posted 11-16-2025 06:19 AM               

It seems to me that we have four basic choices of what to do with our collections:

1. Pass it on to a younger generation, who we would hopefully love them to expand it.
   
2. Pass it on to a friend/colleague to add to their collection.
   
3. Donate it to a museum/organisation.
   
4. Have it sold by a dealer/auction.

So, I'm intrigued to know: what will you do with your collections?

posted 11-17-2025 11:51 PM               

Much like you it seems, I collect because it makes me happy and gives me something tangible to search for in my quest to learn and share about the past, present, and future of space travel.

I'm in a position, thankfully at the moment, to not have to care if any money comes back out to me or my family and I can enjoy the collection for what it is. I did estate planning in my late 30's, with a will, trust, medical decision tree, etc. and will encourage anyone reading that its one way to ensure you have something in writing that can be followed through by the executor. You can assign some rough values for things during this process which will also help those taking over to understand the relative importance of the collection either in parts or as a whole. Certain covers will do better at auction and others a direct sale to a dealer will give the best bang for the buck and ease the burden. Having a list of trusted auction houses and dealers in the documents will give guidance on where to go.

I think ultimately the best items in any collection have the best chance for survival long term. Those physical objects that can transcend generations with a captivating story that begs to be told. Certainly preaching to the choir here, but I say that space covers are the perfect intersection of three things: space history, art, and small physical size. Telling the story of a space event, with an object in your hand, that also provides visual stimulation will allow covers to remain popular with some portion of collectors hopefully long after we are all gone.

I've focused my research on the idea of celebrating and in some cases elevating the cachet artist to a place where their story is captivating to a space history fan or someone who enjoys art of another genre. The passion and dedication of the cachet/cover maker is so very interesting to me and I hope that translates positively to others in the future.

To answer your question in two parts:

1. Story telling is an important factor and why this forum and SCOTW posts are important. Those doing research on an item can find the stories documented on cS and make their own connections of why these items matter, either historically or monetarily whatever that may be for them.

   So, one way the covers live on is digitally here as a resource, this has the potential to live on long after the item is gone or out of public view. Which is why making sure the cover images are stored long-term has been so important here. Credit to many cSers on this point, grateful to you all.

2. The next is harder and probably the heart of your question. In my opinion, we all have museum worthy pieces in our collections. I personally would love to see a few things I've collected and preserved end up on public display. Philatelic museums I've visited only have a small fraction of the collection on display. And, I know from experience that it takes a lot of factors in getting something on permanent display in a museum. The leadership, mission and vision of a museum changes over time, ultimately it can be hard to ensure that long term the items are preserved as I would maybe have wanted. Money is a factor, always.

   I have come to some acceptance that museum display won't likely happen, but plan to try in earnest when I retire from my day job. If I'm in good health then (always a big IF), I'd like to dedicate some time to making some professional quality displays of covers, ephemera, souvenirs, and artifacts. Then work on placing them in a gallery, library, public building, something like that. That would make me very happy.

   To that point and to end, I've printed off research articles, cachet maker information, even past SCOTWs and store these with the covers or in the albums of my collection. I think this ready made research adds value directly for display or a sale.

posted 11-18-2025 05:20 AM               

After much thought I have provisionally decided to write a book based on my collection. I will order it by launch date of each rocket and feature images of the covers along with background information on the mission/launch and researched topics such as stamp issues, Fakes and Forgeries, cachet makers, etc relevant to each cover.

Initially I shall do this digitally on my own computer with a view to later turning it into a website, and even further in time turning it potentially into a printed book.

This way, the actual physical collection can be tied to a resource which will both inform the general public (in the manner of the SCOTW articles) and inform my heirs (as to the intellectual and monetary value inherent in the collection).

posted 11-18-2025 06:36 PM               

I do not have any plans of selling anything from my collection as long as I am breathing. Sorry collectors. I have over 20,000 pieces. There may be several hundred that are worth some decent money. The rest are all worth a few bucks each... but nobody will give you $0.50 for any of them. A dealer not familiar with space covers might just throw many of them away as worthless.

One possibility is to donate them to the Cape Canaveral Space Force Museum. I am a docent at the museum. But what would they do with 20,000 covers and autographed pictures? They would probably just end up in boxes in their archives. They would just sit there with no one to enjoy them and then get thrown away in 20 years because nobody knows what they are.

