so I thought I would put on some pictures of a few stamps we have purchased over the past few weeks,
though to be fair these are actually called Cinderella stamps, their description has been defined as 'virtually anything resembling a postage stamp, but not issued for postal purposes by a government postal administration,' so they are printed not as postage stamps but as a souvenir of a exhibition or in the case of the four above as commemorative stamps, in this case the 1897 Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria, although some Cinderellas command high prices, the four above I purchased for £3.45
these next three stamps were printed for Lloyd's Bank who had a branch at the 1924/5 British Empire Exhibition at Wembley, the opening speeches given by Edward, Prince of Wales, and King George V at the opening ceremony of the British Empire Exhibition can be heard here, as president of the event, Edward, Prince of Wales, asks his father, King George V, to open the proceedings, the price of these three beautifully engraved souvenirs was £4.99, as a matter of interest have a look here to see the situation regarding how the Empire was made up, basically from Companies, Colonies, Dominions or Mandates, also of course when Independence was granted to each, you might be in for a few surprises when you read the list!
businesses also produced promotional stamps, the four above, again beautifully engraved were produced in 1930 for the Hyde Park Hotel in London, I guess to give out to guests staying there, the block four above set us back £5.55,
every so often I play with our stamps, the beauty of them is best looked at with a magnifying glass as the engravers attention to detail is so fine, mainly because many of the stamp printers did in fact produce banknotes not only for the UK but many of her colonies, some of the above stamps were also a way of showing the skills of the engravers and printers as well as advertising the company that commissioned them, for us great fun.
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