The United States Philatelic Classics Society held its annual membership meeting at the Sarasota National Stamp Exhibition, held in Sarasota, Florida from January 21st to 23rd, 2022. Members of the society presented talks to the philatelic community during the show, a society dinner was hosted on Friday evening, and the society board and membership meetings were held on Saturday. In addition, the society’s major awards were presented: the Richard Winter Cup, Susan McDonald Award, Carroll Chase Cup, and Distinguished Philatelist (the Tracy Simpson Cup was not awarded this year).
Sarasota Annual Meeting Presentations
At the 2022 Annual Meeting in Sarasota, Steve Kennedy gave a presentation on “The Elie Beaty and Hagerstown Bank Correspondence.” Steve discussed the history of the bank and what is currently known about the circumstances of the find and dispersal of an estimated 10,000 covers dating from the early 1800’s to the 1850’s. He noted that, because they had not been exposed to light, the colors of 1847 issue stamps were like new. Steve showed illustrations of and described covers from different cities and with different rates, including two unusual covers that were on the tops of bundles and marked with package rates.
Larry Haber gave a presentation on “The Postal History of New Haven from the Beginning to 1861.” Larry explained the history of the New Haven postmaster provisional. He discussed his approach to building a collection and exhibit. He showed very fine examples from his exhibit and auctions of covers that presented an interesting history of New Haven manuscript markings, handstamps, rates and postal routes.
The third presentation at Sarasota was by Mike Plett on “Introduction to the Many Aspects of Sanitary Fair Collecting.” Mike discussed the background and history of sanitary fairs and sanitary commissions established during the Civil War. He showed examples of sanitary fair stamps, covers and ephemera. Mike also described the contributions of soldier relief activities conducted by sanitary commissions and women’s aid societies during the Civil War.
Member Philatelic Exhibits
The Grand Award went to Vince King, for his exhibit In the Beginning…Timbromanie, The Proliferation of Postage Stamps Inspires a Collecting Revolution. This exhibit also received a Large Gold and the AAPE Creativity Award.
Reserve Grand was awarded to Vernon R. Morris for Evolution of Blood’s Local Post: 1842 to 1862. The exhibit also received the United States Philatelic Classics Society Award, the United States Stamp Society Statue of Freedom Award, and a Large Gold.
Mark Schwartz took home the Single Frame Grand for Boston Paid in Grid. Both Boston Paid in Grid and Schwartz’s other single frame exhibit, The Postal Markings of Newbury and Newburyport, Mass during the Stampless Period: 1755-1855, earned a Large Gold. Schwartz’s multiframe exhibit, The Postal History of Salem Mass: Domestic Mail through September 1883: Foreign up to UPU, earned a Large Gold.
Yamil H. Kouri‘s single frame exhibit, The 1855 Y ¼ Surcharged Stamps of Cuba, received the Single Frame Reserve Grand and a Large Gold.
Anthony F. Dewey‘s single frame exhibit, The “A” Rate-Change Stamps of 1978, took home a Large Gold.
Richard Taschenberg‘s The 10 Cent US Envelopes of 1870-1874 was awarded a single frame Large Gold.
Eigel Trondsen took home a Large Gold for Cunard Line: The Ships and the Transatlantic Mail, the Monopoly Years.
Hal Vogel‘s American Heroic Age Polar Expeditions took a Large Gold and the APS Research Award.
The Special Design Issues for Cuba by Juan Farah earned a Large Gold.
Alfredo Frohlich received the Columbia Panama Study Group Medal of Excellence and a Large Gold for Colombia, The Last Classic Issue – 1866.
Norway Registered Mil to 1945 by Eigel Trondsen earned a Large Gold and the AAPE Exhibiting Excellence Award for Treatment.
Lawrence Haber‘s The State of the US Mails – a Snapshot in Time received a Large Gold and the APS 1900-1940 Medal of Excellence.
Registered Mail in the United States by James Milgram earned a Large Gold.
