Korea Stamp Society

During the Korean War (1950-1953) and for at least a decade after the war South Korea (ROK) was counted amongst the poorest nations in the world. As late as the early 1960s the average Ethiopian or Ugandan was richer than the average South Korean. And yes, even the average North Korean was (probably) richer than […]

Shown here is a military post card used in 1952. The card is a commemorative card, printed to commemorate “Samil Day”. The following extract about Samiljeol is from a 1943 booklet authored by New Ilhan entitled Korea and the Pacific War which was based on a report he prepared for the Office of Strategic Services […]

Two post cards, part of a set commemorating the ROK 1955 Expo. These two post cards were made by the Huimangsa 希望社 · 製 for the industrial exhibition commemorating the tenth anniversary of liberation 解放十週年產業博覽會記念. This refers to August 15, 1945, commemorated in both the ROK and DPRK as the date Korea was liberated from […]

When I was writing my earlier article on New Ilhan (see KP Vol. 57 No. 1), I didn’t even realize I had more envelopes from the New Ilhan company. When I did realize, I looked around for more envelopes from New Ilhan and discovered several other items. All these envelopes must have come from the […]

As I looking through my old Korean Philately magazines in preparation for the KP 70th anniversary issue of the Korea Stamp Society I came across something that I had not noticed before. On the back of a facsimile of the first KP issued on October 1, 1951, I found a summary of the KSS from […]

Despite being mortal enemies, North and South Korea agree on thing: Dokdo, the group of rocks in the middle of the “Sea of Japan” or “East Sea” is Korean and not Japanese. The international name for Dokdo is officially “Liancourt Rocks”, a name often found on maps to avoid offending either Korea or Japan, but […]

In Spink’s auction of 12 January 2020 a rather strange item showed up. No, the type of item is not strange, stamp essays are quite commonly available. Actually, one might even say some essays are too common, just have a look at Willem van der Bijl’s article on the subject of North Korean “artworks” in […]

Here is an envelope that looks like Dr. Hall’s examples but has no space for addresses. I thought it could be intended for monetary donations or possibly for condolence letters placed inside comfort bags. Does anyone know for sure?

The South Korean government has been promoting the digitization of archives for several decades now. This is great for stamp collectors, as highly detailed information on South Korean postal and revenue stamps has come to light thanks to the efforts of South Korean archives. If you can read/write (type) Korean, a lot of information can […]

In the last few issues of KP and on the KSS website we have shown examples of album pages made and/or used by KSS members. Here we show the original KSS album pages, the pages as produced and for years marketed in Korean Philately by our long-time member David Phillips.

In early January 2021 the book “Buddhism on Stamps” was released by the Indian philatelist Mr. Lokeswara Rao (retired Principal Chief Conservator of Forests in Nagaland, India). He spared no efforts in creating his book, as not only does the book come with an introduction by the current Chief Postmaster General, the book also contains […]

Philatelic items directly related to Korea are relatively rare in (international) auctions. Of course, there are these “collections” with albums packed with North Korean stamps from the 1970s and 1980s or the usual South Korean flag sheets and such, but occasionally interesting items do show up. Here are a few examples from two different auction […]