Month: July 2020

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Russia 1993, Watch out questors, Baba Yaga eats children or maybe she helps

Russia has a long tradition of epics aimed at children that centers on noble quests ordered by the Czar where the young hero is challenged by evil spirits. A while back we did a 1914 stamp featuring questor Ilya Muromets, see https://the-philatelist.com/2020/01/31/russia-1914-it-is-again-time-for-young-would-be-ilyas-to-defeat-the-german-idolishche/   . Here is a stamp from a much later era that features one of the evil or at least challenging spirits that test the questor in many Russian children’s stories, Baba Yaga. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.

This more modern stamp offers bright colors and well done drawing. However Baba Yaga  has been modernized and loses a little of the idea of her challenge. The 1914 stamp was different. A real Czar was featuring an old epic to inspire his countryman on the near hopeless on all sides quest of fighting World War I. This stamp is just saying Russia had some neat characters for kids, didn’t we?

Todays stamp is issue A2924, a 10 Ruble stamp issued by Russia on February 25th, 1993. This came out as a strip of five stamps featuring modernized versions of children’s book characters. According to the Scott catalog, the strip of five stamps is worth 75 cents cancelled to order. That the catalog only bothers to list the five stamp strip together shows how little the issue was used for mailing letters. If we extrapolate the value of this single stamp at 15 cents, that makes it the least valueable stamp I have written about here and I have written over 700 articles, many on  bulk postage stamps.

Baba Yaga appears in Russian epics as early as 1755. Some think she goes back even farther in Finnish legend. Early Russian depictions often have her dressed in a Finnish style. She is an old woman with bony chicken legs and carries as weapons kitchen implements. Her desire is weed out the heroes unworthy of the quest they are on whom she then eats. If the questor passes her tests, she will give tools that will help him later.

Questor Ivan Bilibin faces off against Baba Yaga. She gives him a horn that he blows to call birds that save him as she prepares to eat him. This is from 1911.

These stories usually have some young male hero visit the Czar. He finds the Czar unhappy because he lacks something he needs. Perhaps the Czar is beset by lame horses or wives that lack for beauty, or the ever present shortage of gold. The Czar is inspired by his young visitor and gives him a challenge of traveling far to bring the Czar back what he needs. If the young hero succeeds, the Czar will make all his dreams come true.

Baba Yaga has been around a while and occasionally shows up in strange places. She is a recurring character in the “Hellboy” series of comic books. In the first John Wick movie, when the title character faces off against Russian bad guys, they refer to him as their Baba Yaga, There is also a version of her that appears in Japanese epics where she is known as Yama uba.

Well my drink is empty and this story has got me thinking the the creators of the questing game “Dungeons and Dragons” got more than a little inspiration from old Russia. Come again on Monday when there will be another story to be learned from stamp collecting.

 

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Mexico 1974, Remembering when the underdogs became overdogs

What is a country to do when the other political side comes to power after much time in opposition and proves to be just as bad as who they replaced. Perhaps the healthiest thing to do is admit it, and in Mexico after the 1910 revolution that is what Mexican author Mariano Azuela did with his novel, “Los de Abajo” which means the underdogs. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering  from The Philatelist.

This stamp is from the period around their Olympics when there was an optimism that the country was finally emerging as an important place. Part of that emerging is presenting figures in the local arts that a wider audience doesn’t know but perhaps should. Mr. Azuela main literary works center around the Mexican civil war of the 1910s that he was a part of. Notice on the stamp he is displayed as a distinguished older gentleman rather than a younger hothead. By the 1970s, it was less important what he wrote but instead the fact that one of us was indeed writing.

Todays stamp is issue A301, a 40 Centavo stamp issued by Mexico on April 26th, 1974. It was a single stamp issue honoring author and physician Mariano Azuela a little late for his birth century the previous year. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 25 cents used.

Mariano Azuela was born the son of a successful rancher in Lagos de Moreno. He studied religion and  local history under Father Augustin Riviera,( and married the Priest’s niece). He then shifted his studies to medicine. Mexico was nearing the end of the long rule of Porfirio Diaz and like most of the young and educated, he opposed Diaz. After the 1910 revolution the other side briefly came into power and Azuela  served as a public health official. The country was breaking down into a long civil war and Azuela joined Pancho Villa’s force as a medic.