Murray Abramson took home a Large Gold and the American Philatelic Congress Award for Expansion of U.S. Airmail to Foreign Destinations (1922-1941).
Bill Di Paolo received Gold awards for his single frame exhibit, Introduction to Italian Lake Mail; and his multi-frame exhibit, Thomas Edison and the Bulb.
The single frame exhibit Non-Denominated Make-Up Rate Stamps of the United States by David Mayo earned the AAPE Award of Honor and a Large Vermeil.
George Kramer‘s For the Love of the Dog received the American Topical Association Medal and a Large Vermeil.
Daniel C. Warren took home a Vermeil for his single-frame exhibit, Richmond, VA 1786-1799.
Oleomargarine State Revenue Types by Richard Lomax earned the Women Exhibitors Sterling Achievement Award and a single frame Large Silver.
Millard Mack‘s Uses of the 50 Cent United States Airmail Transport Stamp received single frame Silver.
Philip Kotsios revived a Silver for his multiframe exhibit, Early Pictorial Issue New York Foreign Mail Covers: 1869 – 1871.
Member Literature Exhibits
The Grand Award was presented to Darrell Ertzberger‘s “Rural Free Delivery in North Carolina” published in the NCPHS Postal Historian. It also earned a Large Gold.
Heinrich Conzelmann received the APB Research Award and a Large Gold for “Printed Matter Sent By Hamburg or Bremen Mail: 1867 Rate Changes” published in The Chronicle.
Albert L. Briggs earned a Gold for “Prexie Postal History: Local Letter Uses” (Prexie Era Newsletter).
“The Development and Use of Consular Bicentennial Postal Stationery 1990 – 1994” (Postal Stationery) by John M. Hotchner earned a Gold.
Bill DiPaolo‘s “Searching for the 10¢ Coil of the 1938 Presidential Series” (The United States Specialist) received Gold.
Terence Hines earned a Gold for “Forwarding of Special Delivery Mail” (United States Specialist). He also won a Large Vermeil for “Norwich Vermont Postal History” (United States Specialist).
Anthony F. Dewey and Peter LaPlaca received a Large Vermeil for “Dodd Was Dead: Tracing the Origins of a Popular Illustration” (First Days).
Anthony Dewey also earned a Large Vermeil for “The Doback Method: How to Challenge First Day Collectors” (First Days).
“Cachetmaker: Tom Mueller” (First Days) by Patrick Morgan earned a Large Vermeil.
Robert Rose won a Vermeil for “The Woodbridge, N.J. Colonial Straightline Handstamp: Where is it?” (NJPH, The Journal of the New Jersey Postal History Society).
“Revolution War Veteran” (NJPH, The Journal of the New Jersey Postal History Society) by Donald A. Chafetz received a Vermeil.
“Military Assistant Surgeon’s Ft. Lauderdale East Florida Letter” (Florida Postal History Journal) by Steve Kennedy earned a Large Silver.
Society Awards
Carroll Chase Cup
For 2021 the Carroll Chase Cup is awarded to Peter Schwartz for his book Inventions of Prevention – a History, Analysis, and Catalog of 19th-Century Patents and Inventions for Preventing Reuse of Postage and Revenue Stamps. Peter’s seminal work opens the door to a better understanding of the essays listed in the Scott United States Specialized Catalogue. For the first time many of the essays can be attributed to the correct patent. The correlation of patents to essays is allowing for new research, which is expanding our knowledge base about the government’s concern over the reuse of postage and revenue stamps.
Peter’s book provides a fresh perspective on the subject of reuse, starting with the all-familiar “grill” that first appeared in August of 1867. He chronicles over 125 reuse-prevention patents and illustrates them with the associated essays, stamps, and rarely seen patent models. Covering a period of time from 1862 to 1875 his analysis further includes the political ramifications of the reuse issue. His work on the subject is by no means complete. In fact, there is a chapter which explores the many additional research opportunities in the field.
This important work will create an entire new area of study. It has already prompted talk of resurrecting the Essay & Proof Society which folded almost 30 years ago. We congratulate Peter Schwartz for his accomplishment and award him the Carroll Chase Cup.
