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collecting
Souvenir items are of very great diversity, extending far beyond simple
labels and souvenir sheets. To bring some
coherence into this large field it seemed
useful to have a record of everything produced
for a given event, leaving the collector
to make his own choice of how he will then
narrow it to manageable proportions as he
wishes. To this end I attempted, while collecting
souvenir material, to compile a catalogue
of everything I had traced, classifying
it and numbering the items. The results
are set out on this disc in the eight sections
headed “British Souvenir Mail”.
Limited solely to Great Britain,
the principle adopted was that if the purpose
of an occasion was philatelic, its souvenirs
are decidedly so and merit listing. This
therefore excludes such general events as
the Wembley Exhibition 1924-25 or the Festival
of Britain 1951, which were not organised
to promote philately. Items from philatelic
events in postally independent Channel Islands
and Isle of Man are included.
Philatelists speak of their
collecting interest as “exhibitions”, a
readily understood shorthand, and philatelic
exhibitions are naturally a prime source
of souvenir material. But many events take
place in the world of stamps where no formal
exhibition is mounted as such, yet some
memento is produced to mark the occasion.
As no one appears to have embarked systematically
on keeping track of the material, new finds
are always to be expected, adding to the
pleasure of souvenir collecting.
Some listed items worth extra
mention are of the Postal History Society
holding a number of its annual Conferences
abroad and the fondness of the active collectors
of Lundy locals in issuing souvenirs. The
Polish community in Britain and their philatelic
societies have also staged numerous exhibitions
in postwar days, notable for their attention
to souvenir production.
The theme of philately is
taken to include events and individuals
celebrated in postal history, such as Chalmers,
Witherings, Archer and especially the ever-popular
Rowland Hill. Present-day designers and
printers of postage stamps are occasionally
recognised with special postmarks, worthy
of inclusion. Philatelic magazines as far
back as the 1920s have been active in sponsoring
various cards, sheets and postmarks.
All kinds of events where
mail is specially transported by unusual
means (other than mailcoaches) have been
considered as “philatelic”, too. These have
featured such things as mail on horseback,
by parachute, by submarine, and so on: but
for philately they would not be produced
at all, nor would such amateur efforts as
a cycle post honouring a Society Jubilee.
However, the whole large group of Christmas
charity posts involving local deliveries
by Scouts, etc., are omitted (they have
been well documented elsewhere by Annand
and Holman).
Attitudes to Souvenir
Collecting 
Souvenir
material is not particularly popular among
ordinary collectors, other than some of
those already interested in Cinderellas.
The items commonly strike people as rather
artificial and scarcely worth studying in
any detail. Perhaps the most collected part
of the field remains the philatelic exhibitions
and annual Congress up to 1950, sought after
by enthusiasts and where prices are quite
high. The major celebration of the Penny
Postage Jubilee in 1890 – the start of British
souvenirs – produced an abundance of items:
they were highly popular at the time and
this is still the case. Now antiques, these
are the stars of a “golden age”, with even
non-Cinderella collectors well disposed
towards them.
The attraction of early souvenirs
stemmed from their being infrequently issued
and then (with some few exceptions) in modest
quantities measured in hundreds rather than
thousands. Passage of time since those far-off
days has ensured the scarcity which fuels
demand from collectors. In addition, many
of the items were in themselves beautiful
examples of printing techniques or (like
labels from Congress and the pre-war exhibitions)
imaginatively designed. Some of this is
broadly paralleled in the similar collecting
fields of (picture) postcards and poster
stamps, both of which look back with fondness
on a “golden age” and have less of a following
for “moderns”.
What has followed the “golden
age”, say from about 1950, determined stamp
collectors’ attitudes by and large. The
first of the ten-yearly International Exhibitions
in Britain, held that year, set the seal
of respectability on the souvenir sheet,
considered then a radical, but welcome,
innovation. This situation began its slow
process of change when an annual Stampex
was inaugurated in 1953. Souvenirs of various
sorts accompanied the exhibition, culminating
also in a souvenir sheet and several elaborations.
Initial enthusiasm from ordinary collectors
waned as the novelty of Stampex sheets wore
off and the ritual of addressing covers
to themselves for the special postmarks
became tedious. They began to wonder what
was the point as all the souvenirs were
so common they were never going to become
valuable.
By the 1950s philatelic societies
were well recovered from the wartime interruption,
new ones were being formed and specialist
societies were multiplying. Local exhibitions
and specialist meetings were more frequent,
with commemoration by way of a souvenir
considered important. New County federations
were springing up, holding regular Conventions
and Stamp Days, where souvenir material
could be a useful source of revenue, as
was the case with the small local societies.
With all this activity, however, prior publicity
and follow-up reporting was often patchy.
The period 1945-59 is particularly suitable
for research into what philatelic events
took place and whether or not any kind of
souvenir material was issued. The new finds,
alluded to above, are likely to occur during
those years.
