Dane used a Powerpoint presentation of his material, thus allowing us all to see the detail without straining eyes; for the purists much of the original material was also displayed on boards.
Dane explained that he had tried to be a ‘single theme’ collector but was always tempted to diverge by the stamps and covers that came into his collection. As Dane called the display ten collections, I shall describe them separately:
Austria: including an 1890 ‘copy’ of the first stamp, issued in 1860.
Avice de Reception: Dane had worked in a publishing company which received mail where the sender requested notification of receipt, and he showed examples from Syria and Spain.
George VI: Ceylon and KUT stamps because of the attractiveness of the designs, along with some 1937 forged First Day Covers – forged because the dealer had run out of originals!
German 3rd Reich: Examples of Zeppelin stationary – headed airmail paper and the accompanying envelope; a 1932 voting slip for the April 10th national elections, and Allied propaganda postcards.
Parliament: A gallery ticket for the House of Commons; of particular historical interest was a letter and cover from Clementine Churchill to Zurich, where Winston Churchill obtained his artists supplies, and equally rare and interesting was a 1714 autograph of the Duchess of Marlborough from a book flyleaf.
Red Cross: Examples of Prisoner of War mail using the service set up by the International Red Cross in 1914.
Suffolk Mail: Letters from 1877 found in the back of a bureau.
Wurttemberg entires
Stuttgart City Post: Stuttgart was allowed a privately owned city post up to 1900, for local mail only, and the enterprising owner created a range of Silver Jubilee printed stationary
‘3/4’ Size stamps: Again, attractive designs – this time from the start of Queen Elizabeth II and including Gambia and other commonwealth countries.
Dane’s presentation definitely fulfilled the description of ten collections and there was material for every interest in his presentation.