How do you mount / display your collection?

[Jesper]

There has been a few articles in First Issues on this topic and there several members who showed us what their album looks like.

However, that is a little while ago and you may have come up with a new idea. Why not tell us about it? Write to the editor of First Issues and get your article in print.

What really prompted me to ask this question is the old problem: "What is a first issue to me?" I was thinking about how I would limit my collection and thought that perhaps I should write a short statement to keep me "honest"

Whether that is a good idea and specifically how to do it is something I was hoping you could help with  

[Nick]

Hi one and all

I am fairly new to stamp collecting, having started with a New Year resolution this year, and very new to FICC, having joined today.

I was going to post a question on what members use for albums, but I see this has already been raised.

I was wondering about starting a "first page of every country's album" collection, using the listings available from http://www.stampalbums.com/. I thought this might allow me to "collect around" any particularly expensive #1s.

Any advice gratefully received.

Regards,

Nick Blackburn
London

[numones]

Welcome Nick,

#1's are fascinating.  We collect the whole world, but still not every stamp that ever was issued.  We have the opportunity and incentive to study the history and geography of the whole world through the collection of the first stamp of each new country/entity as it presents itself on the changing stage of time.

Making pages has always been the worst part of this collection for me.  I have tried a couple of different systems.  First it was one country to a page, with quite a bit of write-up for each.  The stamp was in a mount in the middle of the page.  This made a "lumpy" album.  The middle was high with the extra thickness of stamps and mounts.  The corners sagged downwards.  I only made pages after I had acquired the #1 for each country.  This had the advantage of no blank spaces.  At the time I quit that system, my collection required five 1 1/2" three ring binders.

Next I tried many countries (5 to 15) to a page.  These were ordered chronologically, from 1840 to the present.  There was very little write-up.  Usually just the country name, catalog number and date of issue of the stamp, but sometimes a little more.  This time I also provided sheet protectors for each page which flattened them out a little.  They were not as "lumpy/saggy" as before.  I still did not provide a space for a stamp until I got it.  This meant a constant re-mounting of stamps on a new page every time I got another country and had to squeeze it in.  This time my collection needed only three 1" 3-ring binders to fit it all in.

There is a "Single Specimen" album, put out in Pennsylvania, that provides a space for one stamp from each country.  There is no reason why that stamp should not be it's #1!  I have seen it but not tried to use it.  It is loose leaf, so a page could be added if some country/entity is missing.    

I printed the pages for one of the sample countries from the album makers link which you provided.  They are nice pages, and would provide the spaces to collect the whole first set or whole beginning of each country.  That would be a good challenge.    

[Tim_Balm]

My greetings also Nick,

I've been collecting 1st issues for several years and still have not answered this question.  If you order the early issues of the newsletter, this was a hot topic.  There are many good ideas about how to display your collection.  Probably everyone's first instinct is to do this alphabetically by country name.  That pretty much follows the pattern thrown at us by every album maker.  

Then there are those who step outside that box (like David) and decide to display their collections chronologically.  The fascinating aspect of doing this is to survey how the images, printing methods, papers, etc evolved with time.

Also in those early newsletters are examples of mounting "related" first issues by the geneology of the country (like Basutoland / Lesotho, Brit Central Afr / Nyasaland Prot / Malawi, Brit Honduras / Belize, etc).  It might be easiest to arrange these collections by geography.

And the different ways just continue.  Since, like you, I was unsure how I wanted to do my collection, I just started placing them alphabetically in Vario stock pages.  That way I had the flexibility of experimenting before making the "final" decision - which David has already indicated is likely never to be as final as one thinks.  The Vario pages avoid the issue of "bulging" (as David describes) by placing stamps in small mounts located in similar positions on the page.  Although the Vario pages are a bit expensive (as you have to keep a supply of 4-pocket, 5-, 6-, 7-, and 8-pocket), I find this expense offsets the outlay for Scott mounts. Also, they fit any standard notebook - rather than a purchased album.

As you continue your journey of collecting #1s, you may find you want to collect not only Sc#1, but also the BOB B1, C1, etc.  [By the way, many of us place L1s, K1s and N1s in with #1s rather than as BOB first issues.  See related discussions on this.]  Or, you may want to collect covers with first issues on them (not at all an easy or cheap venture).  Vario stock pages allow you to fairly easily modify the display as your collecting interests become more defined.  The drawback, is that text info you want with each #1 will need to be typed/written, cut to size and stored in the stock page sleeves next to the stamp.  

