I recently attended the European International Philatelic Exhibition in Antwerp, Belgium and I am delighted to report that the following members of our club received awards.  Large Gold to Hallvard Slettebø from Norway for his exhibit “World Scouting”, Large Vermeil to Gottfried Steinmann from Germany for “The Warsaw Uprising and its Boy Scouts” and a Vermeil to Panayotis Cangelaris from Greece for “The Czech Scout Post 1918”.  Congratulations to them all.

Good prices are still being obtained for scarce Scout items being sold in auction and on eBay.  The Grosvenor Auction held in March sold one of the scarce 1957 “poached egg” covers which made a high price of £520 (about € 570 US$ 760) plus of course the usual buyers premium which at 19.975% came to a total of £623.  These trial covers were prepared for servicing the first day covers mechanically.  It was about thirty years ago that our Editor informs me that he went into the International Stamp Centre in the Stand, London where a dealer had some ten or so of these for sale.  His price was £10 each but as Terry asked for a price for the lot, the price was reduced to £9.00 each.  We all hope to find such bargains which can happen occasionally.

At the same auction, a small coil leader with five stamps of the 1/3 (one shilling and three pence) value of the 1957 World Jamboree stamp sold for £1600 (about € 1745 US$ 2335), which must be a record for such an item.  For those who do not know about the coils, originally over 480 rolls of each of the three values were produced in quantities of 4800 stamps, but only 23 rolls of the 2½d, 21 of the 4d and 20 of the 1/3 were sold.  As the quantities purchased were very small, the larger rolls were then rewound into smaller rolls of 480 stamps of the 2½ and 4d stamp, while the 1/3 was produced in a roll of 240 stamps.  Despite only 100 of these lower quantities being for sale, 49 of the 2½d, 39 of the 4d and 33 of the 1/3 were sold.  This was the first and last time that Royal Mail produced commemorative stamps in rolls!
Still writing about the 1957 World Jamboree, a special ‘Sutton Coldfield J’ Jamboree Parcel label (the “J” shows that it came from the Jamboree) was sold on eBay in March for £114 (about €125, US$ 166).  This label was creased, but despite this, the price considering its condition, showed how scarce such an item is.  Today it appears only in a handful of Scout collections.

It was in 1997, some 13 years ago that I became Chairman of our Club and now at the age of 76, it is time for me to retire at the AGM in June to make way for a younger person.  Since joining the club within a few months of its formation in 1957, technology has changed beyond all recognition.  When I took over as Chairman in 1997, the Bulletin was at that time typed by Peter Duck our former Editor, and printed on a duplicating machine.  Very few members used email, and the World Wide Web was in its infancy.  Many of us have bought and sold on eBay which went public for the first time in 1998.  Today the Bulletin is printed from a computer disc with the contents and photographs having been sent to the Editor by email.  Very few people owned mobile phones, but today most families and many children have their own.  We are using colour on the front and back of the Bulletin, which at that time then would have been very costly.  This has all happened within the last 13 years.