MAY-JUNE 2015 Issue # 427

To celebrate 60 Years of Europa

Stamps PostEurop decided that the

motif would be “Think Green” to

emphasize concern for the environ-

ment. They also decided to go for a

common design once again, and

held a contest for best design. The

winner was recently announced on

the PostEurop website.

The design, from Cyprus Post artist

Ms. Doxia Sergidou, was chosen

from 24 entries. Posta Slovenije and

Magyar Posta followed in second

and third place respectively. When

asked about the concept of the de-

sign, Ms. Sergidou explains that

“the main purpose was to show that

it is in our hand to create a greener

planet. Thus, I have placed a hand

on the top side of the stamp which

basically represents any one of us,

actively replacing the grey color

(the environmental pollution) with

the green color which symbolizes

environmental living and hope, and

in turn inspire us for a better world.

“The left side of the stamp repre-

sents the polluted side and is paint-

ed grey showing us the tremendous

disaster caused by the industries,

automotive vehicles, power genera-

tion and inefficient waste. It also

shows how the human activities are

negatively influencing the environ-

ment.”

One wonders why such an activity

wasn’t undergone 10 years ago for

the 50th anniversary, but that’s a

moot point now. What remains is

the question of how the participat-

ing PostEurop countries will choose

to interpret the chosen design. Will

they play it straight and use the

gray/green colors, or will they liven

it up a little? Will they have that

option?

Meanwhile, below is the 2nd place

design, from Slovenia. Hopefully,

the other entrants’ designs will be

released so that we can all see what

the options were. ■

“In contrast,” Ms. Doxia continued,

“the right side of the stamp — the

green side — shows us how using

renewable energy resources, acting

in a more environmental way and

becoming more environmentally

aware, could positively affect the

environment. This will not only have

a positive effect in our generation,

but it will also help the future ones

to co-exist in harmony.”

Luckily, those air turbines appear to

be idle, or that flock of birds might

not have made it through.

Think Green: Europa 2016 Common Design Revealed

WHAT'S IN THIS ISSUE

ARTICLES DEPARTMENTS

Best Stamp Design: sepac 2014 6 Catch-Up ………….…………………….. 6,10

Europa 2016 Common Design ….. 1 Editor's Page...…..…...….………..… 15

Europa QSL Cards ……………….….. 14 Europa Briefs …………………………. 10

Europa Proponent - Jan Nowak 8 Forward Calendar ………….………. 8

European Monument Year …..… 11-13 New Issues: EUROPA 2015 ……….…. 2-6

The Rosetta Mission ……..……….. 9 New Issues: General ……………….. 7

TheTynwald Tapestry ……..……….. 16 New Issues: with Scott #s …..……. 8

FEATURE

Europa Auction #131 Insert

MAY-JUNE 2015 427-2

New Issues

Europa 2015 ~ Old Toys

v = value(s) ms= mini-sheet ss = souvenir sheet

Spanish ANDORRA 1v

Issue date 23 April 2015

Photo of a piece in the collection of

the Toy Museum of Catalonia.

SPAIN 1v self-adhesive

Issue date 23 April 2015

“A model of a wooden train, which

incorporates a light scent of pine” — Spanish Post

FRANCE 1v

Issue date 4 May 2015

NETHERLANDS 2v se-tenant in a ms of 3 sets (shown)

Issue date 28 April 2015 A companion sheet of “Modern Toys” was also issued (shown to the right)

SWITZERLAND 2v Issue date 7 May 2015

The illustration in Swiss Post indicates that they are printed se-tenant

“rocking duck”

“old tricycle”

AUSTRIA 1v

Issue date 6 May 2015

Matador is a wooden toy set, in-

vented in 1899 by Austrian engi-

neer Johann Korbuly for his three

young sons. Wooden blocks are

precision cut to a single size and

shape and are held together with

sticks. Since 1997, 97% of all Mata-

dor construction sets have been

made in Austria from hardwood

sourced from native forests.

— info taken from the Matador website

MONACO 1v

Issue date 11 May 2015

MAY-JUNE 2015 427-3

MONTENEGRO 1v in a ss Issue date 10 April 2015

The stamp is issued as a ss of just one stamp as shown, and in sheets of 8 stamps plus label

New Issues

Europa 2015 ~ Old Toys

v = value(s) ms= mini-sheet ss = souvenir sheet

ISLE OF MAN 1v Issue date 10 April 2015

The 1v is from a set of 10 stamps

commemorating the millennium

of Tynwald tapestry (see last

page); one other value is the

sepac issue. The Europa stamp is

available by itself in a mini-sheet

of 10 stamps (shown below). Both

the Europa and sepac stamps are

included in the second of two sheetlets (which include

the second five of the 10-stamp set) shown cropped

below under the Europa mini-sheet.

