German collection which gives me headaches sometimes although I'll never give it up.
I've no interest in "specialising" in my WW with the exception of shades and perfs or in my penny reds, the plate numbers. Just the chance to travel back in time and see the world is very exciting and I'm looking forward to creating this project.
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Post by classicalstamps on Oct 10, 2017 7:05:39 GMT
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Post by jimjung on Oct 10, 2017 16:25:24 GMT
I think you just have to look at the menus here on The Stamp Forum if you want some ideas on how to organize this.
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bobby1948
Departed
Rest in Peace
"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing." - Sir Edmund Burke
Posts: 690
What I collect: WW to 1945; US mnh 1922-1990; US used and unused to 1922
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Post by bobby1948 on Oct 11, 2017 17:16:19 GMT
I think you just have to look at the menus here on The Stamp Forum if you want some ideas on how to organize this. Good point. TSF topics are set up the direction you have indicated you want to go. There are a few missing entities which you can easily insert as you proceed, but the organizational outline is there for the taking! Why reinvent the wheel? Of course, the real work will be in the page design, country write-ups, and mounting, but I am sure it will be a labor of love. When you complete your first country, I, and I am sure others, would like to see the finished product. |
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Poodle_Mum
Member
Inactive
Posts: 252
What I collect: WW to 1950; All German Eras; Imperial Russia & USSR; All Occupations and Colonies of Germany and Russia; Canada; QV and Belgian Railways
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Post by Poodle_Mum on Oct 11, 2017 20:29:37 GMT
Sounds like a great plan. Thank you everyone.
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tomiseksj
Moderator 
Woodbridge, Virginia, USA
Posts: 6,265
What I collect: Worldwide stamps/covers, Cinderellas, Ohio Prepaid Sales Tax Receipts, U.S. WWII Ration ephemera
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Post by tomiseksj on Oct 12, 2017 14:41:25 GMT
At last count, there were slightly over 100 stamp issuing entities that hadn't yet been added to the Forum's regional boards. If/when a member posts material from one or more of those entities, I'll add them to the "menu" of sub-boards.
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madbaker
Member
Posts: 693
What I collect: (Mark) General worldwide collector (to 1975 or so) with a soft spot for Sweden and the rest of Scandinavia.
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Post by madbaker on Nov 15, 2017 17:33:16 GMT
I just stumbled across this post. It's an area that I find fascinating and yet have struggled with over the years. At one point I wanted to organize things by FIFA conferences. That way I'd have Canada beside all these tiny Caribbean countries which continued to knock us out of World Cup qualifying. But then Australia moved from Oceania to Asia and I realized that even those fictitious groupings were fluid too.  Lately I've been obsessing with the effects of colonialism on modern society and have learned more about how European countries carved up and traded about much of Africa, Asia and the Middle East, for example. So a 'British Commonwealth' section doesn't appeal to me as much as looking at one area in all its permutations. The area that is now Kenya and Uganda got switched about quite a bit over the years, for example. Or even areas like Malaysia and Indonesia. But I think Bobby nailed it. A single stamp can be a launching point for a myriad of stories. So maybe "organizing" is best confined to safety, ease of knowing what you have, ease of finding what you have and very basic storytelling. (Continents and a Scott catalogue cross reference seem to work for this.) Leave the rest for exhibits, digital storytelling, specialty collections and the like. I'll likely change my mind tomorrow, but that's my $0.10 Mark |
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blaamand
Member
Currently creating custom pages until 1940.
Posts: 1,459
What I collect: Worldwide - Stamps and Postmarks - not enough time...