Mexican President Porfirio Diaz

It was from this experience that Azuela wrote his most important novel “The Underdogs”. The lead character Macias has a misunderstanding with a wealthy landowner and Diaz’s Federales police come to arrest him. Not finding him they cruelly kill his beloved dog Dove. Now on the run, Macias builds a group of fellow angry misfits that have various grudges against the government. The interesting part is that the group becomes if anything more cruel than the hated dictator. Every night Macias changes what they are fighting for. One day it is to recreate the Aztec empire and the next it is to cruelly avenge some past slight. Meanwhile the long suffering Mexican peasants are preyed upon by both sides. The end of the book has Macias try to go home having lost most of his misfits only to be hunted down by his enemies for one final? gunfight. The Civil War in Mexico lasted 10 years and as in the book all the figures are left with a foul smell.

The book became famous and was soon translated and sold widely in the USA. The book influenced many later generations of left political Hispanic writers and is still an object of study in Hispanic studies departments.

Well my drink is empty and I am impressed that Mexico proved sophisticated enough to feature an author who told the real story instead of some lesser piece of glossing over. Come again tomorrow for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.

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New Zealand 2016, Remembrance of the New Zealand Expeditionary Force

This article is going to have me come across as an aging bitter old ass. Guilty x 4. Here we have a stamp celebrating an organization with Royal patronage whose mission is remembering the bravery and sacrifice  of especially the New Zealand Expeditionary Force a 100 years later. Noble stuff, but it leaves me with sadness at the thought that none of the western countries are united enough to do that again. The connection to who we are and where we come from is just too frayed. In the places we live, we are now the minority, the aging vestige. A big project of this organization is restoring gravestones, so at least there are monuments to what we were. How many are left who even care? So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.

Before we get to that, a note on the visuals of this stamp. At first glance, and second and third, I thought this was a South African stamp, remembering New Zealanders that fought in the Boer Wars. There were some. RSA was how South Africa labeled the stamps. 100 years after the Boer War puts you in the time of the new South Africa, but once in a while they forget Mandela and topicals for a moment and put out a proper Commonwealth issue. This mistake proves that the designer of this stamp is himself not a collector.

Todays stamp is issue A653, a 80 cent stamp issued by New Zealand on February 3rd, 2016. It was a four stamp issue honouring the 100th anniversary of the Remembrances and Services Association. According to the Scott Catalog, the stamp is worth $1.10.

In 1914, the New Zealand Army was mostly a part time Territorial reserve force with no capabilities to project force beyond New Zealand. Similar to the situation today. The declaration of war by the British Empire immediately saw New Zealand commit to raising two brigades and sending them wherever the British Empire saw fit to use them. A ship convoy taking them and Australians was indeed diverted to Egypt where they camped in their warm European woolen uniforms in sight of the pyramids. Seeking a soft underbelly of Europe they landed in the Dardanelles  hoping to make quick work of the Ottomans. Instead they faced a grueling and unsuccessful campaign. New Zealand ultimately sent a force of over 100,000 at a time when the country had only one million. Maori were excluded from the draft and only a few volunteered. The losses to New Zealand were catastrophic. Of the 100,000 sent 16,000 died and 41,000 were injured.

I mentioned that the Maori did less than their part 100 years ago. Indeed there was civil unrest at the prospect of it. New Zealand is now 5 million people but about 30 percent Maori and Pacific Islander and another 15 percent Asian. In the largest city, Auckland, people of any brand of European heritage are a minority. What kind of expeditionary force could New Zealand raise today. When I was in Auckland a few years ago I visited the ANZAC Memorial which is located in a hilly park. Preparing to enter, I saw an Asian jogger use an unknown soldiers monument to adjust his sneaker before going back down the hill. Inside the displays had been reoriented to talk up the few Maori that did serve and room had been converted where a film was shown of a modern Maori girl who is there to tell you how much she is owed. Hint what ever number you have in mind is not enough. An attack in a city called Christchurch, which seem only filled with mosques teaming with people on a work day resulted in the European heritage PM and much of the surprisingly feminized police force wearing Moslem religious attire. The image of her so attired was then broadcast off of the Burj Khalifa highrise in Dubai. The nation bowed down, and not to God.

At what cost, and for how long?