GUERNSEY 2v from a set of 6

Issue date 10 April 2015

The theme is “Toys of the

British Royal Family”: the

Europa stamps feature

Prince Charles’ toy car

(c.1950) and a Teddy Bear

from the Royal Nursery.

Each is available in a spe-

cial sheet of 10 stamps

(shown below). Guernsey

Post describes the com-

plete set as Europa, but

only these two values have

the Europa logo.

The complete set of 6 stamps is shown below. The sepac

stamp is not among them, which says that another long

set may still be on the way.

MAY-JUNE 2015 427-4

New Issues

Europa 2015 ~ Old Toys

v = value(s) ms= mini-sheet ss = souvenir sheet

SWEDEN 2v in a ss Issue date 26 March 2015

Update from previous issue. The Volvo sedan in the middle is from the early 1950s, and looks somewhat like a 1947 Ford. Or maybe not.

SLOVENIA 2v

Issue date 29 May 2015

SERBIA 2v

Issue date 16 April 2015

MOLDOVA 2v

Issue date 15 April 2015

ROMANIA 2v Issue date 17 April 2015

Issued in mini-sheets of 6 stamps each, and in 2 sheetlets (souvenir sheets) of 2 sets each, one of which is shown below. The sheetlets are the same except that the pattern alternates.

Note: Since the sheetlets are virtually identical, Light-house usually provides a space for just one of the two sheets.

SLOVAKIA 1v

Issue date 5 May 2015

MAY-JUNE 2015 427-5

New Issues

Europa 2015 ~ Old Toys

v = value(s) ms= mini-sheet ss = souvenir sheet

BOSNIA HERZEGOVINA (Serb Post) 2v + book-

let pane (shown) Issue date 17 April 2015

The single stamps are issued separately in sheets of 8 stamps with a central label. The booklet stamps (shown) are issued se-tenant with different perforations

Note: Lighthouse has consistently provided a space for each variety—sheet stamps and a complete booklet pane.

BOSNIA & HERZEGOVINA (Croat Post) 2v se-

tenant printed in a a ms of 2 sets and a ms of 4 sets with center labels (shown). Issue date 5 April 2015

BELARUS 2v se-tenant in a ms of 4 sets and in a ms

of 1 set (shown) Issue date 13 April 2015

BOSNIA HERZEGOVINA 2v + souvenir sheet Issue date 17 April 2015 The single stamps are issued se-tenant in sheets of 10 stamps (5 sets) and booklet panes of 6 stamps (3 sets). They are also issued in a souvenir sheet, shown below.

MAY-JUNE 2015 427-6

AZERBAIJAN 2v + ss

Issue date 6 March 2015

The 2v are also availa-ble as a booklet pane of 4 se-tenant sets, shown be-low the sou-venir sheet

Sepac 2014

Best Stamp Design

The votes are in and the winner of the best design

for 2014 is Aland, with 35% of the votes.

Second place went to Iceland

and 3rd place went to Malta.

New Issues

Europa 2015 ~ Old Toys

v = value(s) ms= mini-sheet ss = souvenir sheet

Catch Up I

ROMANIA 1v issued in 2 mini-sheets of 5v

+ label, and a ss of 1v. Issue date 20 November 2014

Commemorating 25 years since the Revolution of De-cember 1989 and the fall of Communism in Romania

Auction # 131 ! Look for it in the Insert section.

MAY-JUNE 2015 427-7

New Issues

LATVIA 1v

Issue date 6 January 2015

Latvian Presidency of the EU

Council

Only the EU Council, on behalf of all

Member States, has the right to

enter into agreements with third

countries and international organi-

zations. Presidency is on a rotating

basis of 6 months, regardless of

member size. Latvia was preceded

by Italy, and will hand over to Lux-

embourg in July.

SPAIN 2v

CROATIA 2v

Issue date 31 March 2015

Artistic and Cultural Values —

Bobbin Lace Joint Issue

The post office description says

“stamp” (singular) but the illustra-

tion appears to be two stamps se-

tenant.

