Discussion - Member to Member Sales - Research Center
Discussion - Member to Member Sales - Research Center
Who started this practice? Was this marring first initiated long ago when covers were just a way to obtain stamps and lazy dealers rather than soak the stamps off (thank goodness for laziness), just wrote the price on the front or on the back? After that early philatelic period passed, dealers that followed unwittingly continued the barbaric practice?
Caveat: One must be careful what one erases though. Carriers often used their pencil to mark the covers, etc. Be sure it is a price!
What do you think?
Bruce
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Hi Bruce;
If you must erase (I probably would too), use only a "white vinyl" type eraser or a light tan "art gum" eraser. They are designed to do the least amount of shedding of paper fibers, or in other words thinning of paper. They can be found at art supply stores and stores like Office Max.
They are used by draftsmen and artists who have to make frequent and multiple revisions or correct errors, but must not thin the drawing media. Once the paper gets in thin spot, the eraser will wear a hole very quickly. That is why they must be used for work that takes many hours to produce.
Happy collecting
Ken Tall Pines
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I'm vexed! But it's a waste of energy, I think. I've just accepted the dealer notations as part of the covers' provenance. It can actually be quite interesting to spend a bundle on a cover which was priced years or even decades ago at a small percentage of what I paid for it.
A few years ago I invited a paper conservator from the Vancouver Archives to talk to my stamp club about her work. Her comment about erasing? Don't! She said that any type of eraser damages or removes paper fibres.
Bob
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Thanks for the info and the advice. Always interesting to read members'commentary.
Bruce
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I don't erase either, "Stampme". Once a stamp and envelope
have done their duty, fought the good fight and retired
from the campaign, I accept them in all their tatters,
and with all their battle scars.
John Derry
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Although it's probably not a trend (anything not on Facebook or Twitter can't possibly be a trend!) I have seen some covers over the last several months that have been purposely defaced by erasing the names and addresses or just the names of the addressees.
Two of the covers weren't erased, oh no! Someone had used White Out to cover the name of the addressee! The covers weren't ordinary covers by any means. Both had been posted to, and received by, Canadian POWs in Japan during the Second World War! Now that's carrying concerns for privacy just a bit far! Someone who would do that probably wouldn't think twice about not just covering up Michaelangelo's David for modesty's sake, but might go further and use a hammer to remove the "offending" part of David's anatomy. Just as a David without his parts wouldn't go for much on eBay, neither would those POW covers. Normally worth hundreds of dollars, those defaced ones would hardly fetch a minimum bid.
Bob
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Bob! I feel your pain. Nooooooooooooo! White Out!! Say it isn't so.
John, I like your philosophical bent.
Bruce
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11:48:07pm
I was wondering how many people, vexed I'm sure as I am, take a soft eraser to their covers and remove the price that was penciled on the paper or horrors written in ink somewhere on said covers.
Who started this practice? Was this marring first initiated long ago when covers were just a way to obtain stamps and lazy dealers rather than soak the stamps off (thank goodness for laziness), just wrote the price on the front or on the back? After that early philatelic period passed, dealers that followed unwittingly continued the barbaric practice?
Caveat: One must be careful what one erases though. Carriers often used their pencil to mark the covers, etc. Be sure it is a price!
What do you think?
Bruce
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re: To Erase or Not To Erase...
Hi Bruce;
If you must erase (I probably would too), use only a "white vinyl" type eraser or a light tan "art gum" eraser. They are designed to do the least amount of shedding of paper fibers, or in other words thinning of paper. They can be found at art supply stores and stores like Office Max.
They are used by draftsmen and artists who have to make frequent and multiple revisions or correct errors, but must not thin the drawing media. Once the paper gets in thin spot, the eraser will wear a hole very quickly. That is why they must be used for work that takes many hours to produce.
Happy collecting
Ken Tall Pines
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this post
re: To Erase or Not To Erase...
I'm vexed! But it's a waste of energy, I think. I've just accepted the dealer notations as part of the covers' provenance. It can actually be quite interesting to spend a bundle on a cover which was priced years or even decades ago at a small percentage of what I paid for it.
A few years ago I invited a paper conservator from the Vancouver Archives to talk to my stamp club about her work. Her comment about erasing? Don't! She said that any type of eraser damages or removes paper fibres.
Bob
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09:26:42am
re: To Erase or Not To Erase...
Thanks for the info and the advice. Always interesting to read members'commentary.
Bruce
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The past is a foreign country, they do things different there.
13 Aug 2014
04:10:33pm
re: To Erase or Not To Erase...
I don't erase either, "Stampme". Once a stamp and envelope
have done their duty, fought the good fight and retired
from the campaign, I accept them in all their tatters,
and with all their battle scars.
John Derry
1 Member
likes this post.
Login to Like.
re: To Erase or Not To Erase...
Although it's probably not a trend (anything not on Facebook or Twitter can't possibly be a trend!) I have seen some covers over the last several months that have been purposely defaced by erasing the names and addresses or just the names of the addressees.
Two of the covers weren't erased, oh no! Someone had used White Out to cover the name of the addressee! The covers weren't ordinary covers by any means. Both had been posted to, and received by, Canadian POWs in Japan during the Second World War! Now that's carrying concerns for privacy just a bit far! Someone who would do that probably wouldn't think twice about not just covering up Michaelangelo's David for modesty's sake, but might go further and use a hammer to remove the "offending" part of David's anatomy. Just as a David without his parts wouldn't go for much on eBay, neither would those POW covers. Normally worth hundreds of dollars, those defaced ones would hardly fetch a minimum bid.
Bob
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08:32:52am
re: To Erase or Not To Erase...
Bob! I feel your pain. Nooooooooooooo! White Out!! Say it isn't so.
John, I like your philosophical bent.
Bruce
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