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Post by blaamand on Jun 12, 2018 18:56:58 GMT
I love this thread, thanks for starting it and for all inspiring contributions I'm am wrestling over the same dilemma myself. I am currently (and for the next 1500 years...  ) transferring my WW collection from stockbooks to a combination of custom made pages and Vario. My old set-up was strictly alphabetic, simply following the order of SG simplified. Now, SG simplified is on the landfill - and I am drawn between three different strategies: 1) Following the organisation in Scott 2) Following the orgnaisation in Michel 3) 'Old-school set-up' by splitting into Colonial Empires (and spheres of interest) and sort the non-colonial and 'new' countries by continent. The last option attracts me the most, due to the aspect of historiy as already mentioned by several in this thread. I would love to group all Portugues colonies in a couple of albums, keep all the German colonial issues together, British Empire and so on. However, it also creates many dilemmas. If all the colonial countries in Africa is away - it would be hardly anything left in the collection for the non-colonial Africa. Liberia and Ethiopia is not very interesting on their own. What to do with Egypt and Iraq - British or not? What to do with the likes of Togo, Cameroun and Kenya, where several colonial powers were involved.  It would be an option to split countries into several albums, e.g. having Cameroun both as a German colony, British, French and finally keeping the issues after independence with 'Africa'. Seems logical enough, but one loose the timeline for that particular country within one album. Another dilemma is the Ottoman Empire, all the foreign offices and forerunners, the assosiated short-lived states of Alaouites, 'Turkey in Asia', etc etc. I struggle to decide if it is better to keep all the 'Ottoman-sphere' together - all including all the foreign offices - or split into Colonial powers. Hmmm... I and my (twin) brother is actually both in the same process, and he is advocating for the Scott solution, simply to avoid the dilemma. Then again, lot of things I do not fancy in the Scott structure - example givent that Scott is not grouping the Australian states, Candian provinces etc. For the life of me, I cannot understand why not? The German states and Italian states have been grouped, the inconsistency makes my OCD cry. On a positive note - unlike my previous set-up in stockbooks - the collection will now be stored on 'loose pages' in Lighthouse Vario Classic Grande folders - so it will be painless to re-organize now in comparison to how it was with the pages 'locked' in stockbooks. Enough chanting from this end, finally I just want to say I totally agree with Anping Poodle_Mum - I am curious - what strategy did you end up with? |
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daveg28
Member
Posts: 1,015
What I collect: U.S., Canada, Great Britain & Commonwealth, France (esp. 1950-80), DDR, USSR
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Post by daveg28 on Jun 12, 2018 20:10:13 GMT
I have also been creating my own WW album. I lean towards the continent approach, but I'm only creating pages as needed. I won't have a bunch of pages for countries that I don't have or never will have a stamp for. For the time being it's alphabetical as I continue to create pages, but in the end, I plan to group them by continent. WW is not a main pursuit for me. My main interests are, in order, U.S., Canada, and then Great Britain (a recent new sand-alone collection). I have currently 6 volumes of U.S.(Mystic), 4 of Canada (Steiner...I need 2017!), and 3 of GB (I found a great album to download that's UK in origin). I anticipate that my WW will go two, and possibly a third binder. I simply use Steiner's blank page that allows me to type a country name at the top and print whatever I need.
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scb
Member
Inactive
Now at 100,000+ worldwide stamps, and progressing one stamp at a time towards the 200K
Posts: 313
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Post by scb on Jun 13, 2018 8:41:52 GMT
...and I am drawn between three different strategies: 1) Following the organisation in Scott 2) Following the orgnaisation in Michel 3) 'Old-school set-up' by splitting into Colonial Empires (and spheres of interest) and sort the non-colonial and 'new' countries by continent. The last option attracts me the most, due to the aspect of historiy as already mentioned by several in this thread. I would love to group all Portugues colonies in a couple of albums, keep all the German colonial issues together, British Empire and so on. However, it also creates many dilemmas. I know I've written this before, but why not mix different models (that's what I do) - I'm a happy collector mixing methods 2+3 .... Of course nobody else but you might not see rhyme and reason with how you draw those lines, but so what. It's your collection  -k- |
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blaamand
Member
Currently creating custom pages until 1940.
Posts: 1,459
What I collect: Worldwide - Stamps and Postmarks - not enough time...
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Post by blaamand on Jun 13, 2018 18:42:42 GMT
Good point keijo - and whatever I do it will probably be 'inconsistent' in some way - difficult to set a fixed model to suit the complexity of it all. The beauty of loose pages is that one can always re-arrange. |
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ajkitt
Member
Posts: 175
What I collect: Classics, Central Europe, World
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Post by ajkitt on Jun 14, 2018 6:27:00 GMT
I just want to say that this was quite a dilemma for me when I dug back into my stamp collecting. Clearly, my 30 year old album wasn't going to cut it, so I started making my own albums too. And I started with Germany. Soooo... lots of strange things, the Germans did. They overprinted state issues (Bavaria and Danzig) and called them German. And Michel lists them as German. Scott, however, lists them as Bavarian and... what, Danzigian? I'm not even going to start on the colonies - that changed hands back and forth through two world wars, or asking who the stamp issuing authorities were between the end of the Reich and the beginning of the Bundesrepublic (or DDR, for that matter). I mean, in WWI, wouldn't the Belgian occupation stamps have been issued under German authority? So why does everyone list them as Belgians?
My solution so far? None. Except keeping a separate full alphabetical index outside the binders so I can find where stamps are, and a note in Belgium, etc. explaining where to find the (German issued) stamps of those years missing through occupation. And the Allied occupation of Germany gets its own binder, because a person could go crazy trying make heads or tails of all the provisionals, multiple stamp-issuing-authorities, and interim stuff that saw use.
I figure it's my collection, so if someone else doesn't like the way it's (dis)organized it's their problem.