As in so many things, the
1960s wrought changes even in such a minor
area as philatelic souvenirs. Printing techniques
began modernising in earnest and economics
spelled the virtual end of things like the
elaborate engraved label. Security printers
themselves became more active in promoting
themselves and soon saw an ideal vehicle
in the stamp exhibition. Producers other
than amateur philatelists began sensing
commercial possibilities and the special
postmark really took off as a commemorative
item. The Post Office’s attitude to philately
underwent a sea-change: hitherto dismissed
as an irrelevant nuisance, the collector
was now actively courted. A new regular
national exhibition opened its doors in
1966, the BPE (British Philatelic Exhibition),
settling soon into an event to add to the
now familiar Stampex. Set up originally
to be non-trade, this was quickly found
to be non-practicable and was abandoned
in favour of a more-or-less autumn version
of spring’s Stampex. Also, wary of souvenirs
at first it had, by 1971, begun issuing
some of the most satisfactory souvenir sheets
of all, well worth acquiring for their high
philatelic content by collectors disdainful
of such productions in the past. A third
fixture in the philatelic year came on the
scene in 1972 with Showpex, inevitably adding
(though modestly) its own souvenir sheets.
The quantity and variety
of souvenirs, the mass-produced standards
of many, mark the turning point. Productions
from about 1960 are far less collected or
studied even among the specialists. Just
as with postage stamps, an era of over-production
now began to gather pace and popularity
waned accordingly. The trend accelerated
markedly throughout the 1970s and 1980s.
In my collecting days I thought output had
reached its peak with the Stamp World International
of 1990, which produced the biggest number
of items for a single event in the whole
of my catalogue listing. With even souvenirs
from spring and autumn Stampexes and the
Philatelic Congress tailing off and expiring
by then, I imagined the 1990 exhibition
heralded a finale. Certainly things became
relatively quiet for a few years, but two
new sources halted the decline. Stanley
Gibbons was a prime mover in setting up
a new exhibition at Wembley, Stamp 95, bringing
varied souvenirs and staged regularly; meanwhile
the Association of Friends of the National
Postal Museum became more committed to regular
commemoration of their many activities through
souvenir cards, covers, postmarks and cachets.
Philatelic souvenirs were clearly not defunct.
Boundary Problems
With
such an abundance of collectable items stretching
from 1890 to 2000 I had to make up my mind
just what constituted a philatelic event.
I thought originally that there was a simple
criterion: were the organisers amateur or
official – in other words pure collectors
rather than the Post Office? I soon found
this crude division unworkable and undesirable.
The two classes of people overlap and the
distinction is too arbitrary. Take a simple
example, the hundreds of special postmarks
produced for philatelic exhibitions. These
may well have been thought up and paid for
by amateurs, like a local stamp society,
to commemorate their event; but it needs
the officials, the Post Office, before the
idea becomes reality. The finished handstamp,
often from vague and impractical amateur
designs; the manufacture and use of the
handstamp; the transport and delivery of
all the covers posted on or for exhibition
day – without the Post Office no souvenir
item of this sort would see the light of
day. Then again, in 1987-91, it was Royal
Mail itself that issued Exhibition Cards
for no other purpose than to receive exhibition
cachets, so were these to be ignored on
that account?
Souvenir collecting is essentially
thematic. Anyone who has studied the decades
of effort spent by thematic collectors in
trying to lay down precise regulations for
competitive exhibiting will know how difficult
a task it is. The body of rules painfully
evolved is now so complicated as to prompt
the thought: is all this hair-splitting
really necessary? Best to be broadly consistent,
yes; but why not simply collect the items
that appeal to you personally? That became
my own watchword and I included in my thematic
of “philatelic exhibitions and events” many
things I found relevant to philately and
postal history, sometimes as a matter of
taste. It also reflected the way certain
parts of the field became more attractive
than others as the collection grew.
However, I never tried to
list the abundance of printed ephemera associated
with exhibitions: programmes, catalogues,
magazines, reports, pamphlets, yearbooks,
prospectuses, Palmares, entrance tickets
and invitation cards. The subject is so
big it would clearly need separate treatment.
Most menus of dinners and award ceremonies
are likewise disregarded.
There was a particular personal
factor with me. When I started souvenir
collecting in 1987 the only catalogue was
Rosen and that with inadequate coverage
of souvenir sheets alone. Though happily
two excellent catalogues were published
in the 1990s, Chatfield’s pre-1950s Commemorative
Labels and Morgan’s British Stamp Exhibitions,
they were not intended to give comprehensive
coverage of the whole thematic. I had the
aspiration to attempt just that. I also
knew that this meant buying as much of the
modern material as I could find while it
was still extant. Fortunately quite a bit
of it was cheap, because of its unpopularity,
a great help when compared with the expensive
“golden age”.
Fairly clear about what was
philatelic, there were nevertheless several
awkward cases to resolve. They arise from
the grey area, where the activities of the
Post Office overlap into philately. Several
unsatisfactory attempts at a unified listing
finally persuaded me that the best solution
was simply to make a separate list for what
I termed postal souvenirs, using the same
classifications and numbering system that
I had evolved for philatelic souvenirs.