Richard Winter Cup
For 2021 the Richard Winter Cup is awarded to Dr. Yamil H. Kouri, Jr. for his book Spanish Colonial and Mexican Mail in the United States. Dr. Kouri’s important work is the result of years of research on the postal history of the areas of North America that were once under the rule of the Spanish crown. Dr. Kouri collaborated with the late Leo John Harris for many years on this subject, until the death of Mr. Harris in 2017, and he credits Mr. Harris as a co-author of this book.
Spanish Colonial and Mexican Mail in the United States spans the period of the middle of the 18th Century through the 19th Century. It examines one of the least studied and understood aspects of classical U.S. postal history. With copious illustrations of covers, maps and other visual material, the work traces the postal history of the Spanish colonial postal system by region, encompassing a vast area extending from Florida to Louisiana, New Mexico and California. Also, in a significant innovation for a book on U.S. postal history, Dr. Kouri’s work features dual English-Spanish text in two columns on every page. This is truly an important work on the postal history of the United States from one of the most accomplished authors of the subject. We congratulate Dr. Kouri for his accomplishment in winning the Richard Winter Cup for 2021.
Susan McDonald Award
The winner of the Susan McDonald award for 2021 is Scott R. Trepel, for his groundbreaking essay, The U.S. 5¢ Stamp of 1847: A New Approach to Impressions and Color, published in the May 2021 Chronicle.
Printing impression has long been a taxonomical key for classifying important early line-engraved stamps. Mauritius and New South Wales are just two of many examples. But for some reason, the U.S. 5¢ 1847 stamp has always been classified by color alone. As Trepel’s article makes abundantly clear, this has caused increasing problems.
Trepel’s article proposed a new way of looking at our nation’s first postage stamps: using the printing impression as the primary feature of classification, with the color family an important secondary characteristic.
The article presented massive high-definition enlargements showing salient details of the four different plate states (early, intermediate, worn-plate and cleaned-plate) and then showed the major color varieties (dark brown, red brown, orange brown, red orange or brown orange) found in each plate state. These two taxonomical approaches were then cleverly combined into one simple table, presenting lifesize color illustrations of each of the 14 resultant varieties.
In his conclusion, Trepel made specific proposals for modifying the 5¢ 1847 listings in the Scott specialized catalog. Whether the catalog editors will accept them, time will tell. At least they have something to think about.
Distinguished Philatelists
Daniel J. Ryterband, Dr. James W. Milgram, & Jeffrey Mark Forster
Daniel J. Ryterband is the Chairman and CEO of FW Cook & Co., which provides consulting services to corporate boards in the areas of executive compensation and corporate governance. He is a graduate of Rutgers University and holds an MBA from the Stern School of Business at New York University. Dan and his wife, Dianne, have three children and reside in suburban New York City.
Dan is a lifelong philatelist and his interest commenced at age seven when he discovered his father’s childhood collection of United States and Israeli stamps in a closet. Dan and his father spent the next 10 years or so attending shows and visiting a New York City stamp club on weekends. Dan took a detour from collecting when he left for college, but shortly after graduation his father retired from his career as a chemist and became a part-time stamp dealer. This rekindled Dan’s interest and he and his father, who passed away in 2020, spent the rest of their time together pursuing their joint passion.
Dan’s initial “adult” collection was a traditional assemblage of mint and used United States stamps from 1847 through the 1930s. Dan sold this collection as he began building a specialized US Classics collection as well as various postal history collections. Dan’s current interests include the US 1847 issue, the 1851 and 1857 issues, the American Civil War, inland waterway postal history, first through third issue US revenue stamps, and United States free franked covers. He also has several specialized 20th century US collections including the 1930 and 1933 Graf Zeppelin issues and the 1932 Washington Bicentennial issue. Dan also has a comprehensive collection of Canada and British North America, including the stamps and varieties as well as classic postal history. Upon inheriting his father’s US collection when he passed in 2020, Dan decided to expand into new areas and upgrade the material, two things his father would have enjoyed doing had he had more time. An interesting new focus is 20th century errors, which Dan and his father enjoyed seeing at stamp shows in the 1970s and 1980s when many of these fascinating varieties were discovered.
