Scanning of the Quebec Tercentenaries Gets Underway and Steph Hits the Ground Running

Fabio has been with me for just over 2 weeks now, and is learning a lot. I gave him a large lot of British Commonwealth material to sort and catalogue. This was ideal for him as it gives him a chance to learn all about shade differences, perforation measurements, watermarks and so forth. He is asking lots of questions and I think he is slowly finding his way through it.

Steph started on Monday. I put her in charge of organizing some 10 boxes of post 1952 Canadian commemorative issues, which form a large part of my Canadian stock. My son had already rough sorted each box, but it was now time to combine them all so that everything would be in order and the material could now be prepared for listing. Steph has almost finished the sorting after 2 days! She loves the work and is really interested in the modern material, which is fantastic! Her next step will be to ensure that all the paper types and shades are identified, the grading is correct and that everything is ready to scan. It will then be up to her to scan and list the material as she sees fit. I think I will probably have to invest in another laptop, scanner and software program for the scanner.

I have decided to take a break from scanning the Admiral Issue to list the Quebec Tercentenary Issue, as I had been telling my customers for the past two weeks that I was going to start listing it. I figured I had better make good on my promise. I managed to list about 60 lots yesterday, being all the 1903-1911 Edwards that I had bought over the past two weeks, all the 1/2c and all the 1c stamps from the Quebec Tercentenary Issue. I am hopeful that I can finish, or come very close to finishing the issue today, which will give me my late night tomorrow to scan a good number of Admirals. Hopefully by the end of this week I can have the Admirals scanned up to the 8c value. Next week I hope to have the scanning complete by Wednesday or so. Listing will take about 15 days or so - so most of February. I haven't decided yet whether I want to keep listing Canada past 1927, or whether I should start on Nigeria. On the one hand I am building momentum with Canada, but on the other, I know that colonial Nigeria will generate much needed cash flow. I'll have to see how the Admirals and the modern material does I guess.

I will conclude today's post with a glimpse of the issue that I am working on: the beautiful 1908 Quebec Tercentenary Issue:

Queen Mary and George V when Princess and Prince of Wales

Jacques Cartier and Samuel Champlain

Queen Alexandra and King Edward VII

Champlain's habitation in Quebec

Marquis de Montcalm and General Wolfe - both killed at the Plains of Abraham

View of Quebec in 1700

Champlain's departure

Cartier's arrival

In my opinion, these are some of the most beautiful stamps ever printed in Canada - 108 years ago.