Some of the allocations between philatelic
and postal can be mentioned.
The opening of philatelic
counters in the 1980s was frequently commemorated
with a special postmark. In turn it leads
to trying to find an example of postmarks
from each of the counters that existed,
as most have now closed. The British Postmark
Society’s Pearson and successors document
everything in their publications and for
me philatelic counters are “postal”. In
similar vein, the Post Office Regions issued
an extensive range of postcards in the 1970s
and 1980s, another enterprise since killed
off. These postcards are a large collecting
area in their own right. Roberts’s Regus
Collectors' Guide catalogues them and they
clearly do not need the listing repeated
in my own. But I include with “postal” any
special postmark commemorating the first
day of issue of the cards.
Royal Mail has re-run mailcoaches
over historic routes, sometimes with stamp
dealers as sponsors, and items from these
events are also in “postal”. I found the
cacheted covers produced especially attractive.
The Post Office is an active
promoter of its own services, but the catalogue
mostly ignores the resulting material. No
entries are therefore made for modern items
like inauguration of Postbus services, visits
to post offices, and propaganda campaigns
for postcodes or “Collect British Stamps”
through slogans. Some special postmarks
relating to early postal history find a
place in “postal”, however, such as revival
of old postboxes or anniversaries of ancient
postal buildings.
The National Postal Museum,
as part of the Post Office, issued a great
many postcards of its own, as well as the
occasional cover, before abandoning the
exercise. They are not listed as such (the
Regus Catalogue includes them), only where
they are thematically relevant. Such instances
are the celebration of National Stamp Day
with special postmarks beginning in 1981;
cards that include inset postmarks in the
design; postmarks and cachets marking postal
history anniversaries or the Museum's attendance
at British stamp exhibitions. The Friends
of the Museum have produced cachets as souvenirs
of their Stands and both Post Office Archives
and the (Edinburgh) Philatelic Bureau have
recorded their presence at exhibitions by
cachet, Archives having a series of postcards
for a few years. All the material has merited
listing as “philatelic”.
With the 1970 Philympia the
Post Office intensified its financial and
publicity support of the international exhibitions
held each decade in London. It issued special
postage stamps, booklets and premium-priced
miniature sheets, playing a major role in
the success of the 1970, 1980 and 1990 shows
and providing funds to set up the British
Philatelic Trust. Everything produced is
highly relevant to the “philately” theme
but not, of course, as souvenir material
because the items prepaid postage. This
also applies to the series of illustrated
booklet covers for Postal History (1981-85),
resumed in 1993, well worth collecting (in
parallel) for the interesting information
contained, and the various special postmarks
used on First Day of Issue.
Foreign postal administrations
have provided special cards and cachets
when they have been present at British exhibitions.
My listing of them under “philatelic” is
not extensive: it is a particularly poorly
documented area which I never tackled seriously.
For the parallel collection, too, there
are many postage stamps and sheets issued
by foreign countries to commemorate our
exhibitions.
Collecting the Material
The field of philatelic
and postal souvenirs is so large that there
is certainly a case for specialising. It
could be to concentrate on a particular
series of exhibitions, like Stampex, BPE
or Showpex or annual events such as the
British and Scottish Congresses. As with
conventional stamp collecting, the limiting
factor might be date, so that (say) only
material issued prior to 1950 is sought.
Another possibility is to collect only certain
types of souvenir, such as all labels or
all covers. My own original intention, for
example, had been to acquire souvenir sheets
only and nothing else. The subject became
so interesting that I quite soon broadened
out. I also gradually realised what souvenirs
were my special favourites. They were: cachets,
private booklets and, above all, postcards
illustrated with postmarks – “postmark postcards”.
For someone considering starting
a collection of souvenirs, mention of my
own experience may be of some interest.
The main drawback is its sheer size if approached
in the all-embracing way I favoured. It
brings problems, because different kinds
of albums and stockbooks, backed up with
envelopes and boxes, will be needed just
for storage and they can take up a lot of
space. Some souvenir folders, sheets, postcards
and covers come in an awkwardly large format,
difficult to know how to mount or store,
too. Without some kind of methodical approach
the accumulation can remain just that, shoe
boxes
crammed with unorganised and unfindable
items, not really a collection at all. Elementary
things like putting items away in chronological
order of event while they await proper attention
and labelling the envelope holding them
can reduce unnecessary work. Souvenirs en
masse lack the orderly neatness of traditional
stamp collections: they are straggling,
but full of their own fascination for all
that.
My own disposition was to
keep an updated checklist of the material
as I acquired it. It is harder to remember
just what covers and postmarks are already
in stock than with ordinary stamp collections.
I coupled this with buying things as soon
as they were announced as available. Royal
Mail’s British Postmark Bulletin was essential
in knowing what special postmarks were imminent
and I made much use of the reposting facility
it offers. This failed on one occasion only
in the scores of times I used it, when a
self-addressed cover was lost in transit.
