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The catalog is attempting to document in a complete
fashion, all commemorative events that were memorialized by some
type of philatelic item. That includes all dated commemorative
events, postage stamp issues, first flights, and other events of
a philatelic nature. This clearly includes postal covers of any
type. It also includes maximum cards, souvenir sheets, and
booklets (although the vast majority of these were also
documented with covers) and a somewhat unique Carte Souvenir
issued in South Viet-Nam. More recently a different expression
of a philatelic commemorative event was offered to the market -
that being the South Viet-Nam "souvenir pages".
At
present I am not including "slogan" markings, unless
there is a date reference, but that is a natural extension to
the basic catalog information.
The catalog is being prepared in CD-ROM format (two
CD's priced at US$45.00 plus postage) and in printed-paper
loose-leaf format to aid in inserting modifications in the
future. Both color and black & white paper editions will be
produced.
When
I started collecting the philatelic material of South East Asia,
I included the varied, colorful, and numerous First Day Covers (FDC's)
of South Viet-Nam. As time passed, I extended this collecting
interest to all of the countries of what once was French
Indo-China. I discovered the practice of commemorating events,
not only postage stamp issues, was wide spread during the French
Indo-China Government period, including the war years, and
subsequently until the current time. For reasons not fully
understood (although the size of the market certainly was an
influence), the majority of early commemorative material was
produced in what is now Viet-Nam, with a scattering of material
from other population centers in Cambodia and Laos. Forgeries
are also included.
This catalog is a project long delayed and I believe
very timely. Further, I believe that such a publication is long
overdue for our mutual collecting area. I solicit and welcome
your comments and suggestions, and wish to establish a dialog on
various improvements and suggestions. I believe this is a great
opportunity to solicit other collector feedback and
contributions.
The catalog contains over 1000 pages, with many
hundreds of commemorative markings, and thousands of covers. The
images are scanned a resolution of 300 bpi, and in full color
and are presented at approximately 45% of actual size. The
detailed handstamps and cancels are scanned as required to allow
for the necessary details and are presented larger than actual
size. The catalog is in Adobe Portable Document Format (PDF) and
contains a full word index.
Each country and year of this catalog is a
distinct section for ease of production, updating and
distribution. The sections available are:
1.
French Indo-China (1862 - 1948)
2.
State of Viet-Nam (1949 - 1955)
3.
Republic of Viet-Nam (1955 - 1975)
4.
Kingdom of Cambodia and Khmer Republic (1950 - 1975)
5.
Kingdom of Laos (1950 - 1975)
6.
Democratic Republic of Viet-Nam (1941 - 1976)
7.
N.L.F. of South Viet-Nam (1963 - 1976)
Generally,
listings terminate in 1975 as a result of the change of
government control and the installation of communist
governments. The exception is Sections 6 (Democratic Republic of
Viet-Nam) and 7 (N.L.F. of South Viet-Nam) that continue through
the unification of Viet-Nam in 1976.
Identification and numbering are always difficult
issues to address successfully in a new checklist or catalog.
With the number system of “Scott Standard Postage Stamp
Catalogues” copyrighted, use of that identification system is
subject to licenses and potential fees. As this is a catalog of
commemorative markings, which by their very nature represent
dates, and events with dates, I decided on a non-numerical
sequence identification system. Entries are identified by the
commemorative date (in the international date format of,
two-digit day, three-character month abbreviation, and
four-digit year,) with an alphabetic suffix for different and
distinct items, i.e. 10Mar1942A. In this fashion, revisions are
easily accommodated, and new material can be added without
renumbering adjacent items.
Items
will use a suffix to the date format of DDMmmYYYY:
CS for “Carte Souvenir”,
FD for First Day Cover,
FF for First Flight Cover,
MC for Maximum Card,
PS for Official and Unofficial
'Presentation Sheets',
SB for Souvenir Booklet,
SE for Special Event,
SS for Souvenir Sheet, and
SP for Souvenir Page.
Different
hand-stamps, cancellation designs or cachets will be listed with
an alphabetic suffix, i.e. A, B, C, etc |