Royal Philatelic Society of New Zealand
The illustrated cover comes from a collection of items that
will be offered in our next sale by tender. I thought that the message on the
card made it of interest for the New Zealand Stamp Collector.
There cannot be many postally used first day lettercards, and the explanation for it is intriguing. The Penny Universal was a popular item given its association with the dawn of the century, and sold out on the day of issue. The letter reads:
Dear Horace,
I am sending you this postcard for your stamp collection. I am posting it at the General Post Office Chch. before 6pm today so that it may be stamped with today's date. The stamp on the cover has been altered to one penny as the Penny Postage commences today. Would have sent you a postage stamp but the PO were sold out.
Happy New Year, "General".
The card is from group H accoring to Robert Samuels' postal stationery catalogue, and dates from 1899. The cards were revalued down to the new ONE PENNY postal rate in 1901. The overprint is type A with the word 'ONE' widely spaced (BA16a).
Doug Tennant.
The following illustrations are additional to the originally
published article:
a. Contents of letter
b. Back of lettercard
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