Lanarkshire Philatelic Society

"ALL AT SEA"

Elizabeth Nairn presented "All at Sea" to members at our latest meeting.

Elizabeth "launched" into her display with material on Tall Ships. She highlighted the "Pommern" which was built in Port Glasgow, but is now in Åland. This ship had featured on stamps of both Finland and Åland. She then described how ships figureheads had developed into ship's crests and badges over the years. Stamp booklet covers featuring ships included two booklets of Great Britain and several from Sweden and the Falkland Islands. The development of rescue vessels was described with the stories of William Hillary who founded the RNLI and Colin archer who founded the Norwegian equivalent.

The main export from the Faroe Islands is fish, and they, therefore, have used stamps to promote their industry. Similarly Portugal has issued a set of eight stamps featuring local fish dishes. Elizabeth then related the maiden voyage of the top-heavy "Wasa" which capsized on hitting its first wave when leaving harbour. The Seawise University, formerly Queen Elizabeth, was actually named after a man with CY as his initials (CY Tung).

Elizabeth then showed a series of material about famous Portuguese discoverers. Vasco da Gama had been celebrated in 1898 and 1998 with commemorative stamps. Elizabeth finally "docked" in the Azores and showed a wide selection of material from this tiny group of 9 islands, which has a population of around 250,000, most of whom now work in agriculture since the demise of whaling.

Ken Norris provided the Vote of Thanks.

Our next meeting, on Friday 19th March, will see a display of King George VI Miscellany by Robin Sherman, to which all are very welcome.