I hope you don’t interpret this as an attack on New Zealand. The same thing is happening all over the world and seems only to be accelerating. I am not sure anything can even be done anymore about it. Speaking for myself and only myself, I don’t like it.

Well my drink is empty. Hint, I am going to refill it. Come again on Monday when there will be a new story that can be learned from stamp collecting.

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Isle of Man 1981, Remembering the Royal British Legion and Major Cain’s heroics at Arnhem

Here we have the story of a man who did his best in a hopeless battle and was awarded a Victoria Cross. His daughter never knew of the medal in his lifetime, not due to estrangement or embarrassment. Rather he just never thought to mention it. Worth remembering even if us in younger generations can’t  hope to measure up to the mountain of sacrafice of those that came before. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.

Here we have a German Tiger II tank coming for Major Cain in Arnhem. All Major Cain has is a PIAT anti tank rifle that has no hope of penetrating the Tiger’s Armor and 25 % of it’s shells are duds. Yet he doesn’t run away. He is hoping that if the tank crews hear a lot of scary sounding booms they will back off and more of his men can be rescued. This all happened but the stamp shows a Tiger II when the tanks coming for him were really Sturmgeshutz III assault guns. Don’t blame the stamp designer, Major Cain’s Victoria Cross Citation got that detail wrong.

Todays stamp is issue A59, a 10 Penny stamp issued by the Isle of Man on September 29th, 1981. It was a four stamp issue in various denominations honouring the Royal British Legion on it’s 60th anniversary. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth only 25 cents whether used or unused.

R. H. Cain was born in Shanghai to Isle of Man parents. He joined a Territorial Army (reserve) artillery unit while attending King William’s College and then working for Royal Dutch Shell, work which took him around the world. In 1940 he accepted an emergency reserve Commission in the Army and was assigned to the 1st Airborne Division. In 1943 he parachuted into Sicily as part of Operation Ladbroke. He was promoted and given command of a company.

After D Day, the British high command put together Operation Market Garden that would land the Ist Airborne division and an attached Free Polish Airborne Brigade in Arnhem in the hopes of seizing bridges over the Rhine River. The Rhine was a natural last line of defense for western Germany. What they did not realize was that there were two SS German divisions stationed in Arnhem getting refitted. Refit meant incorporating new recruits and new equipment including tanks. Airborne forces cannot parachute in heavy weapons. The battle saw inexperienced but well armed Germans facing fewer lightly armed but battle hardened men like Major Cain. The Germans were able to keep Arnhem  but many more of the British and Polish paratroopers were able to be evacuated thanks to the bravery and the inexperienced Germans not pressing their advantage. The scary booms of the PIAT rifles really were intimidating. Late in 1945, Major Cain left the army and returned to his job at Royal Dutch Shell. In 1965 re retired back to the Isle of Man and died of cancer in 1974.

PIAT stood for Projectile Infantry Anti Tank,
Stug III. no Tiger II but still very formidable

The Royal British Legion was a merger of three veterans groups of World War I. It was decided for the first time that officers and the ranks should be in the same organization to ensure equal treatment of the veterans from the lower classes. After World War II membership got up to 3,000,000 members. It still exists and promotes an Armed Forces Covenant that stresses that the unique sacrifices of the armed forces means that their service should be respected by all regardless of politics. They are behind the red poppies on lapels.

I mentioned above that Major Cain’s daughter did not know of his medal in his lifetime. She later helped get his story out. She was married to Top Gear’s Jeremy Clarkson and he hosted a BBC documentary on his late father in law. Time better spent than dropping pianos on old Morris Marinas.

Well my drink is empty and so I will have to wait till Monday for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.

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Madagascar 1993, The name was so new, it was not yet on the stamp

Here we have another story involving the lead times of esspecially farm out stamps. The country name on the stamp, Malagasy had gone away with the change of government in 1992. The Cadillac automobile on the stamp is a 1985 model last built in 1988. The date on the stamp is indeed 1992 though the issue date on the stamp is 1993. Time isn’t on this stamps side. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.

I shouldn’t like this stamp but I do. I talked above about the timing issues but the fact that they put this particular model of Cadillac on a stamp from a place where I would be surprised if even a single example sold intrigues me. I am actually a fan of this model, but most Cadillac fans hate them as just too small and unflashy. This raises the intriguing to me question of whether the stamp designer just lazily grabbed a stock picture of a Cadillac, or were the picking it to make fun?

