Monthly talk: Robin Buchanan – A most underrated pastime
Our speaker at the March monthly meeting was Robin Buchanan from the Dawlish Stamp Club. In advance of the meeting, Robin ‘warned me’ that to give a talk on stamp collecting might not prove to be the most attractive proposition for many members, and so he promised to offer something rather different, blending his enthusiasm for collecting stamps with his own family history. This proved to be fascinating.
Robin’s early childhood was spent in Nova Scotia in Canada. This part of the world is relatively unknown to most of us but from seeing the photographs and stamps he showed us, I suspect that it will not be too long before some u3a members will be heading there. Lunenburg, the town where he lived with his family, and indeed the very school he attended, appear on many Canadian stamps. It is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Halifax and other towns, significant buildings, the maritime history of the province and other aspects of life appear on Canada’s stamps and connect Robin with this period of his life.
His very large family (both his paternal grandfathers had eight siblings each and so he has had a great many great aunts and uncles and cousins) have lived in all parts of the world, and so his family received a great many letters all adorned with postage stamps from many countries. These obviously sparked an interest from an early age, and showed him what we can learn from studying them.
He found that stamps, in addition to giving basic information about the country of origin, cost of postage etc are an opportunity for a nation to present to the rest of the world something of its history, wildlife, geography, culture, significant events, major personalities and ideas about themselves. We can learn a great deal from studying them as well as just enjoying what are often beautiful miniature works of art.
His family’s connections with South America are extensive and include Argentina, Chile and Bolivia. Robin showed us photographs of his family’s late home near the large inland port of Rosario which is depicted on a number of Argentine stamps.
Stamps are often fascinating in themselves but can also have additional, occasionally contestable, messages for those who see them. Many countries use stamps to make political points, and that was certainly the case in the 1930s when Bolivia and Paraguay were at war with each other. Both countries issued stamps which showed maps of the area with their own country ‘owning’ the disputed territory of the Chaco. Before 1910 almost all of Chile’s stamps showed Christopher Columbus despite the fact that Columbus never had any contact with the country. Chile also produced stamps which asserted their claim to distant Easter Island even though there was no evidence of any relationship with that island. Argentina has often produced stamps asserting Los Malvinas as Argentine territory rather than, as the UK would maintain, they are the British Falkland Islands.
Robin talked about the many reasons why some people collect stamps. It might be the thrill of the chase, a particular interest in one country or a theme, some are obsessed with details of post marks while others are interested in rarity and stamps’ investment value. In some countries such as China, there is considerable interest in collecting stamps, and this is likely to continue. For Robin it is clearly the links with his own family story and experiences which motivates him.
Many people are drawn to collecting stamps in their 50s and beyond, and it is never too late to get involved. After the meeting, I showed Robin several volumes of stamps which I have had in my own loft, both from my father and my own childhood. He is looking through them to see if there are any stamps of interest to other collectors. If so, I would rather they were enjoyed by a knowledgeable collector than remaining unappreciated in my loft. However, as I looked through them, I found that I was being attracted into the world of stamp collecting, and perhaps listening to Robin’s talk will rekindle my interest.
John Vick