quotations about stamp collecting
What we have today is a market place on the Internet which tries to emulate the old time business model of stamp shows where hundreds of dealers congregate in one place where collectors can come and peruse their offerings and haggle over quality and price. The Internet market instead offers thousands of websites where collectors can view hundreds of dealers' offerings, view images of the offerings and compare prices. The haggling can still take place electronically, albeit losing some of the charm many find in the personal interaction. Still and all, this change has been a lifesaver to an industry whose death has been predicted for the last 50 years.
RICHARD LEHMANN
"The Future of Philately", Forbes, August 28, 2016
This year the USPS released stamps with portraits of Pixar characters, Selena and Mark Twain. Do you think that's what stamp collectors are into? Stamp collectors are into eating TV dinners alone and crying. Put out a stamp series of famous people eating TV dinners alone and crying, and there's your $10 billion [needed to get the Post Office out of debt].
JOEL STEIN
"Pushing the Envelope", Time Magazine, September 26, 2011
There is no hobby that I know of which has so many pleasant ramifications as philately. It lays open to the collector a thousand alluring bypaths, and few are the general collectors who do not stray into at least one of them.
ALVIN FAY HARLOW
Paper Chase
My worldly wealth I hoard in albums three,
My life collection of rare postage stamps;
My room is cold and bare as you can see,
My coat is old and shabby as a tramp's;
Yet more to me than balances in banks,
My albums three are worth a million francs.
ROBERT WILLIAM SERVICE
"Stamp Collector", Songs of a Sun-lover
Any stamp that has appreciated to $25 or more in the last 65 to 175 years deserves consideration as a good investment for the future. There is little history of such stamps suffering a decline in value, which for many investors, seeking asset diversification, is sufficient.
RICHARD LEHMANN
"Defining Stamp Investing", Forbes, September 18, 2015
Stamp collecting is perhaps one of the least likely areas that you might think of making an investment, but if you have a specific interest in this area, there are many gems that can help you to turn a profit.
ALISON STEED
"Stamp-collecting can bring first class profits", The Telegraph, August 1, 2012
One of the great pleasures of stamp collecting is that it can be varied to suit anyone's individual needs. There are really no 'rights' or 'wrongs' to collecting stamps. You collect what you want in the way that pleases you most.
JOHN CRAVEN & RICHARD WEST
How about Stamp Collecting
[The collector's aim is] to reassemble the whole of the stamps issued in one country, in a certain part of the world, or if possible, of the whole universe, and not to estimate the value of stamps according to their beauty of engraving or design.
MAURICE BURRUS
The Philatelic Magazine, October 21, 1922
Stamp collecting is looked upon by many people as a solitary hobby. Their mistake. Being a part of a stamp club or society brings together like-minded friends who help each other improve as philatelists.
WILLIAM F. SHARPE
"Keeping & Maintaining a High-Quality Stamp Collection", Linn's Stamp News, August 25, 2016
Another value of stamp collecting is its relationship to geography and history, its current gossip of the globe we live on and its political changes.
ALVIN FAY HARLOW
Paper Chase
The stamp collector's progress from beginner to addict falls, like the melancholy Jacques's chronicle of man, into several stages. First usually in his teens he buys a small album and orders various ten-cent assortments "1,000 all different, catalogue value, $2.37." He haunts the display cases in department or stationery stores and outside the stamp dealers' doors. Presently he begins taking stamp periodicals and joins a club. Within a few years he is not satisfied with a used stamp detached from the envelope, but craves the envelope, too he calls it a "cover" now. He falls a victim to the first-day fad and has a cover always ready to be mailed from the point of issuance of a new stamp. He has already acquired a specialty of some sort -- perhaps two or three of them. When he begins carrying a small magnifying glass in his pocket with which to scrutinize stamps, his case may be regarded as hopeless.
ALVIN FAY HARLOW
Paper Chase
The official designs of the Government, especially its designs in connection with postage stamps and coinage may be described, I think, as the silent ambassadors of national taste.
W. B. YEATS
remarks on Coinage Bill 1926 Second Stage, March 3, 1926
When examined through a critical political-geographic lens, stamp collecting is revealed to be more than just a benign, leisurely pursuit. It is a highly politicized act that not only lends legitimacy to the modern, territorial-bounded-state paradigm but also provides a discourse and forum for the ubiquitous struggle of national secessionist and autonomy movements.
JOHN AGNEW & LUCA MUSCARA
Making Political Geography
Is it the intention to establish a cheap portrait-gallery of living princes and rulers?... What curiosity can any reasonable being have to possess the commonplace effigies of the most commonplace-looking people in Europe?
CHARLES LEVER
writing on the new stamp collecting fad, Blackwood's Magazine, 1864
Stamp collecting is rich in history and covers virtually every topic, from cartoons to famous actors, politicians, cars, trains, planes, boats, motorcycles, dinosaurs, kings and queens, princes and princesses, historical events, plants, animals, and so much more.
WILLIAM F. SHARPE
"The website devoted to getting kids into stamp collecting", Linn's Stamp News, February 17, 2017
You can collect stamps because they are beautiful, historically important, illustrate something that appeals to you, are a connection to the past, or any other reason that strikes your fancy.
JANET KLUG
Guide to Stamp Collecting
Now I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, "How in a free country such as this, can we ban video games and golf, yet continue to permit stamp collecting?"
DAVE BARRY
Dave Barry's Bad Habits
The philatelic industry is once again focused on how to grow our hobby, perhaps this time with a more determined focus. The increased focus is, in part, because the decline in the USA and Western Europe of the number of collectors is reaching an inflection point from which recovery becomes less likely.
RICHARD LEHMANN
"New Stamp Issuance's Affect On The Hobby", Forbes, May 3, 2017
Stamp collectors are not a larcenous lot for the most part. I don't have statistics on it, but I'd say my "loss" rate was much less than 0.001%.
LEWIS BURCHETT
"Attention: It's time to embrace change and move stamp collecting forward", Linn's Stamp News, July 8, 2017
Let's not mince words -- collecting stamps is not considered the most rock 'n' roll of pursuits. In fact in many minds philately equals fusty. It's considered the domain of the anoraky obsessive who sits in their bedroom sticking "treasures" into albums while poring over catalogues with a magnifying glass. A taste for stamp collecting is something to be confided quietly not sung from the rooftops.
JULIE CARPENTER
"Philately will get you everywhere", Express, April 6, 2011