The newly issued 2021 Scott catalog, Vol 4A , has a Korean stamp (Scott804/KPSC639; issued December 1, 1971) for the New Year of 1972 on the cover. The year 1972 was the Year of the (Water) Rat, and this stamp shows two rats flying a kite. However, in the Korean language the word for mouse and rat is identical (it is simply “쥐”), so the stamp designer chose to depict a mouse because mice can be made to look so be much cuter than rats!
Prices are little changed for the vast majority of Korean stamps from last year’s issue. For the 2020 Scott issue, the KSS gave a lot of advice to Amos, the company publishing the Scott catalog series, and its editorial team regarding listings and price information. Especially, Scott updated many issues from the DPRK (North Korea) in the 2020 catalog.
This year Scott took the advice of the Korea Stamp Society and eliminated the price for a “MNH” copy of the 1953 189A, which was used only on postcards. Scott has a note that this 500wn blue stamp was affixed to postcards, so the price they listed “mint”, was for stamps soaked off of the postcards. Therefore the KSS had asked Scott why they had a price for “MNH”, and they agreed and removed that listing in the new 2021 catalog. Prices of legitimately used copies of this stamp are worth far more than mint stamps removed from the postcards.
If you would like to help out in the future with updating catalog listings, for any Korea related catalog, please contact the KSS Chairman Simon Howlett at chair (at) koreastampsociety (dot) org.
