Product Description
The dramatic tale of the world’s most sought-after stamp and the passionate story of the first stamp hunters

In September 1847, Mauritius’s very first stamps were produced to send out admission cards to a costume ball. No one at the party would have guessed that the envelopes bearing these stamps would one day be worth more than a million dollars each.

When a two-pence “Blue Mauritius” surfaced on the fledgling French stamp collecting market in 1865, collectors were driven to bag the stamps as if they were big game. Then in 1903, a perfect specimen was discovered in a childhood album; the Prince of Wales bought the stamp at auction, and the Blue Mauritius gained super-star status. Exhilarating and expansive, Blue Mauritius tells the story of the most coveted and valuable stamps in history as they traveled around the globe and entered the hearts and imaginations of collectors everywhere. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

A Philatelists Pleasure
This is an amazing piece of research that reads like a detective novel.While it is a book on stamp collecting it is an adventure, a quest, and a dream described.Really well written and will be enjoyed by philatelists, historians, and anyone with a taste for exotic locations like Mauritius.

Deep scholarship, deep interest for any stamp collector
My father bought me my second stamp album for $1.00 at a garage sale, a Stanley Gibbons World Wide album. There was one battered Mauritis stamp on that page with descriptions like "Embossed: profile of Queen, with diadem, to left on solid beaded oval, in a reticulated inscribed frame, with scalloped edge."

My mother required me to do "research" on each stamp I hinged into the new album, and my notes for Mauritis contain the following entries:

-- A "Popular Science" ad: "Milford 9-T, NH GIANT collection! Over 200 different stamps including Timor. Rhodesia. Mauritius, etc. Rushed, only lOc to approval applicants!"

-- Stella clavisque maris indici: "The star and key of the Indian Ocean"; on stamps of Mauritius.

-- A long extract from the 1911 "Brittanica" including "The currency of Mauritius is rupees and cents of a rupee, the Indian rupee ( = iorf.) being the standard unit. The metric system of weights and measures has been in force since 1878."

-- Mark Twain: "From one citizen you gather the idea that Mauritius was made first, and then heaven; and that heaven was copied after Mauritius. Another one tells you that this is an exaggeration...."

And, of course, short histories of the stamps of the island including that it was the fifth country to issue stamps, the story of the watchmaker who engraved "Post Office" incorrectly for "Post Paid", the discovery of a cover by a boy in Bordeaux, the Governor's Ball and much more.

Helen Morgan has now done a wonderful amount of research and produced a true biography of the first issue of these beautiful stamps. She writes that she was motivated by

"the visual appeal of the stamps; their production and the early history of the postal service and communication in Mauritius; the philatelic detective work required to unravel their status as the first issue of Mauritius during the 1860s; philatelic research as a science; the provenance of the known examples and the history of collecting, both `big game' and 'small'; those who have owned, lusted after and studied the stamps; the concepts of rarity, intrinsic value, true worth and fame; the role that accident, chance and determined hunting have played in the discovery of the known examples; the apocryphal stories surrounding the stamps, and their appearance in fiction from at least 1896 onwards, including the likes of Billy Bunter and the Blue Mauritius in the 1950s and an episode of The Avengers."

The book is a treasure trove of information and Morgan is maintaining an excellent blog on the book and her other interests, including a Research Companion website bringing together subject entries from the narrative, including a biography for each of the twenty-seven stamps, with bibliographical citations and related images.

My collecting intrests left Mauritius many years ago, but this wonderful book rekindled the excitement I felt as I researched that first battered example from so many years ago.

Robert C. Ross 2009

a book to be admired as much as the valued stamp
A book of deep scholarship, exactitude and completeness;wonderfully written conveying a sense of the collector's passion and the excitement of discovery.In Helen Morgan's world,the search of,and affirmation for rarity and worth is contained in the history of the first issuance of the the Blue Mauritius in September 1847 and the story of the many collectors and philatelists who have owned or now own one of the treasured stamps called Blue Mauritius. Drawing on sources worldwide in many languages, Morgan's philately is more than the love of those "dirty little pieces of paper, " but the study of countries and their histories and the beauty of the art of the commonplace.Her concluding chapter of the return of two of the prized stamps to an honored place on the small island nation of Mauritius is a fitting coda to a story well told. ... Read more

Product Description
Whether it is the thrill of the hunt, thoughts of exotic locales, or learning something new, stamp collecting can be an adventure filled with wonderful memories. Share this passion or explore new collecting interests in this easy-to-read, fully illustrated guide, Linns Complete Stamp Collecting Basics. Written by Scott Stamp Monthly editor Michael Baadke, this comprehensive book will help you start enjoying the stamp hobby and will serve as an essential reference for years to come.

