To kick off the Buyers Guide to building a stamp collection, the APS has found four experienced collectors to act as mentors to you, the readers of The American Philatelist. What follows is a series of advice – from lived experience – from collectors who have navigated the murky waters of building their own collections. Their successes and misfortunes are now yours to learn from.

Kris McIntosh

I’m a retired U.S. history high school teacher, and I always took historical summer vacations. In 1998, I was in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, and went to the battlefields. I was looking for something to show to my classroom, so I went to antique stores and found an envelope that was postmarked in Gettysburg on November 19, 1948, making it the 85th anniversary of the Gettysburg Address. I bought the envelope and began to show it during the Civil War unit at school. In 2008, 10 years later, I was mentoring new teachers who did not know how to start a lesson. I always believed in using images in my classroom, so with that cover as an example, I started investigating the stamp, the postmark and the artwork, and that brought me to first day covers. I used that cover to teach teachers how to start a lesson using an envelope, where the students would collect the facts from the image, make generalizations, compare and contrast. 

From that lesson, I started collecting other first day covers that I could use to write lessons. By the time I was done, I had put together 120 lessons, two CDs, and several professional presentations to school districts about using first day covers to teach. In the meantime, I went to my first stamp show, TEXPEX 2009, and sat down at a 1 dollar first day cover dealer’s table where I started buying as many covers as I could find that I knew were going to help teachers teach U.S. history in the state of Texas. 

Paul Benson, the president of the local chapter of the American First Day Cover Society, sat next to me that first time. He taught me all about postmarks and cancellations, and he talked to me about the cachet makers Artmaster and Artcraft. I started collecting women in U.S. history, then began specializing in the 1936 Susan B. Anthony and 1948 Progress of Women stamps. I have quite a few Eleanor Roosevelts. Finally, I started putting more of my money into the 1936 Susan B. Anthony memorabilia as well as the first day covers. It wasn’t until 2015 that I stepped out and did my first exhibit at TEXPEX.

This story is reprinted from the March 2021 Buyers Guide Issue of The American Philatelist. If you are interested in gaining access to members only benefits such as this highly acclaimed monthly magazine join the American Philatelic Society's Together We Grow page today!