The service from Royal Mail’s Special Handstamp
Centres was impeccable. In connection with
my bibliographic work I received all the
current British stamp magazines and always
kept an eye out for mentions of souvenirs
accompanying philatelic events. The advertisements
likewise gave occasional pointers to which
small dealers handled this type of material,
often through regular lists of offers.
Current material from local-society
events was thus picked up from the philatelic
press and, again, the service was exemplary.
Enquiring to local societies for things
they had produced years before could not
be expected always to produce results, however.
Though the correspondence from them was
invariably as helpful as possible, stocks
could long since have run out or been lost
sight of. It was quite rare for the courteous
enquiry to be totally ignored. The voluntary
workers running a society are normally gratified
that someone living in another part of the
country is taking an interest in their efforts.
There are the usual possibilities
for tracking down older material: specialist
societies, stamp dealers, the smaller auctions,
stamp fairs and the exhibitions themselves.
I was a member of the Cinderella Stamp Club,
the British Postmark Society and the Alba
Stamp Group (Scotland), and these are dealt
with separately, below. One’s own local
society sometimes yields items if they run
an auction and I was not unaccustomed to
fellow-members giving me stray labels or
covers they never quite knew what to do
with. They were only too pleased to pass
them on to someone who would appreciate
them.
Of dealers’ regular lists
of offers, I found the most fruitful over
many years to be those published by Roger
Hudson of Coventry, a specialist in GB postal
history, and Arthur Roberts of Marple (Rejun
Covercards) for current souvenir material,
but who held extensive stocks of older items
and ran postal auctions. The Lyndhurst dealers,
Allan Grant’s Rushstamps, supplied me with
many unusual items of all periods, too,
and the frequent auctions by Sandafayre
of Knutsford sometimes had material of relevance.
Service from all those named was faultless
and rapid. Gradually, as I got to hear of
them, I was perusing lists from several
other mail order dealers with gratifying
results.
What stamp and postcard fairs
I visited usually led to more purchases,
as did the boxes of covers on the dealers’
stands at exhibitions. When I lived in London
it was easy to go to all the regular exhibitions,
which I did. After I had moved to the country,
I was extremely fortunate: a valued friend
and fellow-enthusiast appointed himself
honorary “agent” and meticulously made the
rounds on my behalf. Through his kindness
I had an example of each new souvenir issued
at a London exhibition, often unknown to
me otherwise.
My own experience as a collector
of souvenir material was altogether very
pleasurable. Being ongoing, the thematic
maintains the interest daily, but hunting
for older elusive items has exactly the
same attraction as with conventional philately.
As it provided an opportunity for my particular
specialisations in philatelic history and
cataloguing too, I consider all the time
and effort I devoted to it well worthwhile.
Study Groups
Souvenir material
is one of the many areas covered by the
Cinderella Stamp Club and this is the relevant
study circle for the theme. Since 1961 the
Club has produced a leading specialist journal,
The Cinderella Philatelist and numerous
other publications; its packets and auctions
are specially important as sources for souvenirs.
The Exhibition Study Group
is concerned with researching the history
and background of exhibitions worldwide
and was formed in 1981. Philatelic exhibitions
are but one part of the story, though of
definite interest to some of the members
and occasionally featuring in the Group’s
publications. It is a focal point for exhibition
ephemera and collectables, which have been
produced in astonishing diversity over the
years and do not consist solely of the thousands
of known postcards. My index to its Journal
(formerly Newsletter) has been published
by the Group and will lead to its philatelic
articles.
Philately has always been
strong in Scotland and numerous events have
been staged in the country. It is the source
of many interesting souvenirs, inclusive
of the annual Congress. I found it worthwhile
to become a member of the Alba Stamp Group,
the body devoted to all aspects of Scotland
as reflected in stamps and postal history.
The Group’s regular postal sales usually
yielded some new material for me.
I benefited greatly from
membership of the British Postmark Society,
which had been founded in 1958. The thoroughness
of its documentation of current and past
developments, coupled with the high quality
of its publications and members’ researches,
was most impressive. The section of its
circulating packet for special postmarks
was a prime source of this type of cover
for me for a long time while building up
the collection.
Conspectus
The quest for recognising
unambiguously each of the known kinds of
souvenir led eventually to 49 separate descriptive
terms and I list these in the notes on classification
in section 3. (A few of the less-used terms
could probably be merged with others, though.)
Some of the terms were evolved to contain
keywords to take advantage of the database’s
facilities of “finding” or “filtering”.
I also explain in that section that to determine
an order of listing for the catalogue I
set out the items for a given event in broad
groups. Order is not a problem for postage
stamp catalogues because stamps have denominations;
but, of course, souvenirs do not, hence
the decision to use the following sequence:
Labels
Souvenir sheets and souvenir
cards
Postage stamps and booklets
Covers, postcards and postal stationery
Postmarks and cachets
Forgeries and
facsimiles.