Dan is a member of numerous philatelic organizations including the American Philatelic Society, the United States Philatelic Classics Society, the Civil War Philatelic Society, the United States Stamp Society, the Club de Monte Carlo, and the Philatelic Specialists Society of Canada. He is a Fellow of the Royal Philatelic Society of London, a trustee of the Philatelic Foundation and chairs its Overturns Committee, a governor of the Collectors Club in New York City, and a member of the Council of Philatelists at the Smithsonian’s National Postal Museum.
Dan has formed three 8-frame exhibits focused on the American Civil War, inland waterway postal history in New York State, and the ships of the United States Pacific Fleet on 7 December 1941 (“Day of Infamy”), respectively. The first two have both received multiple large gold awards, and his Civil War exhibit was the Grand Prix winner at Stockholmia in June 2019 and received the APS Champion of Champions award in 2021. Dan has also presented four single-frame exhibits focused on the stamps and postal history of the Civil War, all of which have earned gold or large gold medals. The focus includes multi-colored patriotic covers, through-the-lines prisoner of war mail, adversity usages, and the 10-cent Jefferson Davis copper plate engraved stamps of the Confederacy. He is a two-time winner of the “Friendship Cup” at the Collectors Club, which is awarded for the most popular exhibit in the annual one-frame competition as voted by membership. A portion of Dan’s US free-frank collection was displayed in the Court of Honor at NY2016 and at the National Postal Museum in 2019.
Dan is very busy with family and running the national consulting firm that he leads. He is also an avid outdoors person and enjoys flyfishing, boating, mountain climbing and serves on the boards of several environmental non-profit organizations. Despite all of this, he has found time to conduct philatelic research, publish several articles in the Chronicle, work on his exhibits, present his collections and exhibits in formal talks in support of multiple philatelic organizations, and serve in leadership roles at the Philatelic Foundation, the Collectors Club, and the Smithsonian’s National Postal Museum. In Dan’s words, he is “just getting started” and very much looks forward to enjoying more time with his “stamp friends” and contributing to organized philately, which he deeply appreciates and recognizes as a cornerstone in his life. For these reasons, Dan has been awarded the Distinguished Philatelist.
Dr. James W. Milgram gives the credit for his collecting to his father also a physician who filled two houses with antiques. His earliest memory of the acquisition of an item involves a road trip to Albany, N.Y. visiting The Little Red Barn Antique Shop there. The owner had an old post office with multiple boxes some of which contained old stampless letters. James was given his pick of 4 items for $10.00.
One of the items so selected was the Estill & Co. express letter from the trail to California in 1850. This item was the subject of his first article in The American Philatelist in 1959, an article he says needs no change today.
His father located through a different antique dealer in Newburgh, N.Y. a hoard of 250 wooden crates consisting of a lawyer’s correspondence 1860s-1920s. It was the experience of sorting and reading the letters that established the basis for his collecting: covers with interesting postmarks and letters with informative contents. From the beginning he was interested in all periods before 1900 and letters with worthwhile contents. This wide sphere of interest resulted in the acquisition of items from all areas with stamps being secondary to postal usages.
It was during college at Columbia University that he began to write articles based on some of the covers and letters he found. It was by advertisements “Wanted by collector” and dealers’ stocks at stamp shows that new items were acquired with many Civil War letters, both North and South. This led to a secondary interest in pictorial stationery with the first item purchased, a Magnus view of New York City in 1853, for $5.00 from Mary Benjamin, the famous autograph dealer. In his college years he had a part-time job writing up auction lots for John A. Fox Auctions. He wrote the Meroni Confederate catalog. This also reinforced the wide scope of his collecting interest and he started to purchase at auctions. By the time he entered medical school at Johns Hopkins, he had written over 50 articles on a wide variety of subjects in U.S. postal history.
