Spanish Guinea - Bud's Big Blue

1903-1905 Spanish Guinea in Bud's Big Blue

Bud's Big Blue

Bud's Observations

(From Jim: Bud is well, but has a lot of non philatelic obligations and responsibilities at the moment. With his permission, I will upload  country pages in his complete '69 Big Blue that so far has not been shown. He might add his observations later. Enjoy!)

Jim's Observations

Spanish Guinea, located in western Africa originally between the French Congo (then Gabon , also French Equatorial Africa) and Cameroon on the Gulf of Guinea, was a Spanish protectorate (1885), and then a Spanish colony, beginning in 1900.

Until 1909, Spanish Guinea actually only consisted of the continental territory known as Rio Muni, after a river flowing through the region. Bata, a military post on the coast, was the capital. (Bata is still the largest city on the mainland.)

Stamps issued for the Rio Muni territory from 1902-1909 were labeled "Guinea Espanola" and "Guinea (Continental) Espanola".

Then, in 1909, the administration- for all intents and purposes- of all the Spanish colonies in the area was subsumed under "Spanish Guinea", with Santa Isabel on Fernando Po island the most important settlement. (The formal legal changes were not made, though, until 1926.)

Stamps from 1909 for the territories was issued under "Spanish Territories of the Gulf of Guinea", and Fernando Po and Elobey, Annobon & Corisco stamp production ceased (except for a 1929 production from Fernando Po). Spanish Guinea, under this new amalgamation, lasted until 1960. 

The 2014 Scott Classic Specialized 1840-1940 catalogue has, for Spanish Guinea 1902-1940, 319 major descriptive numbers. Of those, 177 are CV <$1-$1+, or 55% of the total. Clearly, a healthy portion of the stamps of Spanish Guinea are inexpensive for the WW classical era collector.

Now one just needs to find them. ;-)  As a general rule in my experience, Spanish colony stamps are underrepresented in feeder albums and collections in the United States. So, although inexpensive, also not common.

Big Blue '69, on four pages, has 104 spaces for the stamps of Spanish Guinea.

Coverage is 33%.

BB could have been more generous, as there are a number of CV <$1 stamps not given a space. And the 1917 overprinted issue (nine stamps CV <$1) is left out. 

The coverage is located between Spain and Spanish Morocco in the '69.

The 40s editions have less coverage, as the '69 adds 1926 Semi-postal B6-B12 (nine spaces).

There are no "expensive" (threshold CV $10) stamps needed in BB.  The most costly stamps are in the  $6-$7 range.

For more on the stamp issues themselves, as well as the BB checklist, click on the link below.

Spanish Guinea Blog Post & BB Checklist

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Supplements

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