Ajman was a tiny pearl diving village occupied seasonally by Nomads. Thanks to Finbar Kenny there were stamps, big colorful stamp designed to get kids interested in stamps, or at least buy a starter pack from the Macys Department Store. Things can get pretty weird when a hobby goes big business. 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.
Stamps like this from Ajman are considered fake by the hobby. So I cannot give you a value or an exact issue date. That is not to say the “Dune” stamps were not influential. Mr. Kenny hoped that by making stamps more colorful and on subjects more relatable to a wider cross section of kids, he could sell more stamp collecting starter packs. It did not work, neither Macys or any other big department store currently have a stamp collecting department. What it did though was inspire real country stamp designers go down the same road of appealing to the immature would be collector. That did not boost the hobby.
Ajman was a tiny but fortified pearl diving village in what was then known as the Trucial States. Today it is one of the United Arab Emirates. As recently as the early 20th century the population was only 750 people and the town was only occupied seasonally. There was a pearl diving season and a palm date harvesting season. For the date harvesting season, most of the population moved to Muscat in modern day Oman. Pearl diving mostly went away after Japanese advancements in cultured pearls and dates just are no longer lucrative enough to travel for.
The Maim tribe conquered Ajman around 1816. Depending on who you ask the ruling Sheik may have been a vassal of the ruling Sheik of nearby Sharjah. After a sacking of a neighboring trucial state by the British in 1822, Ajman signed on as a British Protectorate that left the local Sheik in charge. Don’t get too annoyed at the British, these villages were constantly sacking each other. Ajman had special and repeated problems with the Sheik of Muscat. Remember it was there the nomads were precuring the palm dates.
Sheik/Emir Rashid bin Humaid Al-Nu’aimi ruled Ajman from 1928-1981. He sold the rights to print stamps in the name of Ajman to Finbar Kenny. The arrangement ended in 1971 when Ajman became part of the United Arab Emirates. The Emirs decided to band together with the end of British Protectorate status.
I mentioned Finbar Kenny was the head of the stamp department of the Macys department store. At the time, in the 1930s, it was common for there to be a table near the elevator displaying stamps to children. Mothers could leave their children there to be entertained while they shopped. Kenny through contacts started participating personally in some sales of very high end stamps. He then had the idea to make stamps that his tables might have more luck with by buying the rights to small independent countries no one could find on a map. Many of the Trucial states signed on to Kenny’s plan. In 1971 the formation of the UAE ended Kenny’s deals as the UAE would have a postal system and do there own stamps. Finbar Kenny then signed up the Cook Islands in the Pacific to continue his business with stamps under their name. That did not go well. The leader of the Cook Islands demanded a loan backed by future stamp revenues. After this bribe was paid, the American government arrested Finbar Kenny under the foreign corrupt practices act. He was fined $50,000 and naturally the Cook Island “loan” was not repaid. Things can get pretty rough when you spend too much time in the dunes or Gilligan’s, excuse me Cook, Island.
Well my drink is empty and I will pour another to toast Finbar Kenny. I don’t think over the long term he was good for the hobby but I admire his creativity in the cause. Come again tomorrow for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting