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Today I will present a small selection of stamps from Venezuela...the time frame involved goes from 1872 to 1910, and in my opinion this is another great way to spend your time ! Yes,we will find the influence of ABNC  and above all the omnipresence of Simon Bolivar , not only in the classics but throughout the time...You will see that the first stamps I will present have strange and out of the ordinary characteristics, and that the always agreeable presence of a large amount of [Recess] stamps is a fact....

Let's start with some of the classics...

The first thing we will notice , is that no country label is presented in these stamps...in fact , we see the currency label below the vignette and the word "ESCUELAS" above it... these are Revenue stamps intended to collect funds for the construction and maintenance of Primary Schools..the word itself means "Schools" in Spanish...the stamps present us a portrait of Simon Bolivar and they have no perforation... the next fact to call out our attention is the pen cancellation's.. we have to know that from 1863 to 1870 Venezuela lived a state of Civil War, and these "Escuelas" stamps were used as Postal stamps until 1911 in some of the remote areas of the country...stamps with postal cancellation worth many, many more and all the values we can find in a catalog are just for these pen Cancelled stamps... the real surprise, only detected in a scan or using a magnifying lens , is that below the pen cancellation ,an overprint exists..!!.. in very small letters ,two overlapping lines repeat themselves, with the inferior one inverted... (it is very strange, and I have a scan with 1200ppp, just to see this.)...

This is a scan of the first stamp, all the 3 of them have the same overprint...Now an important point, that is a major distinction between different  issues...

1) are there just one overprint or two identical overprints in the same stamp?'

You will see that this is very important,because it allow us to center our attention in a smaller period of time and in a smaller range of  issues...

2) Does the stamp have a top overprint  saying "Bolivar Sucre Miranda" and a foot overprint saying "Decreto de Abril de 1870" ?

2a) Does the stamp have just a Central overprint saying "Decreto de 27 de Junio de 1870"?

The answers are 1No,2No 2aYes so we can easily see that our stamps are from the 2a issue and now we can say that all the 3 stamps are from the 1872 issue ... [ in this point , SG present us two different Printing Houses , differing mainly in the quality of the impression... ] in my opinion, this impression is good ,but the 2r stamps present a pale color ,a pale red or rose red so the ornaments are not very clear,but in a closer view we see that  all the details are present ..the 1r stamp is deep red or rose...

1872 "ESCUELAS / Simon Bolivar" (15) [Litho] Sc(28a,28a,27)

 I said this before and i'm going to say it again ... For me a good lot of stamps is one that represents well one or more periods of a country's Philately...to find one or more stamps of each one of the most important series of a particular period is something I enjoy very much because it allows me to know some of the history, the design evolution, the incidence of a particular Printing mode , the importance of a Printing company , of an Artist, of a Personality, etc.. I think this Venezuela lot is one of those.. it is very complete and give's me at least a stamp of each of the main series,and that is Wonderful..!! in this case ,i have other 3 stamps, from two other series, and something I can extrapolate immediately is the similarity of these stamps with those of the same US period... Until the 40's we are at  the Venezuela's ABNC period , so it is normal that stamps from the 1880 decade are similar to those issued in the US at the same time..
[CENTER STAMP]   the center stamp is well accomplished,good design ,good engraving and again Simon Bolivar....
 1882 "Simon Bolivar" (5) [Recess (ABNC)] Sc(75)
[LEFT/RIGHT STAMPS] both from the same series from 1882... the stamps are very beautiful and we  have different frames and labels for different values...Now I will invite you to do a small exercise , involving our ABNC talk above...at our right , I show You a US stamp issued in 1882, at the same time that these two stamps were issued... let us look at it and at the 25r orange stamp above...You can see some marked similarities... the single and simple central oval doted frame, the external background, the spacing of the lines, larger in the exterior part of the background, diminishing as we walk to the center, etc.. I think the stamps are somehow identical in their general construction, the basic lines of the design are the same,..it is just 'coincidence' , I'm sure (..??) , so let's end this small conversation...
1882 "ESCUELAS / Simon Bolivar" (8) [Recess (ABNC)] Sc(79,81)

 from 1892 on , an important fact to know is that every stamp with the label "CORREOS" is destined to Foreigner correspondence... others with "ESCUELAS" or "INSTRUCCION" are for inland correspondence...
[LEFT] stamp from a 1893 'CORREOS' series.. another ABNC product with good quality...
1893 "CORREOS/ Simon Bolivar" (5) [Recess (ABNC)] Sc(125)
[Right] a beautiful, beautiful stamp,!!..notice that the portraits used in these 4 last series are the same , with Bolivar looking right and/or left.. the original series with this 'INSTRUCCION' (Education) design is from 1893 but this particular stamp is from 1901,a "New colors" series... I want to talk now of a major , major disagreement between SG and Sc catalogs... Sc catalog tell us and I will quote " After July 1, 1895, stamps inscribed “Escuelas” or “Instruccion” were no longer available for postage" , but SG tell us that "stamps with the inscription 'ESCUELAS' or 'INSTRUCCION' are revenue stamps intended to collect  a tax to defray the cost of state Primary Schools..Until 1911 they were also valid for Postal use in the absence of ordinary stamps, which often happened in the more remote post offices.."... because of this, I have no Sc code, only SG code...
1901 "INSTRUCCION / Simon Bolivar" (9) [Recess (ABNC)] SG(227)

This is a 1896 series ,known for the high quantity of forgeries existent..these stamps present a relatively high cv , when compared with other Venezuelan stamps, so the existence of forgeries is comprehensible... the catalogs tell us that the original paper is thin,semi transparent , very white and the gum is shiny and crackled... when we talk of the papers , these stamps all comply in two of the characteristics : the paper is thin and with some degree of transparency,but none of these stamps have a shiny glue... the yellow 25c stamp has an error in the foot label, and this is normal when we are talking of forgeries, so I think in the best of my options, I could have an original stamp (the 50c rose red),some of them I really don't know and one is fake (25c-- if you notice it is the only one with perfect perforation and limits...)... I present two 50c stamps,because one is red and the other is rose red (SG makes this distinction, not presented in Sc)

1896 "80th Death Anniversary of Gen. Francisco Antonio Gabriel de Miranda" (5) [Litho (Caracas)] Sc(169,...,173)

I think this is the right moment to introduce a piece of history taken from an old SG catalog , where we can see that those were strange and violent days also in Venezuela, with a Civil War happening...

A nice group of stamps , one more time , and after some of the Civil War issues, work of ABNC..the 5c stamp is missing yet..

1904 "General José De Sucre" (6) [Recess (ABNC)] Sc(232,...,236)

also from 1904, a 'Instruccion' stamp, valid for current inland postage...

1904 "Instruccion / Simon Bolivar" (8) [Recess (ABNC)] Sc() SG(318)

This is a stamp from 1905 , from a series commemorating the revolt of 1889 that is described in the text above... at the center of the stamp, President Cipriano Castro is represented ... it is again a commemorative stamp resulting of inside work and not of foreign companies...

1905 "6th Anniversary of General Castro's Revolt of 23 of May 1899" (3) [Litho (Litografia Del Comercio, Caracas)] Sc(246)

A Beautiful stamp celebrating the Independence...

1910 "Centenary of the Independence" (1) [Des (Pablo W. Hernandez)][Recess (ABNC,NY)] Sc(249)

Well, today's post had a small number of stamps , but I exceeded myself in some talking about non essential subjects... but what is done is done, and I need to move on... In a few weeks I will have another post about Venezuela's stamps, starting in 1910 (where I finished this time..) and hopefully with already some new Classic entries (I became a fan of these classic stamps..)

SeeYou