A ‘Cinderella’s’ happy returns

Press, 6 August 1981, Page 17

A ‘Cinderella’s’ happy returns

By

JOHN WILSON

They are called “Cinderella" stamps because, like Cinderella in the fairy story, nobody, supposedly, wants anything to do with them. But like the Cinderella of the fairy story, the stamps produced as "a fund-raising venture by the “Independent State of Aramoana” are to have a happy ending after all.

The Aramoana Philatelic Bureau of Christchurch, linked to Dunedin’s Save Aramoana Campaign and helped by the Coalition for Open Government in Wellington and the Christchurch Philateic Foundation,- has since the items went on sale on Mav 8. sold about twothirds of the miniature sheets of four stamps and of cancelled first-day covers. The bureau produced 10,000 miniature sheets, with a face value of $1.60 each, and 7500 first-day covers, which sell for $1 each. The production costs were about $2OOO, so the’ Save Aramoana Campaign is several thousand dollars ahead, even allowing for the cut given to dealers, through whom about half of the sales so far have been made.

Although they are not "proper" stamps and have been given a somewhat derogatory name, not all stamp collectors and dealers scorn "Cinderellas.” Nor is it the country's first "Cinderella issue and interest in such stamps appears to be growing. The term “Cinderella” is applied very broadly to all stamps which have not been issued by a government for postal purposes. They include local postage issues, for carriage of mail in a limited area or over a particular route, fiscal, and telegraph stamps" issued bv .various

authorities, exhibition and commemorative labels, Christmas seals, and bogus or phantom issues — that is stamps issued for propaganda purposes in the name of a fictitious country. It is into this last category that the Aramoana issue falls.

Other examples of New Zealand “Cinderellas” include the Auckland Kermadec Island issues, the Ross Dependency stamps, “pigeon post” issues, and the renowned Gisborne-to-Hastings airmail issue. TB Christmas seals are familiar items from years ago, and honey seals and wage-tax stamps are also regarded as falling within the designation “Cinderella.”

A catalogue of New Zealand “Cinderella” stamps is being prepared by a Morrinsville stamp dealer, R. and J. Stamps. Ltd, with a view to its eventually being published. in a loose-leaf form, by. Ponwinkle, a. philatelic publisher in Coromandel. The Morrinsville firm is also forming a • reference collection of New Zealand “Cinderellas” with the intention of setting up a gallery display •of ■ all ' the items collected.

Internationally, there is a Cinderella Stamp Club with a worldwide membership and a quarterly journal called “The Cinderella Philatelist.” ■ Many of those with an interest in “Cinderella" stamps feel that the field is unfairly neglected. They contend that more of our national heritage is to be discovered from collecting and studying “Cinderellas" than from collecting and studying government-ap-

proved postage stamps. They see “Cinderella” issues as “windows" on to important events and crises in New Zealand affairs.

It seems a fair assumption that to future generations the Aramoana stamp will serve as a handsome and tangible link back to what promises to be one of the most significant environmental and economic battles in New Zealand. However, the Aramoana stamp is still worthless to present-day New Zealanders wanting to post a letter. If they are put on letters, the Post Office will simply collect the usual surcharge on delivery. In fact, the Post Office is watching to ensure that no Aramoana stamp slips through the postal system, because an Aramoana stamp officially franked would become a prized item to collectors.

The Post Office’s attitude towards the Aramoana stamp may be tinged with jealousy because in standard of design and in quality of printing, the stamp, in the opinion of many, surpasses the country’s official postage stamps. The official stamps are designed in New Zealand but printed overseas because, according to the Post Office, no printer has been found in New Zealand with the necessary expertise, machinery, and security arrangements.

The Aramoana stamp was both designed and printed in New Zealand, by a Christchurch printer who had had experience with “Cinderella" issues, being the printer of the Pigeon Post issues put out annually since 1978 by the Christchurch Philatelic Foundation as a fundraising venture.

The foundation — an umbrella organisation which runs the Philatelic Centre on Worcester Street, where the city’s five or six groups with an" interest in stamps meet — has been helping the Aramoana Philatelic Bureau produce and market the Aramoana stamp. It intends to include the Aramoana stamp in the lists of items it has available which circulates around New Zealand and overseas. There is a good chance that, by this means, a few thousand dollars worth of the Aramoana stamps will be sold to collectors outside New Zealand, which gives an ironic twist to the story of the Aramoana stamp. It could mean, Ms Margaret Crozier, of Campaign Power Poll, has somewhat cheekily pointed out, that the production of the stamp will turn out to be “an export industry earning more net profit than the smelter will for New Zealand after all its subsidies are taken into account.”