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If there is a graphic record of Mexican culture, where all heroes and distinguished men and women are included, from Hidalgo to Cárdenas, Sor Juana and Juan Rulfo; where there is proof of the deeds and events in the life of our country; where all important aspects are mentioned, from architecture to history, science and art, all the way to sports and flora and fauna, as well as Mexico’s contribution to the modern concert of nations, we would find it beautifully rendered in the philatelic collection of Mexico’s postal stamps.
The Mexican Postal Service has issued more than 3,600 original postage stamps, including permanent and commemorative series that make the pages of our history especially richer and form part the history of Mexico itself. Stamp collecting as a hobby, pursuit or pastime was born out of the need to establish a paid postage system prior to delivery that revolutionized postal activities and opened up the possibility for every country to keep a great graphic record. The terms postage and stamp are used indistinctly to name this tiny piece of paper, which when placed on a letter, validates payment and takes it away to the entire world with a message of friendship and goodwill from the sending country.
Before 1840 and all the series of innovations introduced to the postal world by Rowland Hill, the payment of mail services was charged to the person receiving the mail and not the sender, as we do today. If you were sent a letter, you had to pay if you really wanted to receive it; if you didn’t pay your package or letter would remain at the postal office, to everybody’s disadvantage.
Rowland Hill, headed what is called in Great Britain the Great Postal Reform as director of the English Post in the second half of the nineteenth century by giving postal activities a great thrust supported by a new modern mode of communication based on the invention of steam power. It was during this time when the Mexican Postal system grew and became connected to the world postal network, making it necessary to permanently update operational and administrative postal systems.
With the establishment that the payment of delivery of mail and parcels be carried out by the sender and not the person receiving the mail item, and with a new standardized prices introduced in every country, the first postage stamps started to appear officially. The first postage stamp in history was issued in May of 1840 in England which displayed the profile of a young Queen Victoria in a black backdrop, reason why it is called “Penny Black”, with a face value of one penny. In 1830, Brewster, an English bookseller devised the first “envelope” giving letters their current image. “Post cards” appeared in 1869 with the signing of a decree by the Austrian Postal Director, Baron Adolph Maly, which reduced postage charges on this particular kind of mail. Post cards acquired great popularity as postal art essentials for brief postal messages with the advent of Art Noveau.
Decree of 1856
Sixteen years after the first postage stamp was issued in England, Mexico issued the first printing of postage stamps by decree on February 21, 1856, during the office of President Ignacio Comonfort. These stamps portrayed Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla’s effigy and were put in circulation on August first of that same year. The design and engraving was carried out on joined white paper of varying thickness by don José Villegas, a deft and celebrated draftsman who was in charge of the Government’s Bureau of Stamps and Printings.
The original stamps were printed in sheets of sixty, in rows of 10 by 6 and were cut with scissors by hand. Hidalgo’s bust is framed by an oval with the legend “Correos de Méjico” on the top and its face value at the bottom: half, one, two, four and eight reales. Different color ink used for printing it helped differentiate price: blue, orange, green, red and lilac, respectively.
Drawing together thousands of persons around the world, the enjoyment of stamp collecting first started in England only a year after the first “Penny Black” was issued. John E. Gray, an official at the British Museum, was the first person to collect postage stamps with some sort of methodology. By 1860, stamp collecting gatherings were being held in Paris and London. A year later, John Berger Levraut made his catalogued collection public and again on that same year, Alfred Poutiquet published the first work considered a predecessor of modern catalogues with the title “A Catalogue of Postage Stamps Issued in the Different Countries of the Globe”.
In 1862, Jean Baptiste C. Moens, a Belgian bookseller produced another crucial piece of stamp collecting: “A Collector’s Guide to Stamp Collecting”. With the help of these publications, stamp collecting slowly popularized and in 1922 the Royal Academy of the Spanish Language admitted the word “filatelia” in its dictionary.
The importance of stamp collecting in the world can be measured quantitatively through the following data: 250,000 stamps were printed in the period between 1918 and 1979 and according to the Universal Postal Union, from 1979 to the present time more than 300,000 stamps have been issued.
Issuance and printing postage stamps has become an important business for some countries and in some cases, one single stamp that is considered unique or special can fetch high prices.
The art of stamp collecting, more than a hobby or a simple pastime, but a passion for collecting, for scrutinizing and for knowledge, requires discipline and consistency. Anyone who seriously follows this pursuit will see his efforts rewarded by gaining full grasp of his collection and by sharing it with his friend, children and their offspring.
Stamp collecting in Mexico as a leisure activity has not grown as much as collectors would desire or at the same rhythm as Mexico issues its stamp collections. This has not been an obstacle for Mexico to have real graphic art masterpieces and very localized representative printings that mark a milestone in the history of Mexico. Some fine examples include the stamp that depicts Cuauhtémoc, the last Aztec emperor, with a face value of 30 cents; one with a bas relief from the ruins of Bonampak, Chiapas, with a face value of 50 cents; and one that portrays the Feather Dance of Oaxaca with a face value of 10 cents. All of them from the air mail permanent series on Architecture and Archeology issued between 1950 and 1953.
The most shrew collectors classify Mexican philately in four distinct eras: The Classical Age (1856-1883) ; the Antique Age (1884-1910); the Revolutionary Age (1910-1923) and the Modern Age (1924 to present).
The first attempt at establishing previous postage charges and the subsequent stamps was in 1852 when don Mariano Arista was President of Mexico and don Guilloermo Prieto Secretary of the Treasury. Unfortunately this was not achieved until the year of 1856 (mentioned above), by the same don Guillermo Prieto who was by then Chief Administrator at Correos. Since then to our present times, some stamps that are worth mentioning other than the initial Hidalgos are: the eagles and Maximilanos from the Second Empire; the Hidalgo medallions in blue and green worth 5 and 10 pesos; the 1899 eagle worth 50 cents 1 and five pesos printed in England by Bradbury Wilkinson & Co.and all the wide assortment of themes and designs addressed by El Correo. Mexican stamp making has gone from copper to steel plates, to hollow engraving and offset to the new and innovative computer techniques that render Mexican philately one of the most beautiful and varied in the world. |