Liberia and the London Philatelist publication

The things you get up to in lockdown!

The Royal Philatelic Society has put back copies of its London Philatelist publication online.
You have to be a paid up member to see some of these but those out of copyright (pre-1930) are publicly available

For my own interest I've gone through the publication from 1892 to 1930 noting all items that mentioned Liberia - a surprisingly high number. Some simply note new issues, some comment, some report prizes awarded etc, some make derogatory comments!.

In case it's of interest to anyone else I've attached the pdf file here.

Comments

  • Thanks Mik!

    This is excellent!!! Lots of good nuggets of information. I really appreciate your effort.

    We, as a society, need to do more efforts like this.

    Cheers, Bryant (FRPSL)
  • Bryant

    thanks. Happy to help. There are some interesting snippets

    It's interesting to see how complimentary they were about several of the early designs

    Also, the very last item refers to the auction of a small number of early Liberia that fetched the equivalent in today's money of around £10,000


  • Interesting.

    It's funny to see that so many Liberian stamp issue productions are limited to only 5,000 to 10,000 stamps. When most "normal" collected stamps were produced in the millions...

    We are a rare breed. I'm amazed so many stamps survived.
  • Bryant
    out of curiosity, where do you get your information about issue numbers?

    I agree about the issue of stamps surviving. Having worked and lived in Liberia in the 70's and seen conditions then I'm surprised there are any stamps around from the early issues.

    I've also been puzzled as to why Liberia collecting isn't more popular, particularly in the US with its African-American history

  • Another resource worth plundering is the digital archive of The Collectors Club Philatelist: https://www.collectorsclub.org/ccp/search-the-collectors-club-philatelist/
    Not that many articles on Liberia, and some of them will look familiar because they were republished elsewhere, but there are also some key articles with topics not covered in the LPS Journal.
    Below is the list of full articles I found searching for "Liberia". Of course there is more, ads etc.
  • Mik,
    Check out Cockrell's booklet #25, Appendix C. He lists the Waterlow archive information, dates - values - orders - production. I now have the bulk of all these sheets.

    I am amazed that there is so little interest in Liberian history in the USA. I think it is a fascinating subject, as Liberia was an American colony.
  • Bryany

    technically not quite a colony as it was set up by the US as an independent republic for freed slaves

    Ironically, the local African population was displaced to make room for the freed slaves who were shipped across. When I was there in the 70s there was a big distinction between Americo-Liberians (who controlled the wealth and the politics) who could trace their descent from freed slaves and native Liberians who couldn't

  • Yes, even going back to the earliest days, all people in power had a part white heritage.
  • Mik,

    Attached is a scan of a book written on 1833 describing the settling of Liberia. Fascinating read. Something like 200+ pages.

    Cheers
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