Todays stamp is issue A351, a 6o Franc stamp issued by the Madagascar Third Republic on January 28th, 1993. It was an eight stamp issue in various denominations. Each stamp features a slightly out of date model of a different manufacturer. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 25 cents cancelled. The stamp is this issue with a Renault automobile is imperferate for some reason and that bounces the value of it to $3.00.

Cadillacs were always very large and flashy luxury cars. Where they had offered a smaller model, it was aimed at female and urban drivers. In the late 1970s, American car manufactures were going to be required by the government for the cars they sell to have a set standard of fuel economy. At first Cadillac tried to finesse the issue by offering diesels and offering a gizmo on their gas engine that could turn off two or even four cylinders of their V8 engine to benefit economy. Unfortunately the economy benefit was not enough and further both gas and diesel engine proved troublesome. What was Cadillac to do? The conventional wisdom was that they should build much smaller cars more in the style of Mercedes.

Instead, and why I really like them, they tried to match as much as possible a traditional Cadillac just on a smaller scale. The cars became front wheel drive and mutch boxier to match the ample room of the old. The car still had a V8 engine, with traditional American low end torque but now smaller, cast in aluminum, and mounted transversely. Cadillac was the first manufacturer in the world to offer such a package and it was never common. Though rack and pinion steering and an independant rear suspension was added, the tuning though was to match the old smoothness and quiet. The car was 2 feet shorter and 800 pounds lighter than the car it replaced. In my opinion, and I am a tiny minority of Cadillac fans, the car was a tech masterstroke. Though early sales were good, rival Lincoln hit back with an all American “Mine’s Bigger” ad campaign. The fact that Lincoln was still bigger had more to do lead times than anything else but small big style Cadillac sales went down and the old Lincoln sales went up. Then later in 1985 the Government froze the fuel economy standard and thus the big Lincoln was allowed to continue. In 1989, Cadillac restyled this car to make it look bigger.

The “mine’s bigger” Lincoln. The fake convertible top was a fad available on both cars

The transition from Malagasy to Madagascar was not very successful. The country had the same strongman  since 1975 and in 1991 400, 000 marched to the Presidential Palace outside the capital demanding change. The Presidential guard dispersed the crowd by firing on them from helicopters targeting leaders. The President than agreed to the transition of power and a new election that he lost. Though there was the complication in that the strongman refused to vacate the Presidential Palace. He was right to stick it out as his replacement proved even more incompetent and was impeached. The country then reelected the strongman but he did not revert the name of the country to Malagasy.

Madagascar’s Presidential Iavoloha Palace. Approach with caution.

Well my drink is empty and I like it when one stamp allows me to gasbag on about vastly different topics. Come again tomorrow for another that can be learned from stamp collecting.

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Romania 1978, Remembering the first non stop trans Atlantic air travel in 1919

Early in the 20th century, there were those that espoused blimps for the roles that larger model airplanes eventually filled. There was just enough success to make the tech detour memorable. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.

The headscratcher of this stamp is that it comes from Romania. Other stamps in this set honoring the history of blimps show German Zeppelin models over Bucharest in the 1920s, but that is the only tendential connection of blimps to Romania.

Todays stamp is issue AP75, a 1.5 Leu airmail stamp issued by Romania on March 20th, 1978. It was a six stamp issue in various denominations. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 25 cents cancelled to order.

Our story begins on September 23rd 1916 when a flight of four LZ model Zeppelins in the service of the Imperial German Navy made a successful bombing raid on London dropping 7000 pounds of bombs. LZ 76, on it’s first mission and commanded by Alois Bocker was hit by anti aircraft fire and was forced to go off course. Over the county of Essex it was caught by an RAF biplane fighter B. E. 2e flown by Alfred Brandon that forced the blimp to land in a field. The German crew attempted to burn the craft before it fell into British hands but failed and the British reverse engineered and copied the design.