I guess my opinion/advice is not to make the decision at this time.  Consider buying stock pages and experiment as your collection builds.

Tim

[Nick]

Thanks Tim and Dave

Your comments are entirely sensible. Having access to the "print yourself" pages, I will probably go that way eventually, but for the moment stock pages must be a good idea.

I don't actually have any stamps in the FI collection yet (although I have already covered GB, Egypt and Sudan, before finding the web site and joining the movement). I am looking forward to the next auction to make a start.

I am getting the back numbers on the installment option, so by the time I have read all those I should have enough good ideas - and enough stamps - to progress.

BTW, I have only just realised what BOB means - I thought it was a member of the club who specialised. I think it might be more of a US concept as Scott tends to have more categories than SG.

Cheers

Nick

[Tim_Balm]

...  I don't actually have any stamps in the FI collection yet (although I have already covered GB, Egypt and Sudan, before finding the web site and joining the movement). I am looking forward to the next auction to make a start.  ...

Nick, the current auction just started and is listed on the website under the auctions tab on the home page.  If you wish to bid, just send an email to auctions@firstissues.org (link is provided) stating your bids for lots you are interested in.  If you wish to wait an auction or 2 and get a feel for what amounts the lots sell for (which is what I did when I joined), that is certainly fine.  Good luck with the collecting.

Tim

[Tim_Balm]

... BTW, I have only just realised what BOB means - I thought it was a member of the club who specialised. I think it might be more of a US concept as Scott tends to have more categories than SG. ...

Nick,

Thanks for the reminder on terminology.  There are a number of members outside of the US, and I must be mindful that the Back Of the Book (BOB) stamps listed in the Scott catalog are often not at all "back of the book" in other catalogs.

Tim

[Nick]

Tim

I think BOBs are great (now I understand them) - it means that there are many more #1s.

I just wish we could wind back the clocks and have SG's simplified selection criteria combined with Scott's superior numbering system.

I'm getting rather far off topic, so I'd better stop there.

Nick

[Denikin]

However you mount what you have (the additional thickness of mounts causes worse bulging than hinges; covers are similarly worse than mounts), you can alleviate a lot of this by either gluing additional thicknesses of paper over the left edges of your pages (re-punching the additions as necessary), so that the thickness of the pages at the binding point is close to the thickness at the centers (especially with three-ring systems) or, in something like a Scott album, adding similar loose strips, since the posts hold them without your having to glue them.  

[Nick]

My current solution (after about a month of collecting) is to store them on stock pages and display them on-line. That's a lot easier.

Cheers

Nick

FI score: 19

[Tim_Balm]

My current solution (after about a month of collecting) is to store them on stock pages and display them on-line. That's a lot easier.

Cheers

Nick

FI score: 19

Nick,

Please say more about displaying them on-line.

[Jesper]

That even I can explain!

Just visit Nick-on-the-Net alias Snap Dragon

[x-man]

 Ifound a good method of mounting my collection on a tempory basis . I use a large stockbook with 32 double sided pages with clear strips 10 to a page .I've put stamps in every other strip .   this has allowed me ,to start out in order from A to Z .Now I've found out that Istarted to find other 1's & 2's that don't fall in order , but never mind because I'll be able to change them around.       Yes I've made my collection a little harder to put together .So far I've completed 237 countries of 1's and 2's ,and another 86 that are either 1's or 2's . These I have found in my vast accumulation of stamps .While I've been looking for 1 & 2 I also thought it might be interesting to pull out dead countries   , low and behold I pulled out 365  of the dead countries . Is'nt  this a great hobbie you can find many different ways to collect and none are boring .

[numones]

You are right, x-man.  None of them are boring.  I've been toying with the idea of starting a side collection that shows something of the activities of each country.  Probably one full set from each country.  Maybe the animals of the early African colonies, oil derricks for the gulf states, Sudan had that set of the mailman riding a camel in the desert.  Etc.  But, I still enjoy #1's the best.  

[Tim_Balm]

You are right, x-man.