P=have O=don’t have it
The
Republic of Srpska is one of the two political
entities that together constitute the state of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the
other entity being the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The de facto
capital of the RS is Banja Luka. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republika_Srpska
See: Bosnia and Herzegovina stamps
See: Yugoslavia stamps
Scott: #???O
Issued: 26.10.1992
Inside #???: Stamps on Envelope
Overprint Yugoslavia #2005
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Issued: 09.10.2010
World Post Day
Inside #611:
Lou
wrote: When this s/s came out, I wondered why the reproduced stamp was chosen,
as it seemed to have no relationship to the buildings, olives and cheeses in the
balance of the design. The explanation was right there in the English
translation of the Cyrillic inscription in the lower right: “Private
Perforation Banja Luka”, but it took some web surfing to find the story.
The
stamp pictured is not the common Sc #41 in the scan,
but a very rare 11½ private perforation variety that has all to do with the
buildings and the cheeses. The buildings are the “Marija
Zvijezda” (Mary the Star) Trappist Monastery near Banjaluca.
In
1910, due to a problem at the government printers, the Monastery received a
quantity of imperforate sheets of 45h stamps, and because of the volume of
mail, found that the hand separation of the stamps was delaying
shipments. On their own initiative, the monks used an available 11½ line
perforator on some of the sheets until the local post office was able to supply
perforated stamps again. They were used for only an unrecorded short
period and there was no publicity of the use; collectors did not discover the
variety until many years later, as used examples and covers were
examined. No mint stamps exist.
The
16 definitive stamps that included the 45h were perforated on all available
machines in a wide range of settings including compound perfs;
according to an article in Stamps Magazine, almost 2500 variations exist— and
the Banja Luka stamp is the rarest of them all.
I’ve
read that “every stamp has a story”, and I guess if you look hard enough,
you’ll find it. I like this one, and thought you’d like to know about it
too.
Thanks to Lou Guadagno
Best website related:
http://www.euro-soft.nl/yuclub/
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