From Spanish Post:

“Croatia has a rich history of needle

lace and bobbin lace making. The

tradition is particularly strong in the

town of Lepoglava, in the north-

west, where an international lace

fair is held each year. The piece

shown on the stamp was produced

by Danica Brösles, who is famous in

her country.

“There is evidence of Spanish lace

dating back to the late 15th-early

16th century, when skilled hands

created a native style known as

"punto español". The lace from Se-

ville depicted on the stamp was

made by Cándida García, a teacher

who created new models based on

those produced in Andalusia since

the 17th century, known as twelve-

bobbin lace. Patterns were pro-

duced for each customer, used only

once and signed by the creator.”

KYRGYZSTAN

Kyrgyz Express Post 1v Issue date 18 November 2014

Airbus A320-200

From the Kyrgyz Post website comes the following:

“On 18 November 2014 Kyrgyz Ex-press Post, as the second designat-ed operator of Kyrgyzstan, issued its first stamps and souvenir sheet. The first issue is dedicated to the 140th anniversary of the Universal Postal Union. Stamps depict the history of the Kyrgyz postal service, namely the means of postal trans-portation.

“Kyrgyz Express Post stamps are a new phenomenon in a nearly 175-year-old worldwide tradition of stamp issuing: for the first time in philatelic history the second postal operator of a Universal Postal Un-ion member country, designated according to article 2 of the Univer-sal Postal Convention and operat-ing throughout the entire territory of Kyrgyzstan, has issued its own stamps.”

So now we have two entities in the same country issuing UPU-recognized stamps. The souvenir sheet is shown below. The aircraft is one of a fleet of two operated by the Kyrgyz airline Air Bishkek.

ISLE OF MAN 1v from a set

of 10 celebrating the Tapestry

of Tynwald (see related articles

concerning the Europa stamp on

pages 3 and 16 of this EN)

Issue date 10 April 2015

The sepac stamp is the last of

the series, and pictures the mod-

ern Tynwald building.

sepac 2015 CULTURE

MAY-JUNE 2015 427-8

NEW ISSUES WITH SCOTT CATALOG NUMBERS

- Don Smith

From Linn’s March & April Special Editions

* = position in proposed new HB outline (ref. EN# 404-12)

Forward Calendar

Liechtenstein/Slovenia

7 September 2015

Joint Issue (subject was not men-

tioned at press time)

Monaco

9 April 2015

Dante Alighieri,

a Europa forerunner

Switzerland

3 September 2015

Traditional costumes—joint issue

with Aland

On 2 October 2014 Po-

land issued a stamp to

honor the centenary of

the birth of Jan Nowak-

Jeziorański, Polish politi-

cian, political scientist,

social activist, journalist

and soldier. He was

Head of the Polish sec-

tion for Radio Free Eu-

rope. He was also a

consultant to the US National Secu-

rity Council, and helped the cause

for the inclusion of Poland into

NATO.

In the presidential election of 1995,

Nowak supported Lech Walesa, re-

garding it as a guarantee of the

continuation of the pro-Western

foreign policy.

He received the Presiden-

tial Medal of Freedom

from the United States in

1996 for his work to pro-

mote democracy around

the world and was also

awarded two of Poland's

Golden Microphone

Award and a badge of

honor. In 2002, Nowak

w a s a w a r d e d

the Diamond Micro-

phone for the unique role he

played, guided by Polish radio sta-

tion Radio Free Europe, in promot-

ing the transformation taking place

in Poland, especially the Polish ac-

cession to NATO and integration

with the European Union.

—- from the New York Times and

Wikipedia.

Jan Nowak — Europa Proponent

COUNTRY SCOTT # DATE OF ISSUE DESCRIPTION *

Ascension 1128-32 30-Dec-14 Rosetta Mission (1132 is a ss) 427-9 2a

Bulgaria Non-Scott 25-Oct-14 Diplomatic Relations with Portugal ss 426-5 3b

Bulgaria 4699 11-Nov-14 Diplomatic Relations w/ Sovereign Military Order of 3b

Malta, 20th Anniversary 426-6

Denmark 1703=4 2-Jan-15 Europa 2015 1

France 4437b 6-Nov-14 Mar1anne of Europe, booklet pane 2, 4079, 4437 3b

Isle of Man 1690-7 2-Jan-15 Sir Winston Churchill 4a

Greece 2221B 7-Oct-05 2005 European Basketball Championships 3c

Iceland 1364 19-Feb-15 Sepac 2015 425-3 1c

Israel 2049 10-Feb-15 2015 European Individual Chess Championships 3c

Monaco 2782 7-Jan-15 Russia Year in Monaco se-tenant pair 3b

Poland 4138 2-Oct-14 Jan Novak, Europa proponent (see below) 4a

Serbia 661-2 26-Apr-14 Europa 2014 1

MAY-JUNE 2015 427-9

One of the greatest triumphs of the

European Space Agency (ESA) is

the Rosetta Mission. Here is the

Rosetta Mission Statement, which

could have begun ‘To explore

strange new worlds ….’

