"Old Boys" and their memories of the Collegiate School
Astley Clerk as a young philatelist
Daily Gleaner, May 28,
1910
"Old Boys"
If,
like the Poet, the Philatelist is born not
made then am I a "born" philatelist, for
from a very early age did the "craze," as
anti-stampists love to term it, lay hold on
me. As a boy of eight I used to
accompany my father to his place of
business every Saturday. All the clerks,
with the exception of two or three, were
religiousJews and consequently did not
work on the Saturday and so I was in no one's way as I wandered here and there
through the office poking my hands into
every waste paper basket and dirt barrel
and detaching from envelopes and
wrappers the pretty pieces of coloured
papers which had paid the postage-duty
on letters from different lands. The
stamps thus found I took home with me
and pasted into an ordinary 1/- exercise
book, devoting a page to each country.
This book I still have, and find that the
crest and flag (obtained from the B. O. P.)
of each country adorns the top right and
left hand corners, and under each stamp
I wrote the date of issue, watermark, and
other particulars which the then
catalogues could give me.
made then am I a "born" philatelist, for
from a very early age did the "craze," as
anti-stampists love to term it, lay hold on
me. As a boy of eight I used to
accompany my father to his place of
business every Saturday. All the clerks,
with the exception of two or three, were
religiousJews and consequently did not
work on the Saturday and so I was in no one's way as I wandered here and there
through the office poking my hands into
every waste paper basket and dirt barrel
and detaching from envelopes and
wrappers the pretty pieces of coloured
papers which had paid the postage-duty
on letters from different lands. The
stamps thus found I took home with me
and pasted into an ordinary 1/- exercise
book, devoting a page to each country.
This book I still have, and find that the
crest and flag (obtained from the B. O. P.)
of each country adorns the top right and
left hand corners, and under each stamp
I wrote the date of issue, watermark, and
other particulars which the then
catalogues could give me.
No one in the office collected, in fact, the
collectors in Kingston in those days could have been counted on the fingers of both
hands and there would have been fingers
still to spare, so I had it all my own sweet
way, and many was the good stamp, West
Indian especially, for the firm dealt largely
with the islands, that I saved from an
untimely ending and a grave in the West End. By the time I was sent to a boys' school, the dear old Collegiate of Radcliffe and Morrison fame, I had a very fair collection indeed. A few of my school mates
collected and among them I did some
exchanging stamp for stamp, and purchasing. Many is the day I cheerfully parted with my lunch money to buy a stamp
instead. Even as a beginner, and every
youthful beginner is a generalist, and, may
be it is wise that it should be so, my likes
and dislikes for certain countries were very
pronounced. There were some places,
Russia, Germany, to instance two, which,
although I kept, I simply detested and never
worried over too much; there were others,
Jamaica, Hayti, America, for example, which
appealed to my heart and soul, and on these,even then, I spent most of my spare
cash. When, as a lad of 18, I left school, I
owned a really fine general collection.
collectors in Kingston in those days could have been counted on the fingers of both
hands and there would have been fingers
still to spare, so I had it all my own sweet
way, and many was the good stamp, West
Indian especially, for the firm dealt largely
with the islands, that I saved from an
untimely ending and a grave in the West End. By the time I was sent to a boys' school, the dear old Collegiate of Radcliffe and Morrison fame, I had a very fair collection indeed. A few of my school mates
collected and among them I did some
exchanging stamp for stamp, and purchasing. Many is the day I cheerfully parted with my lunch money to buy a stamp
instead. Even as a beginner, and every
youthful beginner is a generalist, and, may
be it is wise that it should be so, my likes
and dislikes for certain countries were very
pronounced. There were some places,
Russia, Germany, to instance two, which,
although I kept, I simply detested and never
worried over too much; there were others,
Jamaica, Hayti, America, for example, which
appealed to my heart and soul, and on these,even then, I spent most of my spare
cash. When, as a lad of 18, I left school, I
owned a really fine general collection.