The end of World War I saw a severe cut in demand but two blimp copies of LZ 76 flew in 1919. The one on the stamp R34 was built by Willian Beardmore and Company in Scotland. The blimp had a crew of 26 and cruised at 50 miles per hour. On July 2nd, the blimp set out from RAF Croydon for Long Island, New York. The journey took 108 hours and by the time the blimp made it to New York it was almost entirely out of fuel. Crossing the Atlantic east to west meant fighting headwinds and much later Concorde airliners would themselves be at the very edge of their range. Since nobody in the USA had experience remooring a flying blimp. one of the crew parachuted out before landing to show the waiting crew how it was done. The parachutist, E. M. Pritchard thus became the first person to reach the USA by air from Europe. The return trip was also successful and because of tailwinds only took 75 hours.

In 1921 R34 crashed into a hillside in the Yorkshire moors in bad weather. It had not recieved the sent return to base signal. R34 was scrapped and the RAF ended their blimp program entirely later that year as an economy measure.

R34 after the crash

William Beardmore and Company was a giant concern in the twenties building ships, airplanes, one blimp, cars and owning a steel mill. At it’s height it employed 40,000 people. The Deppression was hard not just on blimp production and bankers forced Mr. Beardmore out of his own company. Most operations were quickly would down but  a few persisted. A competitor to the London Taxi by Beardmore lasted until 1966. The Parkhead Forge steel mill lasted until 1983. The shipyard is now a hospital and the steel mill is now the site of a shopping mall called The Forge but forgetting Mr. Beardmore.

Well my drink is empty. I included a lot more names than I usually do hopefully inspiring the readers to look up further the interesting men of earlier times that actually achieved things. Come again tomorrow for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.

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Poland 1986,Remembering Dobrawa’s advise, If you want to avoid Holy Roman Germany, get with God, and Bohemia and err.. her

This is a fun one. You would think with collecting postage stamps, we could only go back in history to 1840 and the first stamp. Every now and then a country puts out a stamp that goes way back, when Royalty was cruel or brave or even haughty and when a King gets religious, so does his whole country, because he said so, and because his wife told him to say so. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.

Dobrawa was a foreign Duchess that married a long ago King. Not someone you would think Poland would choose to particularly remember. As the stamp shows, she has a book for you. A Good Book. The country read the Book and some still do. When they do they should remember Dobrawa.

Todays stamp is issue A875, a 25 Zloty stamp issued by Poland on December 4th, 1986. It was a two stamp issue the other showing Dobrawa’s husband, King Mieszko I. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 40 cents used.

In the 960s AD Poland was still a Pagan country ruled by King Mieszko I. Nearby Germany was ruled by Kaiser Otto the Great who had recently added the title of Holy Roman Emperor. Otto was expansionary both based on patriotism but with the added duty of Christian conversion animating. Polish King Mieszko felt threatened and so sought out allies. He found a ready ally in Bohemia that was then a Dukedom ruled by Boleslav the Cruel. He may have been cruel but that does not mean he did not feel the same threat from the Holy Roman Germany. Bohemia was already Christian. To cement the alliance between Bohemia and Poland, Boleslav offered for Mieszko to pick a wife from his two daughters and Mieszko picked the older one Dobrawa.

Dobrawa arrived in Poland with a large entourage. Among them was Jordan, an Italian Missionary Bishop that reported directly to the Pope. Dobrawa then made it a condition for marriage that Mieszko be Baptized. Mieszko agreed and Jordan both performed the Baptism and officiated the wedding. He was then named the first Bishop of Poland with a base in Poznan. Dobrawa was then the Patron of several of the early Catholic churches in Poland. The union was successful. The Polish alliance with Bohemia outlasted all of them. There were also two children, another Boleslav, this one the Brave who succeeded the Polish Throne, and Segrid the Haughty. Segrid managed to marry, hopefully in different periods both the Kings of Sweden and Denmark. Perhaps Segrid was haughty by I nominate the additional honorific of Hottie.

We know these stories because of the work of the chronicler Cosmas of Prague. 150 years later he wrote the definitive history of the Bohemian people. He inspired a group of followers called Cosmas followers that updated his works as history went along. There are modern historians that dispute details of Cosmas. They say that it is just Catholic iconography that liked to emphasize the role of woman in the conversion of Pagans. Party Poopers.

Cosmas of Prague

Well my drink is empty and I will pour another to toast the the Brave, the Great and even the Cruel and the Haughty among us. That is a lot of toasting, I may need a bigger bottle. Come again on Monday for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.