“Rosetta launched in 2004 and ar-

rived at Comet 67P/Churyumov-

Gerasimenko on 6 August 2014. It is

the first mission in history to rendez-

vous with a comet, escort it as it or-

bits the Sun, and deploy a lander to

its surface.” Rosetta’s industrial team

involves more than 50 contractors

from 14 European countries and the

United States.

Rosetta was launched on an Ariane

5 rocket. The spacecraft consists of

the Rosetta orbiter, which features

twelve instruments, and the Philae

lander, with nine additional instru-

ments.

The Rosetta mission will orbit 67P

for 17 months and is designed to

complete the most detailed study of

a comet ever attempted. The space-

craft i s contro l led f rom

the European Space Operations

Centre (ESOC), in Darmstadt, Ger-

many. The planning for the opera-

tion of the scientific payload, to-

gether with the data retrieval, cali-

bration, archiving and distribution, is

performed from the European

Space Astronomy Centre (ESAC),

in Villanueva de la Cañada,

near Madrid, Spain. It has been esti-

mated that in the decade preceding

2014, some 2,000 people assisted in

the mission in some capacity.

Shown are two issues celebrating

the mission. To this date I am aware

of nothing else, which I would hope

is not the case. This truly amazing

achievement surely deserves more

philatelic recognition, and perhaps it

will get it before this historic mission

is over. ■

— information from the ESA and from

Wikipedia

The probe is named after the Roset-

ta Stone, a stele of Egyptian origin

featuring a decree in three scripts.

The lander is named after the Philae

obelisk, which bears a bilingual

Greek and Egyptian hieroglyphic

inscription. A comparison of its hier-

oglyphs with those on the Rosetta

Stone catalyzed the deciphering of

the Egyptian writing system. Similar-

ly, it is hoped that these spacecraft

will result in better understanding of

comets and the early Solar System.

In a more direct analogy to its

namesake, the Rosetta spacecraft

also carries a micro-etched nickel

alloy Rosetta disc donated by

the Long Now Foundation inscribed

with 13,000 pages of text in 1200

languages.

Scientists will be eagerly waiting to

compare Rosetta’s results with pre-

vious studies by ESA’s Giotto space-

craft and by ground-based observa-

tories. These have shown that com-

ets contain complex organic mole-

cules - compounds that are rich in

carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and ni-

trogen.

The Rosetta Mission — Dana Roper

ASCENSION ISLAND ss show-

ing the ESA tracking station there. Issue date 30 December 2014 Part of set Scott# 1126-1132 (4v+ss)

GUINEA-BISSAU ss

Issue date 12 December 2014

A view from Philae

MAY-JUNE 2015 427-10

Europa Briefs

Russia issued a

very attractive

stamp for Europa

2015 (see EN #425

-2). Now comes

some interesting

information from

Linn’s Stamp

News:

If you look closely,

you can notice a

small change on

new stamps from Russia. Starting

with the Europa stamp that was is-

sued 16 Jan, there is a new symbol

for the ruble.

This symbol, which appears beside

the "23" denomination in the lower-

left corner of the stamp, resembles

a "P" with a horizontal line through

it. The Central Bank of Rus-

sia describes the symbol as a capital

letter "P" — the Cyrillic alphabet

version of the (Latin) letter "R" —

with an extra horizontal line.

The new symbol for the ruble was

selected in late 2013 through an

Internet competition. More than

280,000 votes were cast in this

online poll, and the winning design

received 61 percent of the vote. In

a 11 December 2013 Wall Street

Journal article, Andrey Ostroukh

described the contest: "After nar-

rowing down around 1,000 possible

options to just five, the Bank of Rus-

sia opened the process to the pub-

lic, placing its top picks on its web-

site in early November and giving

Russians until 5 December to vote

for their favorite."

