1967Stamps: Hong Kong

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Today and for the first time I have some Hong Kong stamps.. The Portrait definitive stamps of Hong Kong , all obey to a standard design that started with Queen Victoria and continued until Queen Elizabeth.. there are some differences in the stamps of King's Edward VII and George V ( more elaborated design with frame ornaments and vignette with circular form..) , but King George VI and Queen Elizabeth II returned to the initial Queen Victoria's simpler design...

In today's post I will present some stamps of Queen Victoria and others from Queen Elizabeth II.. I leave the King George VI and specially King's Edward VII and George V for other posts because there must be a careful analyses of the Wmk, that in some cases are simply not visible (Chalky paper, again..) ..

First let us talk about the Queen Victoria Hong Kong Series that present this design...there are three main series with normal stamps, without being Surcharged or Overprinted... All this 3 series have perforation 14 , so that is not the distinctive factor here... The watermark plays the most important role in the differentiation of these series... The first series (and also the first Hong Kong series) has no Watermark.. the Second presents us a Crown above two letters (CC) , and the third a Crown and (CA)... the watermarks , in these stamps are clearly visible and it is easy to make the classification of the stamps...

So, I can tell that all the stamps i present are from the Third series (with Wmk Crown above CA...) issued from 1882/1902.. this time frame is the one presented in the Scott Catalog, and I think it is a correct approach because dividing this series into several one's according to the issue date , would be only 'complicating what could be simpler'... well, I only have these 14 stamps to present and 4 of them are spares, but time will come when some of the high values will also be presented .. (Hope is the last one to Die..!)... the last stamp , the 12c troubles me, because it looks much older than it is.. the colors are faded, the stamp is in very bad condition, but it is without doubts from this series... there are many color variations with the presence of different shades, and i think ( by looking to these stamps..) that well centered stamps should have a high increase in their value...

1882/1902 "Queen Victoria" (13) [Typo] Sc(36b,36b,37,37,39,40,40,41,43,43,44,44,45,46)

These are stamps from the Queen Elizabeth II 1st Definitive Series issued in 1954...this first group present us the values i have to show ... all of these stamps are spares , because I already had this series classified.. it is a relatively simple series without any kind of 'hot spot'... there are many different shades for each color...

These are some of the spares , but they don't have any special interest, but I have to show them...I must say that I can only rely on the Scott world catalog to classify this series, because my SG Commonwealth ends with the reign of George VI...so, it is possible that I actually missed 'some of the action' in this series... Anyway, I like to keep large number of stamps from definitive series from any country and in a near future more specialized catalogs are on the way, so I will take another close look to them...

1954/1960 "Queen Elizabeth II" (14) [Typo] Sc(185,186,187,188,189,190,191,192,194,196)

This is a stamp from the 1978 25th Anniversary of the coronation of Queen Elizabeth , where the simplicity of the original Queen Victoria Design is again used , resulting in a very beautiful stamp.

1978 "25th Anniversary of the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II" (2) [Litho] Sc(347)

For the last part of this post , I choose to present my KGVI Kenya, Uganda & Tanganyika stamps...two common design series (The Silver Wedding and the Coronation series) and the 1938/1954 Various Designs series...

Sometimes , the unexpected happens...this morning , I was finishing the classification of the 38/54 series , when my scanner ended..!! it just ended!! it started to make strange noises and it doesn't work anymore...the sh values remain unclassified and without scans, so I promise that next week (I hope a new scan has arrived...) in the beginning of the post, I will show these stamps that are missing today...

All these [Recess] Printed stamps from KGVI are really excellent stamps.. Good engraver works, good designs , excellent printings, overall Above average Works..! As I said before these two series at right and left are common Designs and are used in many of the colonies, Protectorates and Empire Territories in general...
[Left] 1937 "Coronation Series" (3) [Recess (De La Rue)] Sc(60,...,62)
[Right] 1948 "Silver Wedding Series" (1) [Photo (De La Rue)] Sc(92)

The stamps of the series 1938/1954 present the same designs as those used in the KGV series of 1935, but with the portrait of KGVI... This is a series with some difficulties when we talk of it's classification.. there are many different perforations, there are mistakes, varieties , etc.. ( I don't present any of these 'picture' varieties because I don't have any of them in these sgroup of stamps...) these stamps I have to show could have different perforations and dates of issue... however I will gather those stamps that are similar

I will show the stamps one by one, because they are really beautiful and because these were the last scans of my EPSON SX230...