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Panama 1967, Remembering Palenque, the Mayan city state that rose out of the jungle under Pakal the Great and his mother Lady Beastie only for the jungle to reclaim

Panama was clearly excited by Mexico City getting the Olympics in 1968. In the runup to the games there were many stamp issues showing solidarity with Mexico. This issue shows of some of Mexico’s indigenous ancient sites, of which there were many in Latin America and a part of history that many of the day wanted to better connect to. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.

One thing this stamp does convincingly is teach how to be remembered. Build in stone. It is believed that the area was occupied from about 2500 BC through 900AD. Yet virtually the entire site was built in a 35 year period under Pakal the Great. Carved into the stone edifices were stone reliefs that told how the elite lived and the then understanding of their history. 35 out of 3400 years is a drop in the bucket but all we have.

Todays stamp is issue A150b a 21 Centessimos airmail stamp issued by Panama on April 18th, 1967. It was a six stamp issue in various denominations that was also available as a souvenir sheet. The three highest denominations including this stamp were airmail. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 50 cents cancelled to order. The souvenir sheet is worth $18.00.

Palenque is the Spanish word for the site of the former Mayan Indian city state in the modern state of Chiapas in southern Mexico. In it’s time it was called Lakamha, which translates into big water. What we know of the place comes from modern guesses at translating the hieroglyphics that have been found in great numbers. The place was abandoned and taken over by the jungle. Even now when it is a major tourist site hosting almost 1 million visitors a year, experts believe it is only about 25 percent excavated. Recently they discovered the Western Hemisphere’s earliest viaduct. It had a spring loaded release that could release 20 feet of water under high pressure. Nobody has figured out conclusively why they built it.

The glory days of Palenque started under someone known as Lady Beastie in 600 AD. She acted as ruler after the death of her husband the last King and before her son Pakal could take over at age 12. She is believed to have had a large influence on Pakal during the first half of his long reign. Interesting her stone depictions of her time ruling are much more masculine appearing than those earlier or later. Pakal started his building spree 33 years into his reign with a temple and just kept going. The Throne than past to two of his sons who continued Pakal’s projects though the second son worked mostly on the Palace. The city was sacked by rival Mayan city state Tonina in 711 AD. After that there were no more local Kings but there was still some farming in the area until around 900AD.

Lady Beastie

The site was discovered overgrown by jungle by the Spanish Conquistador de la Nada in the 1520s. Nothing was done and the whole area was very sparsely populated. In 1786 the Spanish administration in Guatemala sent out a proper expedition that included an architect and a draftsman to make copies of the stone reliefs for further study. The findings of the expedition were much later published in London As “Descriptions of the ruins of an ancient city” that was very popular and got the word out about the place.

Well my drink is empty and one thing I find interesting is that these ancient sites always seemed to be discovered and interpreted by outsiders before taken to heart by the actual descendants. Come again tomorrow for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.

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French India 1923, Check out the Temple to Kali, you won’t find that in Paris

The French were in the city of Pondicherry for 250 years at a trading post. As they were there to trade, and it was a city open to trade as far back as the Romans there was no need to try to convert locals to French cultural or religious practice. This is great for the stamp collector as the place can show off the exotic foreign culture in the context of a French prism. Now Puducherry has the tables turned and likes to show off architectural relics of the French now firmly in the context of modern India. No stamps though. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.

This stamp shows off the local Hindu Temple to Kali. The overstamp showing the new currency formulation that year inadvertently tell the stamp collector that the place is really all about money. The vast bulk of the people were then and are now Indian. Elections in the late 1940s saw the people vote to stay French. As in Hong Kong, not wanting to break the golden egg trumped national identity. As with Hong Kong the nation will eventually enforce their will, golden egg be dammed.

Todays stamp is issue A5, a 1 Fannon 6 caches (1.5 Fannon, 8 Fannons made a Rupee) issued by French India in 1923. The new currency that year replaced Centimes and Francs. An earlier version of this stamp from 1914 has no overstamp. This was a 26 stamp issue in various denominations. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth $1.50 cents used. Without  the overstamp the value would go to $2.25.

As the Indians of the day were not writing down their own history at the time, the first mentions of the marketplace at Pondicherry were in logs of Roman Empire traders in the first century AD. At the time the city was known as Poduke. It was part of the then Indian Empire of Kanchipuram.