Russia's 23-ruble stamp shows

two types of traditional Russian folk

toys: Matryoshka, or nesting dolls;

and a Dymkovo toy carou-

sel. Dymkovo toys are brightly

painted, ceramic figurines that have

been created in the town of Dym-

kovo for hundreds of years. ■

On closer inspection, however, I

realized that they were probably

just labels. In EN#425-16 we de-

scribed a legitimate stamp issue for

this event. As of this writing the la-

bels were still being offered for a

“Buy It Now” price of $2.99 +s&h. ■

The block of six shown below

showed up on eBay recently, billed

as “the beginning of euromayday

(sic) 2013 revolution Ukraine”. I was

intrigued, as I had not seen this set

of stamps before. Presumably the

reference was to EuroMaidan.

ESTONIA postal card

Issue date 21 September 2013

European Junior and U23 Weightlifting Championships

Estonia issues a half dozen or so commemorative postal cards each year (see

EN# 412-14f). I missed this one. Note that Estonia will be issuing a single stamp

this year for the U23 Track & Field Championships. (ref. EN# 426-7).

Catch Up II

MAY-JUNE 2015 427-11

“European Monument Year” — Marcel van Graven et al.

In 1986 Germany issued a stamp

stressing Architectural Preserva-

tion. The design was of the

stained glass window of the

Augsburg Cathedral:

So, was anything else produced that

a stamp collector might pursue?

The EMYA is a big deal, with it’s

own logo even. (If something is a

big deal if it has its own logo. I’m

not sure the converse is true.) The

award is given under the auspices

of the European Museum Forum,

which also has its own logo.

A follow-up piece in Grenzenloos

#128 offered the following exam-

ples of stamps which relate to the

awarded museums., which are ex-

cerpted from that article.

In previous editions of Europa News

(see Bibliography at the end of this

article) we have called attention to a

nice Europa sub-topic — European

Architectural Heritage.

The following paragraph is from the

International Council on Monu-

ments and Sites (ICOMOS):

“Thanks to the Council of Europe's

initiative in declaring 1975 Europe-

an Architectural Heritage Year

(EAHY), considerable efforts have

been made in every European

country to make the public more

aware of the irreplaceable cultural,

social and economic values repre-

sented by historic monuments,

groups of old buildings and inter-

esting sites in both town and coun-

try.”

In 1975, several countries participat-

ed in an omnibus issue to publicize

EAHY (see EN# 400-10). This was

followed in 1981 by the Year of Eu-

ropean Urban Renaissance (aka

City Rebuilding) and another, small-

er, set of stamps. These initiatives

have spawned the European Herit-

age Days (EHD), which appropriated

the EAHY logo within the EU flag of

12 stars:

So, how about a sub-topic within a

sub-topic?

Part of the effort to preserve Euro-

pean heritage has focused on mon-

uments and museums. The follow-

ing is lifted from the always handy

Wikipedia:

“The European Museum of the

Year Award (EMYA) is the longest

running and most prestig-

ious museum award in Europe, pre-

sented each year by the European

Museum Forum (EMF) under the

auspices of the Council of Europe. It

was founded in 1977 by journalist,

...broadcaster and book au-

thor Kenneth Hudson. The aim of

the European Museum of the Year

Award is to recognize excellence in

the European museum scene and to

encourage and promote innovative

processes in the international mu-

seum landscape.

“The Award goes to a museum

which contributes most directly to

attracting audiences and satisfying

its visitors with unique atmosphere,

imaginative interpretation and

presentation, a creative approach to

education and social responsibility.

EMYA is awarded to two kinds of

museums:

Established museums that have

undergone modernization or

expansion during the past two

years.

New museums opened to the

public in the previous two years.

“Past winners have been both large

and small museums, public and pri-

vate ones, and whatever their sub-

ject or their nationality. They all

showed outstanding public quality

and changed the standard of quali-

ty in museums within Europe.

“Two more awards are simultane-

ously presented by the European

Museum Forum: the Kenneth Hud-

son Award, and the Silletto Prize.”

Germany Scott # 1468

Logo of the

EMF

Logo of the

EMYA

MAY-JUNE 2015 427-12

“European Monument Year” — cont’d

KUMU (museum)

KUMU is short for the Estonian

“Kunstimuuseum” (Art museum) in

Tallinn.

It was built from 2003 through 2006

after a design by Finish architect

Pekka Vapaavouri and situated in

the limestone hills of Lasnamäe Hills

blending in as part of the old Kadri-

org Park.

The main part of the collection con-

sist of Estonian Art from the 18th

century. Two year after the opening

the museum received the European

Museum of the Year award 2008.