Examination of the database
catalogue will quickly show how this works
in practice. The commentary below may help
give a taste of what sorts of item are met
with in collecting souvenir material. The
remarks there are very roughly in the same
sequence, but with interrelated subjects
kept together.
Labels
PUBLICITY LABELS
for circulation in advance of the exhibition
are collectable souvenirs. Their debut can
be a very early indeed: my first sightings
of labels for two big shows (Stamp Show
2000 and Glasgow 2000) were over two years
before the exhibitions were due to open
(and by which time I had retired). Over
the years publicity labels have become much
less elaborate in production, since 1960
usually self-adhesive stickers on a backing
sheet. Some collectors dislike these because
the adhesive can deteriorate.
The SOUVENIR LABEL is not
an ephemeral item but something designed
to commemorate the event and be kept as
a memento. There is often no very clear
distinction between publicity and souvenir
labels, but having the two terms can sometimes
be useful. At the 1934 APEX, for example,
there was a simple inscribed publicity label,
lithographed in bluish grey; but in addition
the exhibition produced a handsome engraved
souvenir label of an aeroplane above Tower
Bridge, which could be had in six different
colours.
Labels are very desirable
when found on exhibition mail and will add
a pound or two to the value of a cover;
but be careful the label was not simply
added to deceive long after the event. From
their inception in the earliest days, labels
have been deliberately printed in a series
of colours. The Viking ship publicity label
for the 1899 Manchester International Exhibition
was produced in six pairs of colours; beginning
in 1910 the Philatelic Congress regularly
had a souvenir label in anything up to six
different colours.
Publicity and souvenir labels
can be collected as complete SHEETS. The
number of labels in a sheet has been quoted
whenever it could be found and is commonly
between 12 and 24. Traditionally rectangular,
Stamp 95 at Wembley issued “See us at” publicity
labels in circular format instead. Labels
in uniform design have occasionally been
issued in very large (printers’) sheets,
meant for use in providing singles or blocks
of four. Examples are the 1912 Ideal Stamp
(sheet of 240), the 1923 Mercury Airmail
labels (100) and the 1955 De La Rue Centenary
labels (32 and 50). These sheets, rarely
surviving complete, have an added interest:
any marginal markings, like printer's imprint
and plate numbers, can still be found and
collected as marginal blocks.
Souvenir Sheets and
Souvenir Cards
The familiar SOUVENIR
SHEETS are like miniature sheets but without
postal validity and reproduce one or more
items together with appropriate decoration
and inscription. They are meant to be collected
as an entire item, not divided up, and are
usually offered for sale as a complete unit
accordingly. They are not always gummed
and may bear a serial number. There was
a brief vogue in the second half of the
1970s to print souvenir sheets on thick
stock: these are best called “souvenir cards”.
A short-lived complication earlier in the
decade was also the “postally valid souvenir
sheet”. Both these variants are mentioned
later.
Souvenir sheets vary greatly
in size. Perhaps the neatest series, those
for BPE 1971-85 (90 x 65mm), can be contrasted
with the superb Liechtenstein Study Circle
sheets of 1961 (197 x 144mm) and the rare
1965 Schoolboys and Girls Exhibition sheet
(171 x 220mm).
During the second half of
the 1930s some sheets of souvenir labels
underwent a change. Instead of featuring
a single design, those from Congress depicted
different designs across the sheet. As the
wide sheet margins also had commemorative
inscriptions, they have been regarded here
as souvenir sheets, especially as they were
offered for sale as a unit. (The sheet was,
of course, usable broken up into individual
labels, and singles are frequently found
on cover.) The three sheets produced for
the London Stamp Exhibitions of 1936 and
1937 were also of small size with commemorative
inscriptions, so have been listed as souvenir
sheets, though each featured labels of a
single design in these cases.
Souvenir sheets may be housed
or affixed in suitable FOLDERS or SOUVENIR
FOLDERS and these can include informative
notes.
The items reproduced on souvenir
sheets are usually issued postage stamps,
but essays, proofs or unadopted designs
are sometimes featured instead. These latter
are of special interest philatelically,
as are the examples of great stamp rarities
in reproduction that souvenir sheets offer.
An unusual variant is seen for the 1963
Thematic Exhibition of the Polish PS, Manchester:
the souvenir-sheet design was additionally
printed on to a postal stationery postcard.
Souvenir sheets may be produced
in more than one version, notably both on
gummed paper and on self-adhesive backing.
Sheets with altered paper or colour may
be special PRESENTATION SHEETS, as occur
in the BPE series. These were reserved for
the helpers and given with the menus of
the Exhibition Dinner. Bournemouth Philatex
sheets occur on ordinary paper but also
on glazed cards. This latter type of special
printing is then listed as a “presentation
sheet”.
A valuable adjunct to the
BPE souvenir sheets was to include an INFORMATION
SHEET, giving useful background data on
the item illustrated and the method of printing.
An INFORMATION CARD is the same thing, but
card is used instead of a piece of paper
and is found as an enclosure to a cover.
These initiatives are of great benefit to
the collector and, mounted alongside the
item to which they relate, the sheet or
card tells the full story of the item.
