The strike is lasting

The strike in the public transport is lasting in Paris because of the rugby world cup final, a four day holliday, opportunism of the announce of a presidential divorce, and others things that make journalists and French people so lunatic. I take advantage and continue on strike stamps.

In January and February 2007, in the United Kingdom, a postal strike lasted so long that the British government suspended his postal monopoly. The decision permitted to legalize private citizens and organizations to transport mail (some for lucrative philatelic reasons).

If it can be of use for some one : a cover dealer of the carré Marigny, near the Champs-Élysées avenue, is selling covers from the 1971 strike. They are inside a box of 1,50 € covers. They wear a two-flag label (the Union Jack and the one of the country of destination) and a text explaining the legality of the transport. On the cover, there is a cancelled stamp of the country of arrival too.

May philately be a financial danger to UNO?

Thank to Google News in French, I found a UNO press release dated 16 October 2007 that indicated a financial problem about the postal use of stamps issued by UNO's postal administration.

Extract in French is available on my blog in French : during a meeting at UNO, it was decided to spare 3,3 millions US dollars. This amount of money will be needed to pay back the United States', Switzerland's and Austria's post services for the mail they expedit while they bear UN stamps.

The communiqué is full of informations : 87,8 % (!) of all stamps bought to the UNPA slept in philatelic collections. The rest cost UNO 1,5 millions dollars each year.

For fun, let's imagine the fantasies of easy wins that some philatelic service managers are having now, by reading this article, in France and the United Kingdom. 8 stamps out of 10 never used on mail, and no need to sell them glued on first day cover or postal history cards.

Hopefully, UNPA stamps are important through their topics (peace, cooperation, etc) and give a place to children : like this 6-year old Indonesian whose design is chosen for a 2008 series about fighting poverty.

23 October 2007 update :
It seems that this problem has been out for some times (see this threads on The Virtual Stamp Club forum : first and second).

Back to childhood

Every year, the Deutsche Post issued a stamp in the Für uns Kinder series, for us children.



From the German Federal ministery of Finances' presentation ot the one of the postal operator, I can't say if the designers (Olaf and Regina Jäger) are children. A Google serach indicates partners of a design company.

Meanwhile, the topic of the hedgehog and the collage technic with Autumn leaves shaped like hearts are in the way back to chilhood.

Strike action

Tomorrow, there is a strike action of many of the public transport in France (national trains, city buses, metros and tramways). Mainly drivers will protest against the government's project to erase special retirement treatment that benefits public transport drivers.

Some philatelists specialized themlselves in the alternative way of sending mail, while there is a postal strike.

Concerning France and some neighbouring philatelix countries (like the Channel Islands), you can search the bibliography added to the Wikipédia in French article about these stamps and labels that symbolised a effective or imaginary service replacing the defailling State postal monopoly.

Concerning your discovery of French strikes, the big last one (Autumn 1995) makes my fellow citizens discover bicycles of course, and what has been the gadget of the late 1990s : the kick scotter.

Momentary unwilling problem

Since, at the time I can write, Blogger's picture uploading program does not want to work, not many posts these days.


You can take some time to watch -in French- on TV Timbres the interview of Jacqueline Caurat. She was the presenter of Télé-philatélie between 1974 and 1983, the lone television show I knew about in France. She was interviewed by Gauthier Toulemonde, Timbres magazine's redactor-in-chief.

You will see French artist and writer Jean Cocteau drawing his Marianne effigy with Caurat's lipstick.

Late 2004-beginning 2005, a project of DVD release of this old show was announced by the Musée de La Poste, in Paris. But, the project seems to be abandonned : the French Audiovisual National Institute's prices were too high for such a little market as the French philatelic one. The INA uses this prices for its main mission : to archive all French television and radio shows ever broadcasted.

Clever first day card from Australia

Often, during first day ceremonies, postal administrations, collectors associations and philatelic publisher sell first day postal card, whose illustration matches the stamp and its cancellation.

But, if you want to send one of those cards to someone, you have to add another stamps because the original one is already cancelled.

Recently I received through Postcrossing this card :

First day card of September 10th 1998 for the bicentenary of Tasmanian coast exploration by George Bass.

On the other side, you discover that this card is a stationery permitting a worldwide expedition from Australia.

I miss the price of such a first day stationery : is it less or more expensive than the typical first day card? Yet, it is the proof that some postal administrations remember that some collectors dare to use philatelic items in a vulgar postal way.

Christian Beslu

Christian Beslu, here is a relatively unknown person, but everywhere when I look back on my last five years of reading articles about French Polynesian philately.

In Timbres magazine, an article about mini-sheets and booklets issued by the Posts and Telecommunications Office of this French oversea territory, signed : Christian Beslu.

The presentation of a new Polynesian stamp issue, signed : Christian Beslu.

An old document illustrates this stamp, collection of origin : Christian Beslu's.

Finally today, a litterary site about islands taught me more about this collector (jacbayle.club.fr). Beslu was a technical documentalist at French firm Thomson, then at the Atomic Energy Office, that makes France a civil and military nuclear power. This post made him live in Polynesia since the 1960s, because the French nuclear testing site was on the Muruo atoll. I understand better his historic knowledge and rich documentation about French Polynesia that Beslu has been sharing with collectors for decades now.

Electoral letter from Lattes

Here is a scan with the evolution of Lattes townhall's franking machine, French commune in Hérault.


It reproduces the "Port Ariane" pictorial cancellation that Lattes-Center post office was using at that time.

The machine was changed between 2000 and 2002. The new one prints postal mark in two parts, asymetrical moves are possible like in March 2002. The color varies, certainly because the ink quality or disponiblity.

To know more about the postal sending of electoral card in France, you can read News du phospho blog's article posted 17 April 2007.

First day of issue in France

Second step after the first day of issue of the 50 years of space exploration stamp of France :



For once, I remembered to use all the possibilities offered during the first day of issue in France (or "anticipated sellings" in traditional vocabulary) :
* the stamp is sold, a day or two before the others post offices ;
* cancellation of the stamp on mail or on souvenirs with a special illustrated datestamp (here spatial telescope CoRoT) ;
* signature by the author, here David Ducros, illustrator of the CNES (the French spatial center), and you can briefly talk with him and learn how he became involve in the creation of his first stamp.

Generally, these first day issues take place in cities connected to the stamp and are organized by a local philatelic association. It must find a place and earn money by selling its own souvenirs and first day covers, concurrently with those of La Poste. A member of the association can exhibit his collection.

In some cases like this stamp, an institution can be the organisator because of special interest and because it has got the local : here the CNES offices in Les Halles area, right in the center of Paris.

You can obtain the first day cancellation until eight weeks after the issue by sending your enveloppes and souvenirs (with means of return for those last ones) to the Philatelic Cancellation Office :

Bureau des oblitérations philatéliques
61 rue de Douai
75436 PARIS CEDEX 09.


Thank you to a New Yorker reader who told me she was curious on how first day of issue takes place in France.

Mysterious coded cancellation in Canada

After two asiatic steps (1 and 2), a thirs letter sent by a friend whose job helps him to travel.



Full sheets of stamps of Canada has got informations about the stamp's conception (authors, printer). The cancellation is vague, less if the code on the right part of the first line means something.

Concerning the new coded cancellations of France, you can read a list compiled by Claude Jamet (pdf file).