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Almost seventy years ago, in July of 1954, Volume 1, Issue 12, of the Vatican Notes contained the following article: OPENS IN NATIONAL PHILATELIC MUSEUM SEPTEMBER 22, 1954 According to a Press Release received from the National Philatelic Museum, Broad and Desmond Streets, Philadelphia, Pa. the following are the up-to-date details on the Vatican Exhibit to be held this fall:Over the next few days, the VPS Website Team will be presenting excerpts from the book mentioned above, entitled “Vatican” from the National Philatelic Museum. Issued for the exhibition, it serves as a valuable resource for the Marian Exhibition, Vatican and Church history and governance, as well as for Vatican and Roman States philately. The book contains articles contributed by Church officials and historians, as well as many members of the young Vatican Philatelic Society, which was only one year old when this exhibition took place. Perhaps the article of most importance to collectors of Vatican philately is the article written by the first president of the VPS, William Wonneberger, Jr., entitled “Vatican Postage Stamps”. In the article, covering forty-eight pages, he provides in-depth profiles of each Vatican stamp issue from 1929 through 1953. With the permission of the Spellman Museum of Stamps and Postal History, which took ownership of the materials of the National Philatelic Museum on its closure, the VPS has been granted permission to reproduce material from the book, and the Website Team has taken the opportunity to edit Mr. Wonneberger’s article by breaking it into its component sections for each stamp issue. The Team has supplemented the article with digital color copies of the stamps and included images of first day covers for each stamp issue to produce a series of presentations for these earliest and classic Vatican City stamps. Over the next few days, by clicking on the Page 2 tab, the reader can review excerpts from the Team’s work. It provides a look back at the early days of Vatican philately. Some of the articles in this series have presented previously in either the Daily Emails or Page 2 articles, but it was thought that it would be a good idea to consolidate them into a running series over the next few weeks to provide exposure to all the early Vatican issues in chronological order for review and study. The first excerpt from Mr. Wonneberger's article can be accessed by clicking the Page 2 button below. Today excerpt covers the initial set of stamps issued by Vatican City in 1929, which is sometimes referred to as the "Conciliation Issue". As a note, I would encourage each VPS member to click on the link to the issue of Vatican Notes highlighted in this article, and scroll through the eight mimeographed pages of the newsletter from 1954--a different time indeed! It provides a great look back at the early days of our Society, which now dates back over seventy years. The VPS has a grand and storied history which we should be proud to cherish and honor. REFERENCES: |
