Supporting Philatelists Since 1952
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 […]
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Prior to occupation of southern Korea by American forces, the postage used was Japanese. Since the American occupation, and up to the present time, they have continued to use Japanese postage on hand. Importation of additional stamps from Japan was, of course, immediately stopped. No attempt was made to over the postage on hand in […]
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In 1919 the Japanese Posts introduced “Postage Fee Paid” forms. These forms were used to pay for various kinds of mail matter in bulk. The official Japanese postal term was 郵便料金受領証原符 = “Postage fee reception original form” and is imprinted on top. The actual mail items received a circular bisected handstamp in characters “(post office […]
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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 […]
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Marci Jarvis, editor of Cat Mews (which is the magazine of the Cats on Stamps Study Unit) has a question with regards to the postage on this envelope. The Korean Stamp Corporation (KSC) sent it to the then editor of Topical Time, Jerry Husak, the founder of the American Topical Association. On it are a […]
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In an earlier article on 17 August 2019 posted on the Korea Stamp Society’s website, we wrote about the Methodist’s 50th anniversary in Korea. Dr. Sherwood Hall, the creator of Korea’s first Tuberculosis/Christmas and New Year’s seal in 1932 also designed this seal. A number of examples of these seals used on mailings from Korea […]
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For several years (starting in 2018) the KSS has been listing new stamp issues from North Korea. With these new issues the stamp issuing entity of the DPRK, the Korea Stamp Corporation (KSC), always releases a new issue leaflet. This issue shows details of the stamps, while at the same time doubling as an order […]
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Leafing through the catalog of DPRK stamps and analyzing the policy of themes and stories on the stamps, I had several questions. Perhaps you, or other KSS members, can help me with the answer. Starting in 1946 to issue postage stamps with neutral themes (Rosa of Sharon, Diamond Mountains), the postal administration expanded the themes […]
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My question concerns a card that was issued by Chōsen Sotokufu Teishin Kyoku and features a picture of chickens with an inscription in Korean. It appears that the design could have been issued as a New Year greeting. The Teishin Kyoku issued a set of post cards on October 1, 1910 commemorating the opening of […]
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Forgeries have always been a major problem for philatelists. This is perhaps even more true for early Korean materials: the simple fact that early Korean stamps weren’t much collected before the First World War made it quite easy for stamp forgers, especially from Japan, to create forgeries which could fool collectors. Even though often very […]
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The KSS has published a new edition of the KSS magazine, Korean Philately, the fourth KP for 2021! As a member you can download this edition of Korean Philately for free as a PDF. And again, just as was the case with all four issues for 2020, you can own a full-colour magazine-style hard-copy version […]
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