Now many years later his list of publications includes more than 625 articles and 8 books on U.S. postal history. There is a bibliography in American Illustrated Letter Stationery 1819-1899. Each project has a separate story. To tell one might be of interest. Floyd Risvold, the legendary collector of letters and covers, had the collected research of Henry Meyers, who had hoped to rewrite the Klein book on steamboat markings. Richard Graham had intended to carry this project forward, but after 20 years of delays, Risvold offered the material to Milgram. Contacting collectors and drawing on two auctions in Sotheby Auctions resulted in the catalog Vessel-named Markings on United States Inland and Ocean Waterways 1819-1890 published by the Collectors Club of Chicago, later expanded by supplements in the Postal History Journal. This led Milgram to collect this subject which he has continued to do.
He moved to Chicago in 1972 and joined the Collectors Club of Chicago where at present he is the senior member. He won the Newbury medal of the Chicago Philatelic Society two years ago. Membership in the A.P.S. is associated with over 65 articles including two winning the Barbara Mueller Award for best article. Confederate and federal Civil War interest has been strong with membership in the Confederate Stamp Alliance (now Civil War Philatelic Society) and articles in the Confederate Philatelist with several society awards. Western cover interests are held by members of the Western Cover Society where he has written for Western Express. He has won the Helbock prixe of LaPosta twice. But the important society for all types of stamps and covers before 1900 is the U.S. Philatelic Classics Society. He is the stampless cover editor for the Chronicle but writes in many other sections too.
Exhibits at national shows have included many subjects: Express Mail, Civil War stationery with separate exhibits on Lincoln, Fancy Stampless Markings, Registered Mail, Robbed Mail, Louisville & Cincinnati steam covers, Drop letters, Valentines, and Transcontinental Railroad without any championships but mostly gold or large gold awards. However, Dr. Milgram prefers to exhibit his collection in print where a permanent record is created for others to build on. His one personal rule is that an article must have something new to say. There must be a contribution to knowledge.
He has been married to his wife Carol for 40 years and has four sons, each successful in their chosen fields. He is an Emeritus professor of orthopaedic surgery at Northwestern University and has written over 60 medical articles and a two-volume textbook on bone pathology.
Jeffrey Mark Forster, a recently retired attorney based in Los Gatos, California, has been an advanced U.S. collector for nearly 50 of his 76 years. His interest in the 1869 Pictorial Issue goes back to the formation of the 1869 Pictorial Research Associates in 1975, when he joined as member number 24.
Jeff started collecting when his Grandmother Rose gave him a paperback album and a packet of stamps. He moved on to US issues, and landed on the 1869s in around 1975. During this formative period, he was mentored and encouraged by collectors such as Elliott Coulter, Duane Garrett, Bob Paliafito, Len Kapiloff, Robert Siegel, Lou Grunin and Ryohei Ishikawa. He has shared the experience of collecting 1869s alongside Michael Laurence, chief editor of the Chronicle, Steve Walske and the late Jonathan Rose.
Jeff has been a driving force behind the U.S. Philatelic Classics Society, contributing decades of time and effort as a regional vice president, writing articles for the Chronicle, and helping to organize presentations and exhibits for Westpex and other gatherings of U.S. classics collectors.
His Large Gold exhibit of 1869s has evolved from a traditional presentation of stamps and covers to a survey collection of domestic and foreign mails, and then finally into its present form, an in-depth study of how the 1869 Pictorials were used in international mail. It is the product of years of concentrated effort and a serious commitment of resources in a very competitive market.
Since 1981, the 1869 section of the Chronicle has featured 21 articles written by Jeff on a wide range of 1869 topics. He was a major contributor to the 1869 Times, published by the 1869 Pictorial Research Associates, and to the 1869 books published by that group.
In addition to his philatelic interests, he and his wife Sandy are avid art collectors, and Jeff is an accomplished golfer and knowledgeable oenophile.
