Meeting 4- Stamp Trivia

Meeting 4: Stamp Trivia Page1

Meeting Objectives

☑ Know some interesting facts of stamps around the world
☑ Know the first stamps of some countries
________________________________________________________

4.1 Stamp Trivias

1.Sir _________ is believed to be the person that came up with the
idea of the postage stamp.

2. The world’s first postage stamp is the Penny Black. It is issued
during ________ to 1 February 1841 by Perkins Bacon in London.
The portrait in the stamp is Queen Victoria, the royal figure of
Great Britain, the country of issue. Only 1.3 million of the 68.8
million penny blacks are known to exist today.

3. The rarest stamp on earth is the British Guiana ____
Magenta in 1856 at Georgetown, British Guiana. The
latest auction value is $ 9.48 million and is expected to
rise in value to 10-15 million for the latest auction.

4. The largest stamp on earth is issued by the Walt
Disney Company in Lucca, Italy in 2019 and it is 4.11 m2
in size. Meanwhile, the smallest stamp is the Bolivar 10c
green from Bolivar, Colombia and it measures the size of
8mm by ___mm.

5. The 1st Animal in the Stamp is the ______ Bears. It is issued in
Missouri in 1845.

6. The most popular stamp features Elvis
Presley, a famous singer in the USA. It is
issued in 1991 with 124 million owners, a
staggering _______ million extra compared
to the second most popular stamp featuring
Marilyn Monroe. Its face value is 29c.
The market transaction value of these stamps is only around 40% of
its original value because of the overhyped market in USA.

7. The most famous printing error is the ________ Jenny on
May 10, 1918. There are only around 100 of them in
existence, with a market value of $1.6 million.

8. The first multicolored stamp is the Basel Dove, issued on
1/7/1845 with a face value of ___ Rappen. The value per stamp
is around 18,000 Swiss Francs.

9. The 1st astronomy and constellation stamp 1887 300 Reis
Blue, issued by Brazil. It features the _________.

10. The common stamp that has the largest price change is the
Golden Monkey stamp, issued in 1980. It is worth that much
because the artwork of the artist, ____________, is rare and the
number of philatelists in China in the 80s is extremely low. The
monkey stamp issues are usually the bestsellers because it is the
start of a “series” of zodiac stamps.

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4.2 Perspective Trivias

1. Norway’s most beautiful stamp in 2018 features a Snougle (Snowy Owl) and the
2019 stamp features a picture of a town after a snowstorm.

Meanwhile, the most beautiful stamps in China and America are the “Western
Cattle in Storm” and the “Golden Monkey Stamp” respectively.

Design Characteristics of a “beautiful” stamp design:

- __________________ - Pictorials

- __________________ - Numericals

2.The ugliest stamp is the Weißer Dreier,
also known as the whitish 3 cent stamp.
It is considered as the “worst stamp” by
collectors because its sole purpose is to
rise the price of a standard letter from
55 cents to 58 cents. It is issued by
Germany in the year _____.

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4.3 The First Stamps of Every Country

▪ Great Britain/UK: The Penny Black and Two Pence Blue
▪ USA
➢ First Stamps of USA’s Original Colonies

Stamps of the first few states in America:

Missouri: St. Louis

“St. Louis’ Bears” 1845-46

State the state and city below: Providence, Rhode Island
i. Baltimore, Maryland
Annapolis, Maryland
ii. New Haven, Conneticut

Boscawen, New Hampshire Brattleboro, Vermont

iii.

➢ The First National Stamp of the USA (Provisional= Temporary Use)

Franklin 5c Benjamin 10c
- Less than ½ oz. and less - More than ½ oz. or more
than 300 miles than 300 miles
- First used 7/7/1847 - First used 2/7/1847

- First sold on July 1, 1847 Page4
- Invalid for postage starting from iv. ____________.
- First used in Boston, Massachusetts

▪ Canada

Name: Threepenny Beaver

Issued on 23 April 1851 for the Province of Canada

This is the first official postage stamp because the St. Louis’
stamps are v. ______ stamps.