Overall, however, I have a general "by-continent" thing going, and German East Africa will eventually migrate into relative proximity to Burundi... . |
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Poodle_Mum
Member
Inactive
Posts: 252
What I collect: WW to 1950; All German Eras; Imperial Russia & USSR; All Occupations and Colonies of Germany and Russia; Canada; QV and Belgian Railways
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Post by Poodle_Mum on Jul 22, 2018 3:12:38 GMT
So, after starting to work on my collection, I've changed my mind (again). Tried sorting into stockbooks but everything ended up everywhere! Lol
My Canada thus far I will stay with homemade pages according to year. Likewise my DDR, West Germany and Berlin.
Going through the sorting of all my loose stamps - separating into "wants", "don't want" according to years of my worldwide collection 1840-1949/50. I wanted to cover WWII and the aftermath as countries were re-assigned. After 1950 it goes into post-colonial so that's part of the "don't want".
I downloaded Steiner but since I'm doing 2 sided printing and they are going into sheet protectors into 2 post Scott Jr Albums, there's a lot of work to redesign margins. I have an awesome pdf program but when I tried to convert to Word, I lost some of the boxes. So PDF to PowerPoint to JPG, go into Paint and move the page over and eliminate all white space. Then insert JPG into Word, resize margins, resize JPG and centre pages. It actually sounds like more work than it is. This way I can sort everything, and then get things mounted once everything is sorted. Dups I'm keeping will be on blank pages. Forgeries on blank pages.
I'm still going by continent so even if it's a colony, it goes under continent. Opening page will include historical information that can be added later.
This eliminates a lot of time consuming work and moving things around especially when dealing with fragile and/or high value stamps.
So it will still be a Big Blue but with a personal touch.
Belgian Railways have their own home.
Since 99% are previously hinged, I'll stay with hinges except for a few countries.
It will separate my German collection though that will go up to the zones and plebiscites mixed into the Big Blue.
If I create pages for everything I'll never get anywhere and I want to see progress.
My entire collection matches with parchment colour stock pages so the weight of paper is easy to do double sided printing and heavy duty sheet protectors.
I'm thinking it will turn out well and I can easily sell off the post 1950 accumulation.
My friends who are helping with the sorting are fantastic so I'm getting a lot sorted quite quickly. I spend about 12 hours a week on it so it's great having people help with that since I can only see a bit. The Steiner will also help them with the mounting. I have 2 that love the sorting and one who loves the nitty gritty of ID, perf measurements, colour ID, etc. I'm in charge of the watermarks because no one likes that part! Lol
So while taking a break from writing articles on stamps, I'm totally focusing on my collection which has brought much comfort, relaxation and fun into my life after 5 very difficult years battling breast cancer and losing 3 members of my very small family (my Grandma, my Mum and most recently my soulmate). I needed a break from the world and surround myself with loving friends and learning to live in a world without the 3 most important people in my life. All three, may their memory be eternal were the centre of my life and everything that has been my world.
So, that's the update on what I've been doing and it's creating a peaceful transition into my new reality.
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Beryllium Guy
Moderator
Posts: 5,654
What I collect: Worldwide Stamps 1840-1930
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Post by Beryllium Guy on Jul 22, 2018 8:21:15 GMT
So, after starting to work on my collection, I've changed my mind (again). Tried sorting into stockbooks but everything ended up everywhere! Lol.... So it will still be a Big Blue but with a personal touch.... So while taking a break from writing articles on stamps, I'm totally focusing on my collection which has brought much comfort, relaxation and fun into my life after 5 very difficult years battling breast cancer and losing 3 members of my very small family (my Grandma, my Mum and most recently my soulmate). I needed a break from the world and surround myself with loving friends and learning to live in a world without the 3 most important people in my life. All three, may their memory be eternal were the centre of my life and everything that has been my world. So, that's the update on what I've been doing and it's creating a peaceful transition into my new reality. Kelly, thanks for your great post. I am so sorry to hear about all of the losses and challenges you have had to survive, but I very much like the sound of your closing words: "a peaceful transition into my new reality." Here's to more peaceful transitions for everyone! It does indeed sound like you are making good progress on your chosen path, and for that, I salute you.... especially since being away from my collection as I am now, has started to sow seeds of doubt in my own mind about how I am handling my own collection. So, I completely understand your comment: "I've changed my mind (again)." I still struggle to understand how a hobby which brings me so much joy and relaxation can also result in an almost continual uncertainty about which way I want to organize my collection. It shouldn't be that difficult, but for some reason, at least for me, it seems to be. Anyway, Kelly, thanks for a really great post! |
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blaamand
Member
Currently creating custom pages until 1940.
Posts: 1,459
What I collect: Worldwide - Stamps and Postmarks - not enough time...
