A is for Aden and Z is for Zanzabar


A is for Aden and Z is for Zanzibar... Now what is between? For the world wide classical era philatelist and stamp collector, a country specific philatelic survey is offered by the blog author, Jim Jackson, with two albums: Big Blue, aka Scott International Part 1 (checklists available), and Deep Blue, aka William Steiner's Stamp Album Web PDF pages. In addition, "Bud" offers commentary and a look at his completely filled Big Blue. Interested? So into the Blues...

Friday, March 9, 2018

Finland - Bud's Big Blue

Finland "Protest" Stamps
Bud's Big Blue
Bud's Observations
The Tsar’s 1900 russification plan abolished the use of Finland’s 19th century stamps, but protests flourished. Finland’s senate voiced disapproval, but that didn’t change matters. A “mourning” stamp (see above) was privately created for placing on mail along with the Russian-mandated stamps. It came in two varieties; the “1” on the back has either a concave or a straight head serif (also above). Profits from sales surged and went to support education. A forgery, slightly different from the original, appeared. Then, Imperial Russia banned the use of such propaganda. If one of these pops up in your feeder album, you’ll notice it.

Scans often show problems that went undetected beforehand. Two Russian interlopers have displaced two Finnish stamps (see lines for 1891-92 below). These, too, have been banned and replaced, even though they resemble the Russian-approved Finnish stamps, because they lack the circled dot motif. 

Census: 160 in BB spaces, 13 tip-ins, 19 on supplement page.

Discovery of the Russian interlopers led me to overhaul the Finland pages since the scans were made. Changes include: shifting all 20th century definitive issues for which BB does not provide space to the supplement pages; placing Scott #110 (as Jim suggests) in the blank space on page two, end of line five, instead of what’s shown on the scan; and adding Finland’s only classical era airmail stamp, a 1930 zeppelin overprint on Scott #178. Changes and additions resulted in 68 being currently on supplement pages.

Jim's Observations
The Finnish "Imperial Arms of Russia" era is a Finnish-Russian identification minefield for collectors. I found even carefully put together collections of Finland with Russian interlopers on the album page, so clearly these designs can be an identification problem for the general classic WW collector.

Scott states: Finnish stamps have "dot in circle" devices or are inscribed "Markka", "Markkaa", "Pen", or "Pennia". A good thing to heed. !!

Finland Blog Post 1856-1917

Finland Blog Post 1917-1940 & Checklist

Page 1

1a

1b

1c

Page 2

2a

2b

2c

Page 3

3a

3b

3c

Page 4

4a

4b

Page 5

5a

5b

5c

Page 6

6a

6b

6c

Supplements
Page 1

Comments appreciated!

2 comments:

  1. Finland's stamps continue to fascinate me. Since the above scans were made, I've added several. The census now is: 160 in BB spaces, 15 tip-ins, 69 on the supplement page. Particularly interesting are the early saw-tooth perf issues; finding them without dental problems presents a challenge.

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  2. I remember inquiring about the saw-tooths with a Scandinavian dealer, and he asked me how many teeth I wanted. ;-)

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