▪ China

Qing Dynasty Taiwan under Qing Dynasty
Name: Large Dragons Issued on 22/3/1888
First Issued: 1 May 1878 (x 10): Li (smallest), Candareens,
1 candarin= 0.375g of silver Mace, Tael
1 Silver Yuan= 0.72 Tael
Taiwan under Formosa Period
People’s Republic of China Issued on 1895
Featuring Tian’anmen
(Heavenly Gate of Peace) Value in Taiwanese Yen
Issued on 8/10/1949
100,000 Gold Yuan= 1 RMB Republic of China (Taiwan/
3 Million Fabi= 1 Gold Yuan Penghu/ Kinmen/ Mazu)
Issued in 1949 featuring Sun Yat
Republic of China (Mainland) Sen.
Issued on May 1913 by Value in Taiwan Dollar
Waterlow and Sons, London
3 designs: 1 NTD= 40,000 TD
- Junk ship
- Harvesting Farmer with
Temple Qi Nian Dian
- Beijing Guozijian Academy

Silver Yuan is used, then Fabi When the silver standard is abolished, all parts of
(法币) in 1935 which has no China except HK and Macau experienced
pegged value. hyperinflation because they are pegged to the
British Pound Sterling and the Portuguese Escudo.
The ROC 5 Precious During the Japanese Occupation, the HK Dollar is
considered as illegal currency due to its high value.

Activity: Summarize the stories of any 2 of the 5 stamps.

The Inverted Beijing’s Guozijian Archway (宫门倒印票) Page5

Latest Auction Value: RMB160K In Nov 1998
The no. of stamps that had whereabouts known: 49
No. of existing copies:30+
No. of stamp on cover: 1

New York Inverted 2 Yuan Sun Yat Sen (纽约版孙中山像 2 元中心倒
印)

Issued date: Unknown (Est.1941-45)
Discovered: 1945
Issued by: ABCorp, New York, USA. (The name of stamp had
NY at front because it’s issued at NY.)
No. of existing stamps: 50 (the sheet)
Latest Auction Value: RMB290K on 20th May 1996

Beijing Junk 3c 1st Issue with inverted overprint (surcharged) 2c

(北京一版帆船 3 分暂作 2 分倒盖)
Printed on: 1st November 1922
No. of existence: 10+
Latest Auction Value: HKD322K In April 1996

Beijing Junk 4c 2nd Issue with inverted overprint (surcharge) 3c

(北京二版帆船 4 分暂作 3 分倒盖)
Stamp issued on: 1922 Nov.
Cancelled on: 1925
Latest Auction Value: HKD414K In April 1996

$1 Beijing’s Guozijian Archway with ‘Only to be used in Province New’
overprint (北京一版帆船加误盖 “限省新贴用” 票)

Overprinted in 1915
Price: Average RMB 1M for one
Believed to have only one in existence
Story:

The stamps are uniformly issued by the General Post Office, and then sold at the local currency
value according to the face value of the stamps. Therefore, in order to prevent people from
buying stamps from low-currency areas to high-currency areas for profit, the Republic of China
government adopted the method of stamping “only can be used in X only" when issuing stamps…

▪ Hong Kong
➢ British Hong Kong

- First used: 8 Dec 1862

- Printed by De La Rue

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➢ Hong Kong (Returned To China)

- Issued in 1997
- The only time use ‘Hong Kong’, after that ‘Hong Kong, China’ is used.
Achievements:
- It is the longest stamp on earth at that time (53x 273 mm)

▪ Macau 1 Pataca= 450 reis
➢ Portuguese Macau
In 1906, Macau start using the Macao Pataca (MOP) but
1884 it isn’t pegged to any precious metals. Hence, it is worth
less than other currencies circulating in Macau such as
the HKD and the Straits Settlements Dollar.

Features the Portuguese Crown

➢ Macau (Returned to China)

1999

Fun Fact!

The most colourful definitive
stamp series is the Machin
Definitives.

▪ Japan

1st Issued: April 1871

The mon in the stamp: a Japanese currency that currently substituted
by Yen.

1 Yen= vi. _________________ Mon Page7

▪ India

Issued on: 21 November 1947

▪ Thailand
The vii. _________ series
Date of production: 4 August 1883
Printer: Waterlow and Sons, London

Portrait: King Chulalongkorn

Thailand’s Currency at that period: Thai Currency today:

1/8 Fueang Att 25 satang
¼ Fueang Sio 50 satang
½ Fueang Sik
1/8 Baht Fueang Old system used up to 1897,
1/4 Baht Salueng when Thailand starts issuing
½ Baht Song Salueng satang coins under Prince
1 Baht 15g of Silver Jayanta Mongkol

▪ Brazil (Kingdom of)

Name: Olho-de-boi/ Bull’s eye stamp

Note: Brazil is the second country on earth to issue
postage stamps for usage throughout the country.

Date of issuance: 1 August 1843

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