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| Coronation Celebration |
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| ABOVE: The 12 numbered lithograph proofs, imperforate, produced by Perkins Bacon around 1911 |
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Amongst our collection we have a rather tatty postcard of the Festival of Empire, that is addressed to Geelong, Australia. It was written at Crystal Palace on June 20, 1911. 'Reg' writes: 'Having a jolly time here it's a fine place no doubt. Saw some Australian Cadets here (Vic) they are camping here. PS Went up North Tower 282 ft high'. What is unusual is that the postcard only bears the blue Festival of Empire stamp, no postage stamp, and the stamp is tied to the postcard by a Paquebot cancellation.
Referring to Paquebot Cancellations of the World by Roger Hosking (1 st Edition, 1977), the Paquebot cancellation was applied at Miri, Sarawak (type 1528). Conceivably, 'Reg' wrote the card and didn't post it in London. He was returning home by ship that travelled via Sarawak. When the ship docked at Miri, the purser would have taken any let-ters that had been posted on board ship to the local Post Office, and each would have been cancelled by the Paquebot mark. |
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| Printers Samples |
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The Festival of Empire design did not end with the Crystal Palace exhibition. In our collection we have 12 numbered lithograph proofs, imperforate, that were produced by Perkins Bacon, probably around 1911. The text included in the design has been changed to - top panel 'Perkins Bacon & Co Ltd' and bottom panel 'Postage Stamp Engravers & Printers, London SE1'. These printers samples, were printed in the colours (1) purple, (2) claret, (3) red, (4) pale blue, (5) olive green, (6) citrus yellow, (7) same as (4), (8) same as (1), (9) pinker version of (2), (10) pale brown, (11) grey, and (12) deeper olive. green than (5). But why were they produced?
Perkins, Bacon and Petch of London produced the world's first postage stamp, the Penny Black in 1840. The technique it used was line-engraved printing and this process, although producing fine stamps, was very expensive to operate. Through simple cost considerations, Perkins Bacon lost most of its colonial contracts in 1863 and the British contract, its most important, in 1880. De La Rue, with its far cheaper surface printing technique, progressively won the contracts from Perkins Bacon as each contract came up for renewal. Perkins Bacon contin-ued to produce stamps for places like Newfoundland, but by 1941 it no longer produced stamps. |
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| Contract Competition |
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However, we suggest the follow-ing theory. In 1911 a competition was held between various printers for the contract to print the new British King George V stamps, and was won by Harrison & Sons, De La Rue losing the contract it had held from 1880. Perkins Bacon knew that it had to reduce their unit printing costs if they were to compete against modern security printing. It certainly experimented with lithography, and it's our belief that these sample stamps were an experiment in postage stamp printing. The numbers marked on each stamp signified the colour used and we are not sure why these insipid colours were tested. Stamp colours are chosen so that different colours can be distinguished easily even under artificial light. Using strong blue and red colours enhanced the fine design of the Festival of Empire stamps. The insipid colours on the sample stamps make the detail design look blotchy, to say the least.
These sample stamps are the only ones we have seen, and other philatelists specialising in King George V material have never seen other examples. Our theory may be completely wrong, but hopefully one of our readers will be able to add something to this intriguing story. |
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