Here are just a few of the subjects covered: Where to find the stamps you want for your collection; How to safely remove stamps from envelopes - and when to leave them on; How to store and display your stamps safely; How to identify your stamps and learn their value; Important facts to consider when buying collectible stamps; How to measure perforations and die cuts; and How to check for watermarks and tagging.

With a complete subject index and an extensive glossary that explains the most commonly used stamp hobby terminology, Linns Complete Stamp Collecting Basics is an all-in-one information source that every stamp collector will enjoy. ... Read more

Product Description
Everything you need to know about the world's favourite hobby and the many ways to build a collection * Featuring expert advice, vivid examples, famous issues and over 500 images of stamps from around the world. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Not Complete Enough
My boyfriend's grandfather left him literally thousands of postage stamps. I had collected stamps as a child, but never at this level! When the task of organizing and caring for these stamps fell to me, I immediately went out and bought this book to help me do the task properly.

The guide is definitely "pretty". It has many full color photos of lovely stamps, intending I imagine to lure one into the wide world of stamps. It talks about the history of stamps, how letters were mailed in the days of the Roman Empire, how for a long time postage systems were only intended for royalty and military. Even when civilians were finally allowed to send letters, it was typically sent cash-on-delivery. I.e. the recipient would pay when they got the letter.

You can imagine that this system led to a lot of lost money for the "postal people" :) Finally England decided there should be a better way, where every letter was pre-paid in an easy fashion. So in 1840 they created the Penny Black, postage for one penny. Other countries followed, and now we have millions of different kinds of stamps.

The guide then goes into the various parts of a stamp - how they are made, how they are gummed, so that you know what to look for when you collect them. It talks about how a stamp may look very similar but may be quite different based on how it was created.

On to the practical side. The book talks about how to soak stamps off of the letter they were sent on, how to flatten and dry them. It goes over the various types of stamp mounting books you can get - where you stick stamps to pages that help to describe and display them. While people used to actually "stick" tabs to the back of the stamps, in modern times they try to not stick anything at all to the stamp, as to not damage them at all. They have album pages with "pockets" in them so you put the entire stamp into that pocket without touching it.

There's all sorts of cool tidbits in here. For example, most postmarks have a series of seven "wavy lines" across the stamp to cancel it. Looking at history, that's because an old postmark in Boston in the late 1800s had an American flag on it, and the wavy lines were the stars and stripes stretching out.

The book talks about wartime mail, airmail, and other specific types of mail. It also talks about the issue of forgeries and how to be alert for them. It talks about how postal collecting organizations began and how they have changed over the years.

In general, the book, at just under 100 pages and full color, is a lovely "history of stamps". However, as a guide to stamp collecting, it tends to fall short. There are only a tiny few pages about the actual activity of stamp collecting. There are a few more pages of side benefit, with the details of a stamp's parts and information about forgeries. However, the rest of the book is a skim of stamping history which is far too brief to be a help. There are millions of pages on the web if you really want to know about the "stamps of Australia" or the "stamps of India". This book does little good if that's what you need. So you don't get nearly enough of the basics, the step by step how to get started and how to do a good job with it. Instead you get skims of advanced topics in those pages, which take up valuable pages and aren't complete enough to be helpful.

If they relabeled this book to be a "Brief History of Stamps and Stamp Collecting" I think it would be a quite fine mini-overview with photos. However, as a "complete" guide to stamp collecting, it is definitely not complete and there isn't enough about stamp collecting in here.

Rating: 3/5
... Read more

Product Description
There were almost 18,000 value changes recorded in Volume 2 of the 2010 Scott Postage Stamp Catalogue, which includes countries of the world C-F. There are more than 5,000 value changes in the group of French-area countries running from French Colonies to French West Africa, with French Morocco leading the way in this group with 1,163 changes. Other countries with a large number of changes include Canada with 2,100 value changes, followed by Cuba (1,183), Reunion (1,173), Costa Rica (1,008), People s Republic of China (764), Cameroun (727) and Estonia (603). ... Read more