Errors of printing do not
seem frequent with souvenir sheets. What
few I acquired were usually missing colours
and are duly listed.
Souvenir sheets occur as
SPECIMENS and the practice appears to have
been initiated at the 1935 Philatelic Congress.
Well known is the “Sample Not for Sale”
overprinted on to the sheet issued for the
1950 International in London. Sheets may
well be distributed for publicity ahead
of an exhibition and the “specimen” or other
marking mimics the practice used for new
issues of postage stamps. But such overprinting
is also an easy way of creating extra collectable
items and this is undoubtedly the reason
for numbers of modern instances. Some specimen
overprints are of doubtful provenance, too:
a handstamp that is absolutely identical
on three separate sheets (1972 Showpex,
1972 Runcorn, 1973 Liverpool Collectors'
Fair) could well have been applied posthumously
to remainders, for example.
Cases are known of the conventional
use of specimen overprints, namely on souvenir
sheets submitted to exhibition organisers
by the printers. By their nature they will
normally be preserved in archives and not
be available on the market, but they do
exist.
A further legitimate use
has been made of specimens for purposes
of presentation. Stampex sheets overprinted
specimen were issued in souvenir folders,
suitably inscribed; BPE in 1984 and 1985
affixed a specimen sheet to a PRESENTATION
CARD. In both cases the sheets are tied
with the exhibition cachet.
About 20 instances are known
from 1965 onward where souvenir sheets have
been given overprints of thematic nature
(Europa, Kennedy, Royal Wedding, etc.).
Until provenance can be established, they
are listed as PRIVATE OVERPRINTS applied
to remainder sheets. Some scarce private
overprints, produced unofficially at the
1911 Congress, made use of locals and even
forgeries as the basic material.
Postage Stamps and Booklets
COMMEMORATIVE
OVERPRINTS, on the other hand, are well
attested. The most celebrated (and expensive)
are the “L.P.E. 1890” overprints on two
unissued postage stamps of Mauritius for
the London Philatelic Exhibition of that
year. But they have occurred sporadically
since, sometimes on postage stamps and hopefully
then with permission.
The earliest Philatelic Congresses
before the First World War were keenly interested
in producing souvenir material. An unusual
innovation was to modify the souvenir label
as an IMPRESSED DIE printed on some other
item. The Birmingham Congress of 1911, for
example, did this with an invitation card
and a menu. In modern times impressive souvenir
material for the Royal Philatelic Society’s
Presidents’ Dinner in 1994 used an actual
postage stamp die, the 1867 South Australia
2s. The stamp in ultramarine was impressed
on the menu, dinner ticket and a plain card,
then in carmine on an information card.
Much more extensive are privately
produced BOOKLETS, panes for which usually
come from dismembered sheets of postage
stamps. An innovative series for the Northeast
Philatelic Weekends has been issued annually
since 1982; it seems likely more booklets
remain to be recorded and this is another
area recommended for research.
Printers’ SAMPLES have been
made or presented at philatelic exhibitions.
These are a class of publicity label, sometimes
intended to demonstrate particular printing
processes and the quality of workmanship.
One by Harrison showing a ship and mounted
on a card was available at Stampex in 1957,
for example. Instead of specially printed
labels, printers have also mounted postage
stamps they have produced on advertising
cards, as at the 1956 Gibbons Centenary
Exhibition.
The modern invention of the
PRESENTATION PACK was introduced at the
1974 Festival of Stamps as an adjunct to
a postally valid souvenir sheet. Apart from
a couple of Society souvenirs in 1981 and
an attempt at a pop-up version for the 1982
Covent Garden Stamp Festival, packs do not
appear to have caught on. The PERFIN has
also been pressed into service occasionally,
such as for National Stamp Day in 1976-78.
Perfins serve the same purpose as commemorative
overprints; since 1980 their chief proponents
have been the organisers of Polish events
in Britain. For the 1975 Festival of Stamps
a PERFIN BOOKLET was even produced where
perfinned “Heritage” postage stamps were
presented in booklet form.
TRIALS of souvenir sheets
show some differences from the issued versions.
An interesting case for 1972 Philatex has
four sheets in unissued colours that show
unwanted coloured borders to the reproduced
£1 PUC postage stamp. The postcard
for the Merseyside PS Anniversary in 1981
had a poster reproduced in full colour:
there were six trial printings in small
quantities for the colours and these were
subsequently made available to members.
Genuine PROOFS, such as occur with early
Philatelic Congress material, are another
part of the more offbeat items to be found
among souvenirs. And once again it is 1890
that provides an example of a PROOF POSTCARD.
Covers, Postcards and
Postal Stationery
POSTCARDS
of a commemorative nature date back to the
earliest days, the 1899 International Philatelic
Exhibition at Manchester producing one with
the Viking ship motif and four views of
the city. The idea was taken up when Congress
was founded in 1909, its very first souvenir
being a postcard in attractive Art Nouveau
style. There is at least a theoretical intention
of a postcard seeing passage through the
post, though often it is not inscribed “postcard”.
