My family and I spent a couple of weeks away from home this month, and I’m still playing catch up on letters and emails. One of the pieces of mail that I received right before heading out of town was a note from Purgatory Post’s Scott Abbot, complete with copies of his newest stamp picturing the Loon Island Lighthouse.
Purgatory Post Loon Island Lighthouse stamp
Scott writes that the Loon Island light, one of five functional lighthouses in New Hampshire, was built in the 1890s to aid steamboat traffic on Lake Sunapee. The original structure burned in 1960 after it was struck by lightning, but it was soon rebuilt.
If you follow Purgatory Post at all, you know there’s a new stamp or set of stamps released every month. I wish I could keep up with that kind of schedule for Philosateleian Post, but I do well to get two or three new designs done each year.
Boys Town holiday mailing features four stamp-sized designs
Boys Town has begun their holiday fundraising for the year, and the business reply envelope included in a packet that I received last week has four more preprinted “faux” stamp designs with Christmas themes.
The designs include a wreath and angel (faith), a child at a window (hope), two children in front of a mantel (love), and two children walking along a snowy path (believe).
Boys Town business reply envelope with faux Christmas stamp designs
I think the images used for these particular designs are perhaps a bit busy for the size at which they were printed, but they are colorful and might catch the eye of an average recipient.
Update (2019-10-28)
Upon returning home from a couple of weeks out of town, I found a new Boys Town mailing in my post office box, and inside was another business reply envelope. This cover reuses three of the four preprinted designs from the previous BRE that I received in September, but they are carefully aligned instead of slightly rotated as on the first envelope.
Boys Town business reply envelope with faux Christmas stamp designs
This is the first time that I’ve seen Boys Town reuse any of their faux stamp designs. We’ll have to wait and see if it happens again.
Purgatory Post celebrates 50th anniversary of Abbey Road
On September 3, New Hampshire-based Purgatory Post issued two new stamps celebrating the 50th anniversary of The Beatles’ Abbey Road. One of the stamps features the iconic photo of the band’s four members walking across Abbey Road in London, which was used for the album cover, while the second stamp features an alternate shot that was not used.
Purgatory Post Abbey Road stamps
The stamps are printed in miniature sheets of four using a slightly shiny silver-colored paper. The miniature sheet’s design means it is possible to identify singles as coming from the top pair or bottom pair of stamps based on slight differences in the colors of the corners of each of the four stamps, but as the differences are very minor and there are equal numbers of each variety, that is likely of interest only to specialists.
Purgatory Post Abbey Road miniature sheet
Purgatory Post’s operator, Scott Abbot, notes that although Let It Be was the last album released by The Beatles, Abbey Road was actually the last recorded by the group before they disbanded.
The United States Postal Service has issued more than three dozen stamps in the past three months, so this is a fairly significant update. Based on the release schedule announced for the remainder of this year, at least to this point, I doubt The Philosateleian’s winter supplement will have to add quite so many spaces.
Thank you as always for your interest in my project, and happy collecting!
I received Boys Town’s latest fundraising mailing today, and in addition to a 2020 planner and a couple of other booklets, the packet contained a business reply envelope bearing another new cinderella stamp, this one picturing three birds.
Boys Town business reply envelope with birds cinderella stamp
At first glance, this looks like three individual stamp-sized labels, but closer inspection reveals that what we’re actually seeing is a single horizontal label with three separate stamp-sized designs printed on it.
Boys Town birds cinderella stamp
This is the latest addition to my growing collection of cinderella stamps applied to the organization’s business reply envelopes this year, and I must say that the potential of finding something like this inside does make me look forward to opening envelopes bearing the Boys Town logo or return address.
(I ended up with a spare copy of this cover that is now listed on my shop if you’re interested.)
