Hobbies And Interests
Stamp Valuation
Stamp collecting is considered one of the world's most popular hobbies, with up to 20 million collectors in the U.S. alone. Due to the variety of designs, years issued, countries and denominations, the types of stamps available for collecting are now almost endless. The main determinants of a stamp's value are age, condition, amount produced and number still in existence. Therefore, many stamp dealers don't even bother to list more recent stamps (newer than approximately the 1970s), since their value has yet to increase significantly. Stamps of recent years are still available, of course, but at prices which are not far above their original face value.
Current Value of the 1929 Pierce Arrow Stamp
The 1929 Pierce Arrow Stamp is available from a variety of sources, both as an individual stamp and as part of the five-stamp pane. Due to different sellers and differing conditions, an exact value cannot be determined, but a range of value can be. As of May 2010, First Issue Stamps values the individual Pierce Arrow stamp at 43 cents---a 72 percent increase over face value---but it is being sold by dealers for between $1 and $3 (mint condition). The pane which features all five classic cars can be bought for anywhere from $7.45 to $14.50. Interested buyers will need to shop around to find the best price, or a collector should check various sellers' prices to find an average value. Of course, the value will continue to change over time.
1929 Pierce Arrow Automobile
Pierce Arrow, based in Buffalo, N.Y., manufactured American automobiles from 1901 to 1938. It quickly became well-known for making luxury cars. As the website Cars of Dreams says, "Exceptional build-quality made the Pierce Arrow the number one choice for the rich and famous." Their popularity increased due to their performance in numerous auto races, and the fact that only a limited number were manufactured in any given year. With competition from Packard and Cadillac, however, sales fell in the 1920s, and in 1928 Pierce Arrow was saved from bankruptcy by Studebaker. In 1929, Pierce Arrow rebuilt itself with a complete new line of cars (with a new eight-cylinder engine and top-of-the line styling). The new line was a great success, and 1929 was Pierce Arrow's best year ever.
1988 Commemorative Stamps
Along with the Pierce Arrow Stamp in 1988, the U.S. Postal Service presented stamps honoring a wide variety of historical vehicles and other modes of transportation from the 1920s and 1930s. These included railroad mail cars, railroad coal cars, tugboats, cable cars, tandem bicycles, popcorn wagons, early fire engines and police patrol wagons, and even wheelchairs. Included with the Pierce Arrow Stamp in the five-stamp set were the 1928 Locomobile, the 1931 Cord, the 1932 Packard and the 1935 Duesenberg.
History and Value of Rare Stamps
The first U.S. postal stamps were produced in 1847. At first, only 5-cent (picturing Benjamin Franklin) and 10-cent stamps (with George Washington) were used. Over the next two decades, new designs were rare. It wasn't until 1893 that the first actual "commemorative" stamps---intended to honor a place, event or person---came into being in the United States, with the first honoring the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago. Now, due to their popularity, dozens of new designs are created each year. Obviously, the rarer a stamp is, the more valuable it will be. And while there are extreme and exciting examples (an "Inverted Jenny" stamp sold for almost $1 million in 2007), the huge number of people now collecting means that more recent stamps, such as the 1929 Pierce Arrow Stamp, will never reach that extreme level of "rare."