A special usage of the postcard
has been to express thanks to exhibition
helpers, as at Scotex 1986, so creating
a PRESENTATION POSTCARD. A particular, widely
adopted type of postcard uses an array of
postmarks for the illustration – the POSTMARK
POSTCARD. By thus summing up the postal
history of the town or region where the
philatelic event took place, this type can
make an attractive collection approaching
200 different postcards. The elaborate set
of postmark postcards issued for the 1947
Congress at Birmingham merited including
a leaflet of lengthy descriptive notes as
POSTMARK INFORMATION.
SOUVENIR CARDS differ from
postcards only in that there is no intention
of being posted, the items being produced
as straightforward souvenirs of an event.
They are sometimes glazed and with gold
edging. As already stated, some souvenir
sheets have been printed on stock heavier
than the usual paper or parchment and are
best regarded also as souvenir cards.
The noted postal historian,
W.G.Stitt Dibden, has listed a TELEGRAPHIC
CARD for the 1890 Guildhall event. I never
found any further information about it and
it was seemingly unknown to other authorities.
Souvenir COVERS exist in
large numbers, frequently unrecorded, and
research will undoubtedly unearth more.
Two types are commonest: the inscribed and
the illustrated. The inscribed usually give
simple printed details of the event, though
this may include a town coat of arms or
a philatelic society logo too. Illustrated
covers carry some picture relating to the
event and this is the type most sought and
collected nowadays. Several different colour
printings of an illustrated cover are quite
usual, particularly those from Congress,
and it is interesting to establish the range
of colours and to acquire an example of
each.
Covers are frequently
posted unsealed, but if they are not it
is advisable to slit them open with a paper
knife to examine the FILLER or FILLER CARD.
If not a collector’s makeshift stiffener
it is most likely to have been specially
printed for the event and contain useful
information in amplification of the cover.
For example, a 1982 Chalmers Bicentenary
cover illustrated with a portrait supplements
this with a filler outlining his place in
postal history. When the Wiltshire Federation
held its Convention in Bath in 1970, the
cover showed the Bath Mailcoach but the
filler card had a brief history of the Post
Office building. A particular sort of filler
is the POSTMARK FILLER. The illustration
there is an array of postmarks of the locality
in which the event took place. A cover inscribed
for the Kendal Gathering in 1971 used this
device. The Kendal PS staged an exhibition
and used the filler to show Kendal postmarks.
A postmark filler of Stroud postmarks appeared
for the Three Counties Convention held in
that town in 1983. This was my only knowledge
of the event, as the cover mentioned as
issued in the press never came my way.
Before the Post Office rationalised
the numerous sorts of postal stationery
out of existence, a great deal of use was
made of them in devising exhibition souvenirs.
The first souvenir of all was an item of
postal stationery, the penny postcard issued
at the 1890 Penny Postage Jubilee celebration
at Guildhall. A similar event shortly afterwards
at South Kensington saw an illustrated ENVELOPE,
also impressed with a penny stamp.
Some of the postcards issued
for annual Conferences of the Postal History
Society are notable for appearing in two
forms, with and without impressed franking.
More esoteric sorts of stationery have figured
on infrequent occasions from the very early
days. The London Philatelic Exhibitions
of 1890 and 1897 made use of Newspaper WRAPPERS
franked at ½d. and given commemorative
overprints. In modern times the first Convention
of the Isle of Man Federation in 1976 overprinted
an AEROGRAMME and favoured this unusual
souvenir material several times later. National
Stamp Day in London in 1977 made use of
a LETTER-CARD in which to feature a black
print from the Silver Jubilee postage stamp
issue. The Association of Essex PSs had
celebrated its own Silver Jubilee in 1969
with a Convention at Chelmsford notable
for a wide variety of souvenirs for this
milestone event. Specially designed LETTER-SHEETS
were one such. The AEPS has been especially
innovative in the souvenirs for its regular
Conventions and Rallies and – as they have
troubled to document these items – have
added much to the interest of the thematic.
Founded in 1944, their very first “Congress”
at Southend in 1945 produced a postmark
postcard, which is a rarity in used condition.
Until it withdrew the service
in October 1973 the Post Office would impress
stamps on private stationery and much philatelic
use has been made of this. The Stamp Collecting
Promotion Council at the 1974 Festival of
Stamps made a special feature of POSTALLY
VALID SOUVENIR SHEETS, though the idea had
been used before then. The items resemble
souvenir sheets, with suitable inscriptions
and illustrations added alongside the impressed
stamps. Very soon, as stamping-to-order
was by then defunct, this type of souvenir
sheet was manufactured from cut-down postal
stationery envelopes. Because of the impressed
stamps they could still be advertised as
“postally valid”. Actual postal use on cover
is more desirable for the collection than
the more frequently seen mint examples.
A handful of exhibitions,
starting with the 1934 APEX, have used the
PIGEONGRAM, a quaint and attractive type
of souvenir.