National Museum Kopenhagen

The “Princes Palace,” a former 18th

century Royal Mansion, is home to

the National Museum of Denmark.

The museum contains a large col-

lection of artifacts, ruins and rem-

nants of the Viking Period. The

showpiece is a “Sun battle Chari-

ot” (see stamp). After a major ex-

pansion and renovation, this won-

derful museum received the Euro-

pean Museum of the Year Award in

1994. The stamps depicting the Pal-

ace were issued in 1957.

Olympic Museum in Lausanne

This museum, an initiative of Juan

Antonio Samaranch (remember

him? former IOC president) was

opened on 23 June 1993 and was

awarded with the European Muse-

um of the Year Award two years

later. The permanent exhibit themes

are Pierre the Coubertin, the Olym-

pic Summer games, the Olympic

Winter games and a section on phi-

lately and numismatics.

Museum of the Romanian Farmer

The 1996 European Award was giv-

en to this museum, located in Bu-

charest, founded in 930!!

The Romanian name is “Muzeul

Taranului Roman”. The collection

consists of more than 100,000 ob-

jects and a textile collection (mainly

costumes), pictograms, ceramics

and other art objects from the life

of a Romanian farmer.

The most famous part of the former

Tzigara museum (Romanian Peasant

Museum) is “The House in The

House”. This house belonged to the

original owner, Antonie Mogos, a

farmer from Ceauru, a village in

Gorj County.

The stamps, shown

at the right, were

issued to celebrate

the centennial of

the museum, in

2006.

Denmark Scott # 363-364

Switzerland Scott # 929

Estonia Scott # 535

Romania Scott # 4882-4885

MAY-JUNE 2015 427-13

“European Monument Year” — cont’d

Bibliography and Resources for

further information:

Europa News

153-6, 167-1, 169-2, 179-2, 183-3,

193-2, 206-11, 400-10, 401-1

Grenzenloos

123, 128

International Council on Monu-

ments and Sites

icomos.org/en/

European Museum of the Year

Award:

Wkipedia entry. This site lists every

winner of the award since 1977:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/

Europe-

an_Museum_of_the_Year_Award

European Museum Forum:

www.europeanmuseumforum.info/

European Archtectural Heritage

has morphed into a number of initi-

atives:

European Heritage Days

Official website:

europeanheritagedays.com/

Wikipedia entry:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/

European_Heritage_Days

Europa Nostra

Another annual

award celebrating

cultural heritage in

Europe, with its own

variant on the EAHY

logo:

europanostra.org/

European Urban Renaissance:

The European Smart Cities Model:

http://www.smart-cities.eu/

Reference Framework for Europe-

an Sustainable Cities:

http://www.rfsc-community.eu/

The Resilient Cities Series, a global

forum on Urban Resilience and

Adaptation:

resilient-cities.iclei.org/

Salzburg Museum

The Salzburg Museum was estab-

lished in 1834 and, at the time, con-

tained a small collection of military

memorabilia in remembrance of the

Napoleonic Wars. Over the years it

grew and became “THE” museum of

Austria, and the place to go, to

learn everything about the history,

art and culture of Salzburg and the

region.

The museum was reopened in 2005

and moved to the beautiful, re-

stored, “Neu Residence” (former

home of the Salzburger Historical

Archbishop).

In 2009 the museum received the

European Museum of the Year

Award. There were no stamps is-

sued for this occasion.

The stamp shown, depicting a me-

dieval gold cross, was issued in

1967 to publicize the Salzburg

Treasure Chamber Exhibition in the

Salzburg Cathedral. Although an

important part of European Herit-

age, it is a separate facility from the

Museum (albeit not far away).

There might be other relevant

stamp issues unknown to the au-

thors. Please share any information

you may have.

Recent winners of the Award

2013 Riverside Museum in Glas-

gow, Scotland.

This museum replaced the Glasgow

Museum of Transport and was

opened on 26 June 2011

2014 Museum of the Innocence,

Istanbul, Turkey.

This is an historical museum, start-

ed by Orhan Pamuk, a writer, and

based upon his novel by the same

name, recounting life during the

second half of the 20th century.

(There are no known stamps issued

for either museums).

2015 TBD

The 2015 EMYA awards were held

at the site of the 2013 award — the

Riverside Museum in Glasgow. As of

this writing the winners had not

been announced, and so it is also

unknown whether it will be accom-

panied by any new stamp issue. This

year 42 candidates from 21 coun-

tries were in the competition. ■

Austria Scott # 792

MAY-JUNE 2015 427-14

From ESU member Leo Malz comes this interesting correspondence:

Dana, I was diving into a box I had been meaning to look at for ages and looky what I found… this is the first QSL (or QXL) card I’ve seen that had a Europa “theme” on it, and with a Europa franking to boot (most QSL cards are sent interna-tionally without franking).