The French arrived in the area in 1674 under the auspices of the privately owned French East India company. The company had a large investment personally by the French King and had a monopoly on French trade with Asia. The company fairly quickly failed as it was very expensive to maintain far flung outposts from India to Madagascar to Mauritius. After the financial failure the French government stepped in more formally to protect the enclave from British or Indian encroachment.

Kali first appeared as a Goddess around 600 AD. Kali translates into the feminine form of the fullness of time. She appears when the higher Goddess Durga is attacked by two demons. Durga responds with such anger that her skin darkens resulting in Kali appearing out of her forehead. Kali’s is colored dark blue with sunken eyes, a tiger skin sari dress and a garland of severed human heads. She quickly defeats the two demons. I can understand why the stamp shows her Temple rather than Kali directly. It might have made Pondicherry seem unwelcoming.

Hindu Goddess Kali

Well my drink is empty so I will have to wait till tomorrow when there will be another story that can be learned from stamp collecting. 27th wedding anniverary greetings to Mrs. The Philatelist who takes all the stamp pictures for the website.

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Togo 1983, We must make reservations early for The Feast of Victory over the forces of evil

Etienne Eyadema was the longest serving leader in Africa when he died in 2006. He claimed to process superpowers and his long rule  where he did stand for election does provide some evidence. His powers were so great that his son replaced him and just recently won reelection. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.

This stamp issue was a farm out issue of famous paintings related to the Crucifixion of Christ in celebration of Easter. In this case by Raphael. When the President has superpowers and only about a quarter of the country is Catholic, I find it hard to believe Easter is that important to Togo.

Todays stamp is issue A253, a 70 Franc stamp issued by Togo in 1983. It was a three stamp issue in various denominations that was also available as a souvenir sheet. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 25 cents cancelled to order.

Etienne Eyadema was born into a poor Kabye tribe family from the interior of Togo. As a young man he joined the French Army for whom he fought in Indo China and Algeria. In the early 1960s he returned home to now independent Togo and was commissioned an officer in the Togo Army. He was a Coronel when he participated in the 1963 coup where he personally murdered President Olympio. He stayed in the Army a few more years until there was another coup and he was ready to become President. He maintained close relations with both Germany and France, the former colonial powers and the French were still active in the economy where there was a fairly lucrative bauxite mine. As President, he banned all other political parties except his personal Rally of the Togolese People.

President Eyadema early in his reign before everyone realized the extent of his Superpowers

A President needs to have some ability to  intimidate to avoid the next revolution. In 1974 there was a plane crash of a Togo Air Force C47 that was taking Eyadema from the capital to his hometown. The fact that he walked away from the deadly crash was proof of his superhuman strength and the plane must have been sabotaged by evil forces that opposed his plan to nationalize the bauxite mine. Soon there were comic books with Eyadema cast as Superman and even male wristwatches where his portrait would appear and disappear every 15 seconds. His entourage began to include 1000 girls who would sing and dance his praises. The date of the plane crash became a national holiday and excuse for a national feast remembering his victory over the forces of evil. Eyadema even changed his first name in honor of the crash.

The monument at the crash sight. The pack of dogs seems impressed

Naturally there were political opponents who would have rather him disappeared permanently from their watches. To end a riot, Eyadema granted an amnesty that allowed exiles to return to Togo in 1991. The opposition met in a forum and immediately declared itself a sovereign national assembly with a new Prime Minister but Eyadema still a ceremonial President. Surprisingly this was allowed as Eyedema waited for the inevitable infighting between the opposition to ease out his opponents one by one. In a few years he was back in total control despite have allowed rival political parties and Presidential candidates. In addition to his superpowers, a source of strength has been the the still French managed bauxite mine belonged personally to him and now his son.

Eyedema died in 2006 aboard a Gulfstream jet taking him to France after suffering a heart attack. The head of the Army of Togo then declared his son President. His son has as his last name the new first name Eyadema made up after the plane crash. Opposition leaders complained that the transfer of power was unconstitutional  but then 15 seconds later Eyadema’s portrait again appeared on their watches.

Well my drink is  empty and so I will just have to wait until next January 24th for the still celebrated Feast day. Come again tomorrow for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.