Postmarks and Cachets
There
have been over 10,000 special POSTMARKS
of which philatelic events have accounted
for 1100 or so. The special postmark was
initiated for souvenir material by the Post
Office in 1890 as part of the celebration
of the Penny Post Jubilee. As soon as Congress
came into being in 1909, a postmark was
the usual adjunct to a philatelic event
and this continued for the rest of the century.
Thanks to the comprehensive documentation
produced by the British Postmark Society
it is unlikely that any special postmarks
for the philatelic theme remain to be discovered;
however, the Society’s continuing researches
do make refinements to the existing lists
as new information comes to light. These
may add such data as further code letters
or time indicia to known postmarks. Very
rarely does a POSTMARK PROOF become available
to collectors and I was specially pleased
to have one from the 1936 First London Stamp
Exhibition.
In my database catalogue
note especially the range of postmark dates
for the Philatelic Congress; this annual
event is listed at the day when the Formal
Opening occurred, which is sometimes not
the postmark first day. Likewise the Postal
History Society Conferences' one-day postmark
(shown with FD and date) often did not coincide
with the Conference opening day.
Plain covers with a special
postmark are not difficult to find, especially
as much use has been (and is) made of the
Post Office's reposting facility. Seen in
quantity the covers present quite an interesting
historical record of the changing face of
the affixed definitives and the transformation
when regular commemorative stamps began
being produced in the 1960s.
By no means has every philatelic
exhibition or event had a special postmark.
Thus souvenir covers bearing simple operational
postmarks continue to surface, signalling
hitherto unrecorded shows and well worth
looking out for. In some ways such covers
are more attractive than souvenir material
with well known special postmarks.
A specialised type of souvenir
cover is the commercially produced first-day
cover. Some collectors find a place for
them when they have an exhibition tie-in,
those from the Warwick series 1978-80 being
notable examples. On several occasions the
Post Office has timed a new issue of stamps
for Stampex, providing their own (“commemorative”)
covers and special new-issue postmarks.
(Full details of fdc’s and their postmarks
are in the Bradbury Collecting British First
Day Covers catalogue.) Because handsomely
produced and franked with complete sets,
commercial fdc’s tend to be rather expensive.
The collector may feel that, as they commemorate
the postage stamps rather than the exhibition
itself, they can be omitted in favour of
the special postmark on plain cover.
Commercial FDC's, however,
can be useful in finding SLOGANS. Exhibitions
have made use of this form of postmark for
advertising since the 1950 London International
but, with the progressive deterioration
in quality, the FDC may be the best method
of acquiring a legible strike. As Royal
Mail discontinued offering slogans in the
late 1990s this type of souvenir is now
obsolete.
One of the most attractive
forms of souvenir is the exhibition CACHET.
These are markings provided by the organisers
to embellish covers and to cancel souvenir
labels and sheets, often resembling postmarks
or with pictorial or explanatory motif.
Occasionally a defunct operational handstamp
has been pressed back into service as a
cachet. The BPE cachet has seen service
in marking souvenir sheets distributed as
trade samples. The 1934 APEX changed the
colour of its biplane cachet daily, so there
are six varieties to collect. For a while
the National Postal Museum and Post Office
Archives introduced cachets for postcards
sold at Stampex and these were usually provided
in more than one colour.
Souvenir mail impressed with
METERS (meter stamps) dates back to the
1923 London International Stamp Exhibition,
but has not seen much usage over the years.
It was interesting that the 1937 Airmail
Exhibition at Selfridge's employed meter
franking for its postcard in preference
to a special postmark.
Forgeries and Facsimiles
Straightforward
FORGERIES have so far been unusual in the
souvenir field. The much sought after 1890
Penny Post Jubilee represents the exception,
with both the Guildhall postcard and the
1890 Christmas Card having attracted the
forger. The highly popular Furniss caricatures
and Elliot plagiarisms arising from the
Jubilee events are listed as PRIVATE ENVELOPES.
A legitimate PRIVATE POSTCARD as a subscription
reminder from the indefatigable Cinderella
collector, Victor Short, also harks back
to the great year of 1890. The same collector
has produced a PRIVATE LABEL, a near-facsimile
of the Ideal Stamp souvenir label of 1912,
but reading “Ideal Stamp Albums”.
FACSIMILES of souvenir labels
and sheets have been issued as such. The
1974 Festival of Stamps, for example, had
available Rotaprint copies of the 1923 Mercury
Airmail label, while the 1989 Congress reproduced
in facsimile the souvenir sheets of the
1932 Congress, with advertising for the
Cinderella Stamp Club added in the margins.
The 1987 Tynemouth PS Diamond Jubilee imitated
six Penny Post handstamps on mock entires.
The Mulready letter-sheet was reproduced
in facsimile for the 1990 London International
and surely pleased many a collector not
otherwise in philatelic souvenir material.
(Unpublished.
Written July 1994 and revised during database
construction 1996-97. Updated with additional
text and transcribed October 2001.)
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