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 Stamp collecting is the collecting of postage stamps and related objects, such as covers (envelopes, postcards or parcels with stamps affixed). It is one of the world's most popular hobbies, with estimates of the number of collectors ranging up to 20 million in the United States alone. .png) Pigeon post is an obsolete method of sending messages by using homing pigeons. The method was used from antiquity until the early 20th century. The use of' homing pigeons to carry messages is as old as the ancient Persians from whom the art of training the birds probably came. The Greeks conveyed the names of the victors at the Olympic Games to their various cities by this means. Before the telegraph this method of communication had a considerable vogue amongst stockbrokers and financiers. The Dutch government established a civil and military system in Java and Sumatra early in the 19th century, the birds being obtained from Baghdad. The pigeon post which was in operation while Paris was besieged during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870–1871 is probably the most famous. Barely six weeks after the outbreak of hostilities, the Emperor Napoleon III and the French Army of Chalons surrendered at Sedan on September 2, 1870. The normal channels of communication into and out of Paris were interrupted during the four-and-a-half months of the siege. With the encirclement of the city on 18th September, the last overhead telegraph wires were cut the next day, and the secret telegraph cable in the bed of the Seine was located and cut on 27th September. For an assured communication into Paris, the only successful method was by the time-honoured carrier-pigeon, and thousands of messages, official and private, were thus taken into the besieged city. Pigeons were regularly taken out of Paris by balloon. Soon a regular service was in operation, based first at Tours and later at Poitiers. The first despatch was dated 27th September and reached Paris on 1st October, but it was only from 16th October, when an official control was introduced, that a complete record was kept. Major-General Donald Roderick Cameron, Commandant of the Royal Military College of Canada in Kingston, Ontario from 1888–1896, recommended an international pigeon service for marine search and rescue and military service. A pigeon post between look-out stations at lighthouses on islands and the mainland at the citadel in Halifax, Nova Scotia provided a messenger service from 1891 until it was discontinued in 1895.  A magnifying glass is a convex lens which is used to produce a magnified image of an object. The lens is usually mounted in a frame with a handle though other designs are produced. A magnifying glass works by creating a magnified virtual image of an object behind the lens. Stamp collectors frequently use magnifying glasses to inspect their stamps. This photograph shows the magnified image of the Deutsche Post 1 Reichsmark stamp issued on May 12 1946.  Henry Bishop (1611–1691) was Postmaster General of the United Kingdom and inventor of the first postmark used on mail. In 1660, at The Restoration, Henry Bishop paid £21,500 per year to farm the Post Office for a term of seven years. Bishop was the first officially appointed Postmaster General to Charles II but within a year of taking office he was accused of abuses. Bishop gave up the remainder of his lease to Daniel O'Neill. The "Bishop Mark" which take his name, introduced in 1661, was designed to show the date on which a letter was received by the post and to ensure that the dispatch of letters would not be delayed. There is a discussion about getting more people involved in Philately on Wikipedia. Join the discussion and share your thoughts here.
WikiProject Philately organizes the development of articles relating to philately. The collaboration focuses on one article at a time until they can proudly put that article up as a featured article candidate. This will last until they have run through a pool of "featurable" articles, then they will use a time-based system. Currently there is one philatelic featured article, if you can help with another candidate, please do so. For those who want to skip ahead to the smaller articles, the WikiProject also maintains a list of articles in need of improvement or that need to be started. There are also many red inked topics that need to be started on the list of philatelic topics page.  ... that the first Penny Post was established in London in 1680 by William Dockwra nearly 200 years before the better known Uniform Penny Post that was part of the postal reforms of 1839 and 1840 in Great Britain. ... that Czesław Słania (1921-2005) is the most prolific stamp engraver, with more than 1,000 post stamps for 28 postal administrations? ... that a forerunner is a postage stamp used during the time period before a region or territory issues stamps of its own? ... that the Royal Philatelic Society is the oldest philatelic society in the world, founded in London in 1869? ... that Marcophily is the specialised study and collection of postmarks, cancellations and postal markings applied by hand or machine on mail? ... that Non-denominated postage are postage stamps that do not show a monetary value on the face? ... that the Daguin machine was a cancelling machine first used in post offices in Paris in 1884? ... that the first airmail of the United States was a personal letter from George Washington carried on an aerial balloon flight from Philadelphia by Jean Pierre Blanchard?  The Inverted Swan, a 4-pence blue postage stamp issued in 1855 by Western Australia, was one of the world's first invert errors. Technically, it is a "frame invert". In 1854, Western Australia issued its first stamps, featuring the colony's symbol, the Black Swan. The 1d black was engraved in Great Britain by Perkins Bacon while other values, including the 4d blue, were produced in Perth with different frames around the swan design for each value. In January 1855, additional 4d stamps were needed. When the printing stone was brought out of storage it was found that two of the impressions had been damaged, so they had to be redone. One of the replaced frames was tilted; the other was accidentally redone upside-down. Ninety-seven sheets were printed before the mistake was discovered and corrected, resulting in a total of 388 errors being printed.The errors went unrecognized and unreported for several years and only 15 complete copies, plus a part of a stamp in a strip of three, have survived. Fundamentals of Philately. American Philatelic Society. 1990 revised ed.. ISBN 0-9335-8013-4. Hornung, Otto (1970). The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Stamp Collecting. Hamlyn. ISBN 0-600-01797-4. World History Stamp Atlas. pub: Black Cat. 1991 reprint. ISBN 0-7481-0309-0.
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