One Way to Organize a Collection

At the Washington 2006 ESU meeting, Steve Luster suggested some of the many avenues a Europa collector could explore. One topic that drew a lot of conversation was the Europa Handbook. The first Europa handbook was almost a pamphlet by today’s standards -- a small booklet issued by the ATA in 1962. Still, that was enough to open my eyes to the many possibilities of Europa collecting. I began my collection in 1959, just in time to witness the mega-explosion of issues in the 1960s. It was, however, fairly easy (even for a teenager of limited means) to assemble a “complete” collection of what I now call the Annual Issues. I was using White Ace pages at the time, and that was all they provided spaces for.

Back in the early ‘60s there were a lot of little independent album makers. One of these was AYAL, who produced 3-ring album pages in a style similar to White Ace. AYAL was noted for its clever page layouts, and an ad in Linn’s, showing a sample EUROPA page, really caught my eye. It showed the 1956 Northern Countries issue, and the layout captured the feeling of the stamps. I liked it so much, I’ve stuck with it on my present Lighthouse pages.


That got me thinking that there might be more than what White Ace was offering. Then came the ATA Europa handbook, which included agencies, forerunners and historical Europa, and I was on my way to beginning a very ambitious Europa collection.

The second handbook (called “Special Bulletin #3”, and the one still being offered today in hardcopy form), was much more ambitious. Begun in 1965 and updated through 1974, it was organized by then editor of the Europa News, Ms. Ruth Hellard. It expanded considerably on the original handbook, and the topics were extensively subdivided. The organization was a mixture of subject matter and historical timeline. The idea was to show the connection between the various issues, and to help the collector decide what he or she wanted to collect. The trap in doing this was that some issues can fall into multiple categories. Putting things in several places may be fine for a catalog, but do you really want to organize a collection that way? Unless you buy more than one copy of something, where do you decide to put it?

My solution to this problem was to organize my collection into 5 parts. I came up with this scheme shortly after the second Handbook was released, and it’s served me well. I computerized the listing in 1983 (my first real use of the IBM PC). The database has migrated from PC-File through dBase IV to Microsoft Access, but the layout hasn’t changed very much.

Category I is the core of most Europa collections – the annual issues. Related stamps (such as the 1992 Panama issue, and the recent 50^th anniversary issues, I identify as “Ia”).

Category II is the “Agencies of Europa”, including Council of Europe, ESA, etc.

· IIa is EU proper, from the ECSC to the EU parliament

· IIb is NATO and other military alliances

· IIc is the ERP

Category III is European Cooperation in general. Here is where all those issues that don’t fit neatly into the other categories go. I later subdivided this as follows:

· IIIa is friendship, cooperation, joint efforts, etc.

· IIIb is meetings and conferences of a European nature

· IIIc is European sporting issues

I only broke up IIIa and IIIb because each became so huge, but in so doing I fell into the Handbook trap. For example, many countries (most notably Malta) have issued special postal cards for European stamp exhibits franked with the annual Europa issue. So, where do these belong?

Category IV is Europa Forerunners:

· IVa Prophets or advocates of unity (St. Benedict, Victor Hugo)

· IVb Historical attempts at peaceful unity (Balkan Entente)

· IVc Military attempts (Caesar, Charlemagne)

Collecting every stamp with Churchill or Hitler on it can get ridiculous. I just include enough to tell a story.

Finally, Category V is the Eastern Bloc.

· Va KSZE issues

· Vb Iron Curtain counterparts to Europa (Warsaw Pact, COMECON)

This last Category is a lot of fun to collect, as it is considered way off the beaten path by some. Steve suggested during our meeting that this would be a fascinating area to delve into, and I have found that to be the case. Lighthouse prepared a few printed pages for KSZE issues. These are still offered, but they are far from complete. I prepared a checklist of these in a previous EN years ago. I hope to provide an update soon.

Beginning Exhibitor's Brochure

For anyone interested in exhibiting but not knowing how to, this new brochure, "Getting Started with Philatelic Exhibiting", by John Hotchner of the AAPE will help. He's graciously agreed to allow it to be posted on our web site. Thanks John.

Index for Europa News 2006

The Europa News Index for 2006 is attached in pdf format.

Index_2006.pdf

Welcome from the Treasurer

It's good to see the ESU web site up and running. I'm glad to report that as we near the end of 2006 the Unit is on a very sound financial footing. Member donations play a big part, and this also shows that people are happy with what they are getting. The quarterly EUROPA NEWS and the Europa auctions are both very popular.

I hope to post the beginnings of an article shortly. Thanks again for visiting.

President's Welcome Message

Welcome to the Europa Study Unit Web Site.

I am pleased to announce that the Europa Study Unit web site is up and running. Thanks to support from people like Fran Adams and with the help of members Cuneyt Cuneydi, Caroline Scannell and Dana Roper, the site has become a reality.

As you can see, the site is still in its embryonic stage. In the future, we plan to have past issues of the Europa News, articles and items of interest to collectors of Europa philately. Please let me know what kinds of things you would like to see on our web site.

For now, may I wish you all a joyous holiday season and good health and prosperity in the coming New Year.

Steve Luster

Index for Europa News 2005

The Europa News Index for 2005 is attached in pdf format.

Index_2005.pdf