AN INTERESTING STORY! YOU WERE LUCKY YOU LIVED WHERE YOU DID. WOULD HAVE BEEN DIFFERENT IF YOU LIVED IN NORTH DAKOTA.
MID 20'S TO MID 50'S WERE THE HEYDAY OF PHILATELY. DID YOU EVER VISIT DAVID F. CHASSEY?
Great story Richaard.
The year was 1937, and I was 14, just starting high school. I lived in the Flatbush section of Brooklyn, NY.
Erasmus High School was just three blocks from my house, and right next to the school was Otto's Stamp Shop, indeed a busy place, especially when school let out. The shop was in the basement, with the entrance fronting on Flatbush Avenue. For some reason at that time, I decided to collect Philippine Islands under US rule, and built a nice collection from Mr. Otto.
I remember coming up the stairs one day in 1938, from the shop, and hearing a lot of noise outside, When I got out, there above me was the Graf Zeppelin lazily heading to Lakehurst, NJ. Although the zepp made several trips to that area, that was the only time that I saw it.
Otto's and Gimbels were the only stores that i went to before WWII. After the war I frequented the famous Nassau Street with wall to wall shops from Park Row for about three blocks. There were ground level stores, one after the other, plus many stores located in the office buildings, including Stanley Gibbons. This was one of my favorite stops, as I basically built my US collection shopping there. My British collection was purchased mostly from Union Stamp Co. I actually shopped all the stores looking for the best buy. Another favorite was Stampazine located, I think, on 42nd Street & 8th Ave. There was a time, in the 1970's when I got a bug in my ear to buy US $5.00 Columbian stamps in mint condition. As they were fairly expensive at that time, I could not spend all my money on them, as I had to feed my family, but I remember buying several, and turning them at a quick profit. My best deal at the time was buying a beauty from Huntington Stamp Shop in Huntington, L.I., NY, and having them call me a couple of days later, and offering me a hundred dollars profit to sell it back to them. It was the best one that I had, but a hundred bucks profit so quickly, was a good deal, so I sold it back to them.
Another adventure with Columbian stamps was buying a collection of them in multiples , from blocks of four to a block of twenty. Values went up to the fifty cent stamp. The only problem with this deal is that all the stamps were mint with no gum. Took me a little while to sell them all at one shot, but I did sell them to a judge in Long Island.
He regummed them and sold them at a big profit.
I lived in Uniondale, L.I. from 1957 to 1989, when I moved to NJ.
Richaard
re: Earliest Stamp Shop I Remember, etc
AN INTERESTING STORY! YOU WERE LUCKY YOU LIVED WHERE YOU DID. WOULD HAVE BEEN DIFFERENT IF YOU LIVED IN NORTH DAKOTA.
MID 20'S TO MID 50'S WERE THE HEYDAY OF PHILATELY. DID YOU EVER VISIT DAVID F. CHASSEY?
re: Earliest Stamp Shop I Remember, etc
Great story Richaard.