Week #2016.42 on SébPhilatélie

A week of pause and, well, unphilatelic leisures. Consequently only 3 posts and article this past week.

Monday 17 October: Collectors Club reminds me there is that book in my library.
A recent conference at the Collectors Club of New York, October 5th, reminded me that Gary W. Granzow's book on security printing through the Perkins-Bacon example, is still to be read, years after its purchase.

Granzow's book, published by the Royal Philatelic Society London.

The company was founded by U.S. inventor Jacob Perkins (1766-1849), who emigrated to England in 1819, and his then associate, British engraver Charles Heath (1785-1848). The latter was very interested in the security engraving machines imagined by the former to created unfalsified banknotes. Joshua Butters Bacon, Perkins' son-in-law, bought Health's shares in 1829.

The conference is didactic and illustrated with the designs from Perkins' patents and for a good reason... During the Q&A, Granzow explained that only Perkins and his closest partners were capable of conceiving, building and maintining the engraving and printing machines!

Perkins-Bacon went bankrupt in 1935 hit by competititve new technics and ill-management. The Royal Philatelic Society London acquired its archives (search the catalogue), that helped the writing of Granzow's Line Engraved Security Printing published 2012.

The 5 October conference can be read on pdf and watch on Vimeo.

Thursday 20 October: A workplace crisis at La Poste? Or in Welfare-State Europe?
The text is my personal insight on the accumulated little incidents at the French public postal operator and to autoemployed parcel delivery workforce in France (some paid - and fined - by La Poste's private subisidiaries). A workforce rebelling in Britain with the support - shocking - of the current conservative government!

My final question is: Can't we find a way to keep the welfare state and not depreciate the economic, social and environmental value of the mail and parcel delivery sector? Or are we, Europeans, doomed to "thatcherize" our whole societies for the sole benefits of the 1% and their minions?

To readers from the United States: yes, I'm French, two steps from marxism :)

Sunday 23 October: Indian Summers and the apex of a crumbling empire.
On Arte, French and German viewers discovered British Channel 4 TV series Indian Summers during the month of October. Two seasons were produced and broadcasted in 2015 and 2016 in Britain.

British DVD edition of the first season  (amazon.co.uk).

Set in the summer capital Simla in 1932 for the first one and 1935 for the second, the series follows a large group representing all kind of situations and behiavors in the British Raj, from the young promising colonial Administrator to the representative of the Dalit who tried to get rights for this cast while pursuing the wish for India's independence.

Amateurs of sopa operas will get their lots of private secrets behind the historical context, all masterminded by the owner of the British club.