The front and back of the card are shown on the right. ——————>

OK, thought I. What’s a QSL card? I asked Leo that question and got back a most comprehensive an-swer. He wrote:

Wow, you caught me off guard ... books have been written on the subject ... Well OK here goes …

QSL cards are used by Ham Radio buffs to acknowledge contact with one another on short wave radio frequencies ... in addition to requir-ing a license to use the radio equip-ment, every ham (amateur) radio operator is assigned a unique set of letters and numbers which are then used to identify themselves to oth-er users anywhere in the world.

In this instance, the letters DL indi-cate that the origin is Germany (i.e., DeutschLand). There is no pre-scribed format for the message on the cards, but long-time users have their own cards printed up, on which they then fill in the necessary information: the date and time of the contact, the frequency used, and the call letters of the recipient.

They then leave room for any addi-tional notes or greetings they wish to add.

In this card, the recipient has the call letters W1ACC, contact was made on 11 November 1965, etc. The sender in this case also added New Year greetings in English (English was the language most often used by operators in over 200 countries, followed by French).

By international accord, QSL cards were permitted to be mailed 'free' without franking, but some coun-tries did require cards to have spe-cial labels affixed at times and oth-ers required postage for certain destinations or services ... in the instant card the sender added 20pf postage, which was the correct sur-face postcard rate to the US, using the 1965 Europa stamp in keeping with the theme of the card.

The hey-day of these cards was the 1940s through the 1970s, with the earlier cards being the ones most sought after. Ham radio operators most always saved these cards and formed collections, often scotch taping them to the walls of their den or basement, where the ham radio sets were used as the evening's hobby.

Ham operators often competed with one another as to how many contacts one made or the most ex-otic or remote destinations contact-ed around the globe.

The cards were a form of 'proof' of the contact - if someone said " last night I spoke to a fellow ham radio operator in Mongolia" you can be sure the listener's response would be a sarcastic "yeah, right"... but with the receipt of a QSL card from the operator in Mongolia, usually in less than a week, acknowledging that contact was indeed made, there was the proof in hand.

Very often, ham radio buffs would prepare cards with illustrations or cartoons of different themes or subjects in which they had an inter-est... cards are known with pictures of Disney characters, with Rockets or Satellites, with Penguins (most common with operators in the Ant-arctic), Palm Trees, etc. but rarely anything political. I've seen thou-sands of cards over the years and this is the first card seen to have a "Europa" theme though surely there must be many more out there.

Ham radio operators will soon go the way of the Dodo bird, being replaced by computers and the In-ternet, but the cards are a nostalgic reminder of days past and are a great way of getting our children interested in geography in addition to stamps.

I do remember now that a friend of ours in the old neighborhood was a Ham, and he fit Leo’s description perfectly. I’ve also learned that the CEPT issues licenses for ham radio. If any of our members have any Europa related QSL cards, please forward scans to the editor! ■

Europa QSL Cards — Leo Malz

The

interna-

tional

symbol

for

amateur

radio

MAY-JUNE 2015 427-15

BULLETIN OF THE EUROPA STUDY UNIT,

AN ASSOCIATION OF PHILATELISTS DEVOTED TO THE STUDY OF PHILATELIC MATERIALS COVERING THE IDEA OF A UNITED EUROPE... UNITED IN A POLITICAL, ECONOMIC, AND SOCIAL SENSE.

www.europastudyunit.org

EDITOR: Mr. Dana Roper, 7266 Prices

Cove Place, Gainesville, VA 20155;

email: droper555@comcast.net.

OFFICERS AND DIRECTORS:

PRESIDENT: Mr. Dana Roper

EXECUTIVE SECRETARY: Mr. Tonny

VanLoij

TREASURER: Tonny VanLoij

VICE PRESIDENT: Tonny Van Loij,

SECOND VICE PRESIDENT: open

DIRECTORS: Mr. Alex Cwiekalo, Ms.

Caroline Scannel, Mr. Dan Shilcrat

WEBMASTERS: Dana Roper, (acting)

AUCTION MANAGER: Mr. Donald W.

Smith, P.O. Box 576, Johnstown, PA

15907.

