Philosateleian Post postmark and cancellation changes

As you may have noticed if you’ve received any mail from me this year, some of Philosateleian Post’s postal markings have changed.

First, the familiar five-barred cancel with a “P” in a circle is no more. The rubber handstamp, which I commissioned during my senior year of college, began to show signs of its age when a piece of the circle broke loose, and the rubber eventually crumbled more or less completely. I carved a couple of different cork cancels which I’ve begun using. Long term, I would like to get a couple of pieces of solid cork since it would give a more distinct impression, but first things first.

Second, at some point in December I began using a different format for Philosateleian Post’s date stamp. It now follows a year-month-day order rather than month-day-year; e.g., 16/04/18 instead of 4/18/16. I suppose there are probably historical reasons for the use of month-day-year in the United States, but as a computer tech, year-month-day appeals to me because computer files so named are automatically in the right order when sorted alphabetically. At any rate, if you’ve been trying to figure out the new date format, that’s it in a nutshell.

Published 2016-04-17