I had the opportunity to visit Ebay in San Jose yesterday. There are definitely more vintage postcards on their web site than at their corporate office. Lots of other collectibles adorning employee's offices though!
We get a lot of folks that tell us they have a collection of postcards with "Rare Stamps". Usually they're referring to stamps like these: These are usually common Washington–Franklin Issues , issued from 1908–1922, Benjamin Franklin 1902 series issued from 1902-1917 and US Regular Issues issued from 1922-1931. Most of these stamps were printed in quantities that reach into the billions, so they are definitely not rare by any account. Just because something is 100+ years old, doesn't make it valuable. Scarcity and collector demand make things valuable. "But I just Googled these stamps and they're selling for $50,000!" you say? Perhaps you see something like this: First, it's doubtful that any of those stamps have actually sold for that much. You need to look at SOLD prices [ebay.com] , and even then many of those sales for common stamps may not actually be real. There may be a few of these there that sell for more than $1, but for
Went to the Phoenix Grill last week - the decor was more interesting than the food. They had this front & back postcard framed, apparently from a patron or employee. If you can't make it out, there's a quarter clipped to a guy's hat with a clothespin and the caption reads "Montana Money Clip". They had a lot of old-timey stuff decorating the walls. The other piece that caught my eye was this first day cover from 1944 commemorating the "Golden Spike". I found it curious that the dealer had written the price "10-" on the front. I guess it doesn't hurt the value too much... Anyway, food was ok - just kind of bland.
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