There are thousands of varieties of stamps available today for no more and frequently for less than they sold for in 1920.  The sixty years that have elapsed since then haven't made most of the common items of the first eighty years of stamps scarce.  A packet of 1,000 different sold by Scott Stamp and Coin Company nearly seventy years ago for a couple dollars is still worth only a small sum.

What all this means is that scarce and valuable items do the increasing in price.  Common stamps stay common, generation after generation.  There are just too many of them.

On the other hand, the fun of collecting is equally good with all levels of stamps.  If a collector can afford rare items and buys them, he is certainly justified by the pleasure and value he obtains. If he must limit his budget and collect only relatively common material, he can still get all the pleasures that our great hobby grants its followers.

- Earl P. L. Apfelbaum
The Best of Apfelbaum's Corner
Dorrance and Co., 1983

Posted August 7, 2000