EUROPA HANDBOOK: Alex Cwiekalo

ANNUAL DUES: (Including one year

of the EUROPA NEWS): Electronic

Membership only $10/yr; Standard

membership (hardcopy of EN mailed):

$20/yr USA; $30/yr outside USA.

Dues are payable as of January 1st

each year*. Payments must be made in

U.S. Dollars; cash, or a bank draft, or a

money order (made payable to the

Europa Study Unit). We also have a

PayPal account (europastudyunit,

email eunity415.sl@gmail.com) to

which any payments can be transferred.

Any of these methods is acceptable;

however, when using PayPal please

add 7% to cover PayPal costs.

SERVICES TO MEMBERS: Periodic

bulletin (EUROPA NEWS) to all mem-

bers; website with special “Members

Only” section; periodic auctions (~3/yr)

of EUROPA-related material, EUROPA

Handbook, monographs and specialty

items available only to ESU members.

* Dues must be received by

31 January to ensure continued

membership, including uninter-

rupted receipt of the EN and ac-

cess to the Members Only web-

site.

The Gremlins are still at it

Try as we might, strange little stuff

keeps creeping in to the final prod-

uct. Bad grammar, missing punctua-

tion, and all under scrutiny by your

officers. Alex Cwiekalo is especially

adept at finding these, as he was a

tech editor/proofreader in his for-

mer life. The one that truly mystifies

me, though, are the hieroglyphics

after the first bullet of the sepac

2014 insert. I checked the original

and it was ok, so where did the

mess-up come from? Obviously an

undocumented feature of the Xerox

machine. For those who were won-

dering, the first bullet simply names

the participating countries (Aland,

Faroe, etc…) and is the same infor-

mation as the issuer list in the left-

most column.

Be Careful Out There Dept.

OK, I couldn’t resist … I was offered

a brand new Lighthouse Europa

springback binder for $25. The eBay

seller had also offered me some

early hingeless pages that were just

what I was looking for and worth

every penny, so of course I said

‘yes”.

Well, the binder was new all right.

When it was made. Probably around

1960 or before. It was the old gray

cardboard-like binder with the vinyl

spine, the precursor to the padded

all-vinyl leatherette that was intro-

duced in the early to mid 1960s.

I should have realized that the bind-

er would be old since it came from

an estate sale, but still …..

On the positive side, the binder was

in like-new condition, so that made

it a bit of a collector’s item and I

was ok with it. Still, it reminded me

of that old engineer’s rule: never,

ever assume.

I thought of this when Don sent me

the galleys for this issue’s auction.

What is described is what you will

get, and if it’s not what you ex-

pected, no problem, send it back.

So, bid with confidence and have

fun. ■

Editor’s Page

Still experimenting

I’m still playing with typefaces for

the EN. They are subtle, and I sus-

pect that many readers will have let

it pass as simply tricks of the eye-

ball. For the past few issues the

body text has been cast in some-

thing called Segoe (as in see-go),

the latest Microsoft offering. Should

be clearer (?) and use less ink. Let

me know what you think.

MAY-JUNE 2015 427-16

EUROPA NEWS Bulletin of the Europa Study Unit

Tonny VanLoij 3002 S Xanthia St. Denver, CO 80231-4237

Postmaster: Return postage guaranteed If not delivered.

Millennium of the Tynwald Tapestry

On 10 April

2015 the

ISLE OF

MAN issued

a 10 stamp

set which

reproduces

10 panels

from the Mil-

lennium of

Tynwald Tap-

estry, com-

pleted and presented to Tyn-

wald to celebrate the Millennium

in 1979 by the Isle of Man’s

branch of the Woman’s Insti-

tute, who celebrate their 65th

Anniversary in 2015.

The 7th and 10th stamps are Eu-

ropa and sepac, respectively.

The Millennium Tapestry con-

sists of 78 embroidered squares

which were created by embroi-

derers in the Isle of Man during

the spring of 1977 to April 1979.

The tapestry marks 1,000 years

of Tynwald and the main histori-

cal events in the life of Tynwald

are given pride of place.

Time starts

with the arri-

val of the Vi-

kings and

m o v e s

through the

ages to the

modern Tyn-

wald building.

The Millenni-

um Tynwald

Tapestry is on display on the

ground floor in the Legislative

Buildings on Finch Road, Doug-

las , for those fortunate enough

to live near the Isle of Man.

Additional information may be

found at www.isleofman.com,

from which this article is taken.

EUROPA sepac