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Post by blaamand on Jul 22, 2018 19:38:55 GMT
Poodle_Mum - Sorry to hear about your losses, still like reading about how you deal with it - sounds to me like the perfect path for mental recovery  Good luck with your endavours - Please feel free to share some images with all friends on this forum. Hahaha, I know exactly how you feel Beryllium Guy , like I should have said it myself  A few years back I felt totally lost and unable to decide what to do, but then finally decided what to do: Ditch all my stockbooks (160x64) - replace with a combination of custom made pages for the classics and Vario pages for the modern stuff, all housed in identical black Lighthouse Vario Classic binders. At least that gave me liberty to re-arrange whenever I wanted to. Since then I have experienced less of the "continual uncertainty" - however I am still in doubt on how to best fit in all items of postal history into the collection. Example given forerunners, pre-philatelic letters, covers in general, Paquebot, TPO and Maritime mail covers and postmarks, Numeral Postmarks.....where does it all go? 
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Post by greaden on Jul 24, 2018 1:17:57 GMT
Organizing by empires and spheres of influence will lead in one direction, while organizing by region will lead in another. Which is the most interesting story that could be told through stamps?
The Pacific, for example, breaks down roughly into Polynesia, Melanesia,and Micronesia. Polynesia is interesting in how one cultural area was divided by several different empires. It includes German Samoa, American Hawaii, French Polynesia, and several British possessions. I find it more interesting to keep them together than to split them into separate German, British, French, and American albums.
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Poodle_Mum
Member
Inactive
Posts: 252
What I collect: WW to 1950; All German Eras; Imperial Russia & USSR; All Occupations and Colonies of Germany and Russia; Canada; QV and Belgian Railways
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Post by Poodle_Mum on Jul 24, 2018 5:42:40 GMT
What do you do with the colonial stamps where a country has changed hands? I'm thinking in terms of countries that were German and then British. There are some who changed hands two or three times just in my era of classics.
I'm interested to know how you place these as well as occupation stamps.
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blaamand
Member
Currently creating custom pages until 1940.
Posts: 1,459
What I collect: Worldwide - Stamps and Postmarks - not enough time...
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Post by blaamand on Jul 24, 2018 9:25:21 GMT
I have been wrestling about the same dilemma myself, basically I am considering two options: 1) Having all stamps for one country, including colonial issues, in one album/collection following a chronological timeline - so. e.g. Togo would start with German forerunners, then German Colonial issues, Anglo/French occupation issies, French Colonial issues and finally independence 2) Having all colonial issues for one Empire together, so example given all German colonial stamps would be collected in one album. (Unlike e.g. the arrangement in Scott, where most of the German colonies are grouped at the letter 'G', whilst others are scattered around the alphabet....) I do not know what I will end up with doing. Option 1) is the preferred option in order to display the postal history of one country in one timeline. On the other hand it would be quite sweet to get all the German colonies in one album.... (Hmmm... now that my brother barbu has joined the community, it would actually be more appropriate to say "We have been wrestling about the same dilemma" as the 2 of us are cooperating to establish identical set-ups for our collections) |
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Post by greaden on Jul 24, 2018 21:30:22 GMT
For coastal West Africa, the story I want to use stamps to tell is how it was carved into colonial slivers. Togo was split between Gold Coast/Ghana and French and independent Togo, so I keep the whole region together. This is easy because I only have a few representative examples of each of the countries - except the French colonies which I prefer to keep together. To reconcile the two ways of organizing, I put French colonial duplicates into the album with German and British Africa.
If I develop the German colonial collection to the point that I become interested in the papers and ink shades of all those yacht issues, then I will probably keep them all together.
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Post by classicalstamps on Jul 25, 2018 6:48:49 GMT
I'm building a "World War 2" collection. Stamps and postal history of all countries at war with a focus on Germany. After considering many different ways to organise the collection, I've settled on a chronological approach mixing different countries. This enables me to tell the story behind why a stamp were produced in a historical context. "Why was this stamp only valid for 5 days?" Perhaps something happened on the battlefield...
I'm also free to leave out stamps that aren't interesting, and I can also tell stories like "why the "V" (Viktoria) overprints from Norway are scarce used compared to mint".
I will probably spend many years researching which is great :-)
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blaamand
Member
Currently creating custom pages until 1940.
Posts: 1,459
What I collect: Worldwide - Stamps and Postmarks - not enough time...
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Post by blaamand on Jul 25, 2018 19:52:42 GMT
classicalstamps - I like your reasoning, it sound like a really interesting project. Would be nice to see some of the results when you get that far.
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) transferring my WW collection from stockbooks to a combination of custom made pages and Vario. My old set-up was strictly alphabetic, simply following the order of SG simplified. Now, SG simplified is on the landfill - and I am drawn between three different strategies:
It would be an option to split countries into several albums, e.g. having Cameroun both as a German colony, British, French and finally keeping the issues after independence with 'Africa'. Seems logical enough, but one loose the timeline for that particular country within one album.
Good luck with your endavours - Please feel free to share some images with all friends on this forum.