Sorry for being cynical but I do not see any realistic options... at least for me. I have watched really great covers sell for close to nothing online. Apollo test covers with Official NASA Cachets that would sell for $350 all day long in 1990 sell for $18 today. Newer collectors just don't understand what some of these covers are and the history they represent. And again, other than this group there really isn't any organization who can educate newer collectors.

posted 11-23-2025 04:28 PM               

It's probably not an exaggeration to say that there is in excess of a million space covers in existence, but sadly and realistically, also limited interest in them and limited possibilities for their proper dispersal (Robert Rank, in advertising his well-done Space Voyage space covers, promoted them as "excellent investments," but that didn't come to pass with his or most all of the other space covers from many other producers).

Ideally, a father will pass on his many-year space cover collection to his son (or deserving family member), as Eddie's father has done and then the son will continue caring for and adding to the collection where the father left of and so on. But this ideal space cover scenario rarely happens and too often the collection is stored away and is forgotten and, in effect, lost. This may be the fate of many of our beloved space cover collections, as many of us, such as myself, don't have any family members interested or worthy to pass our beloved collections on to.

With our better space covers, however, their fate may depend on eBay, maybe RR Auction and end up in the hands of, hopefully, enthusiastic and deserving fellow collectors — especially younger ones.

Here, as an example, are just two nice, but low-value space covers from my collection having unknown fates.

posted 11-24-2025 05:31 AM               

There are a number (at least five that I use regularly) dealers out there on eBay who would love to stock the likes of those. Although they may be offered for only a few dollars I'm pretty sure they would sell.

Of course, over the years, there will be attrition. Some collections on their curators' passing will be unrecognised as worth saving and will be lost to the rubbish tip. But that will only ensure the increased value of the survivors.

A friend of mine collects ephemera from a certain year. He will stop at nothing to own a piece, whatever: railway tickets, bus timetables, ocean-liner menus, election leaflets, etc etc. His main problem is actually locating anything to add to his collection but when he does a very few of the items he finds are at bargain prices, but the majority cost him an arm and a leg to purchase, having to battle with fellow collectors - and despite there being no well known label, such as philately, attached to his collecting area.

I am 100% sure that in a hundred years time both of your covers illustrated above Bob, if they survive, will be treasured items in some collection. We live in a fortunate era - the start of the space age. I cannot see any future where the items produced during this time will not be valued by at least a minority of the population of Earth.

posted 11-24-2025 08:49 AM               

1. This is a niche hobby. I only know about it because of other space related memorabilia. I know other stamp collecting exists but I don't see the specialization. (My bother is into railroads and trains and I haven't seen related stamps.)

2. With the demise of snail mail and the increase of launches, this hobby is only going to get smaller.

3. This has to "compete" for display with more directly connected collectables like patches, flown items, hardware, etc.

posted 11-24-2025 09:34 AM               

1. All hobbies are niche. Philately has expanded enormously from simple stamp collecting in the Victorian era. Cover collecting for all sorts of topics, and thematic stamp collecting exists for a multitude of subjects such as trains, cars, penguins, women's votes, nuclear science, pineapples, Presidents, football, and flags just to name a few.

   I can, if you want, point you and your brother to at least two sellers on eBay who specialise in railroad stamps and covers. The Royal Philatelic Society of London has hundreds of members across the world who specialise in that branch, including the Royal Collection of King George V, now under the aegis of King Charles III.

2. Your very sneer of "snail mail" speaks volumes. The amount of mail sent through the post can be counted in the billions.

   And yes, the increase and regularity of launches means a similar decrease in interest. But that decrease is to do with the present, not the past. Two aspects alone can show why you are wrong:

   Firstly, Airmail flight covers. There has been a massive increase in airplane flights since the Wright Brothers, and yet, still, first flights and the mail carried on them are still collectible. There is a thriving market for first airmail flights over a hundred years after the initial one.

   Secondly, Pioneer Rocket Mail covers. The hobby may in your words be "small." But ninety years on it is still in existence. There may well be fewer than a hundred collectors, but prices are astronomical compared to the average hobby.

   I'm certain that there are more would-be collectors of T-Rex skeletons than there are T-Rex skeletons discovered on the planet to date. But, the availability of those there are limits them to be purchased by nations and billionaires alone.

   Be sure, in the future, that is the same fate for philatelic covers. Now is the time to grab what will be absolute rarities come a hundred years hence.

3. I have never understood the appeal of patches and don't see them as competitors. And yes, flown items and hardware are, and will be, a market in the future - but a bit like Vegans and Piscitarians, they don't eliminate Beefburger eaters by just existing!

   Also, hardware and flown items are less accessible to the beginner.