Product Description
The third in Stephen R. Datz's trilogy about the stamptrade.Datz's true-life adventures chasing deals all over the mapfrom the desolate hinterlands of Wyoming and Montana to the brightlights of New York and Las Vegas.An amazing odyssey: fast times andbig-dollar deals, wild goose chases and third-rate motels, blizzardsand tornados, eccentric millionaires and desert rats, even a hippiehitchhiker.Action-packed all the way.You'll be up all nightfinishing this one! ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

A Must Read For Anyone In The Stamp Business
I became a stamp dealer in the late 1970s then got out of it in the early 80s when the stamp market dropped, I then moved onto Sports cards and when the market for those bottomed out in the early 90s I moved on to coins, I just recently got back into dealing in stamps since the market for them is strong again, i purchased this book on Amazon because it sounded interesting to me, and I was correct, when i started reading I found it hard to put down, I ended up reading the entire book in 2 nights, for a stamp dealer mister Datz is a heck of a good writer, much better than I had expected, he tells the story in an easy to follow fashion and his exploits in the stamp dealing business are funny and revealing, i found myself laughing out load at some of the people he has dealt with over the years, and also how very similar his dealings were to so many of mine (mine of course were on a much smaller scale than his, but similar none the less) if you are a stamp dealer, large or small you will gain a lot by reading this book, I give it 5 stars!

Entertaining tales of stamp wheeling and dealing
I enjoy Mr. Datz's anecdotes of the stamp trade in his many books.This book concentrates on stories, without the practical stamp-collecting information to be found in some of his other books.He's a great story teller and has met some truly unusual folks in his travels.Great light reading!

A Must Read for the Collecting Enthusiast
People who are expert on stamps aren't necessarily the greatest writers in the world.Stephen Datz is a nice exception.His book, though hardly a Pulitzer Prize winner, is a must of sorts for those collectors who go toshows and have always pined to either sell stamps of their own, or go intothat business, or just know more about what it takes to make stamp worldspin.Datz writes with humor and an infectious enthusiasm.The book iskinda short, and you are certainly sorry to have it end.I read TOP DOLLARPAID some years ago, and have reread a couple of times since.I recommendthat one too.(If you are not a collector and have stumbled across thisbook...for you I would NOT recommend it.This is really for people whoknow and love stamp collecting.) ... Read more

Product Description

Customer Reviews (9)

Great starter sets for stamp collecting
Bought two of these for grandkids last Christmas (ages 5 and 7). We've had many hours of fun/education together. With some assistance from Grandma they have a good start on what I hope will be a life-long hobby.

Broken after 5 minutes!
We bought this for my 5 year-old son. Within 5 minutes of opening the box we realized we'd made a mistake...
The magnifying glass fell apart and the hinges (adhesives for stamps) are very poor quality - frankly, they don't work!
The enclosed info. booklet is also VERY basic and explanations are not very detailed.
Disappointing.

incomplete kit
I was disappointed in the miniscule number of stamp hinges in the kit.Picky, I know, but necessary. A few glassine envelopes would have been helpful too.These items are not readily available in small communities, and must be searched out in speciality stores.

beginners stamp collection
Notgood for small children.On the plus sidekit came with lots of information about history of stamps.Did not come with to a lot of stamps.Alsoflimsy way to afix stamps to book.Overall not a bad start up kitbutnot the best out there..

Product Is Very Good
I have started a stamp collection with my grandson.This was a very helpful tool in getting started.We enjoy looking through the book and all the stamps that came with it.
Thanks,
J Nelms
California ... Read more

Product Description
The book has no illustrations or index. It may have numerous typos or missing text. However, purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original rare book from the publisher's website (GeneralBooksClub.com). You can also preview excerpts of the book there. Purchasers are also entitled to a free trial membership in the General Books Club where they can select from more than a million books without charge. Original Publisher: New York, H. Holt and company; Publication date: 1940; Subjects: Stamp collecting; Postage stamps; Antiques ... Read more

Product Description
The history of stamps, famous specimens, a poster, and tips on how to begin and care for your stamp collection are included in this kit. Some samples are included to start you off, plus you get a nifty collector's box to house your stuff. Illustrated. ... Read more

Product Description
This is an EXACT reproduction of a book published before 1923. This IS NOT an OCR'd book with strange characters, introduced typographical errors, and jumbled words.This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Stamps stump
The ad said the book came with stamps, but it failed to say that the stamps had been glued to the back pages of the book, and I had to soak those pages to remove the stamps, losing several in the process. The book is now very obviously a used book with some damage. I'm disappointed. ... Read more