"The Liberty Series" Now Available

"The Liberty Series" Chronicles the Saga of the First Modern U.S.
Postage Stamps

"The Liberty Series," co-authored by Ken Lawrence, C. David Eeles, and
Anthony S. Wawrukiewicz is now available from the American Philatelic
Society. The 6-inch by 9-inch softcover book is a comprehensive guide
to the long-running series of engraved United States definitives that
made its debut in 1954, endured until 1973 and saw variants still
being pressed into use as recently as 1988.

The book describes the challenge of the series, also called the Sixth
Bureau issue, for collectors in its opening chapter:

"More than half a century ago the Liberty series of stamps and postal
stationery ushered in the modern era of United States stamp
production. No set of U.S. stamps before or since has brought so many
innovations in such a short period of time, or has departed from
traditional methods of stamp design and production in so many
respects."

The 262-page book is richly detailed, with a wealth of illustrations
of the stamps, precancels, errors, freaks, oddities, booklets, panes,
tagging varieties, postal stationery and important period postal
history presented skillfully throughout, with all but 21 of the 505
images in full color. Practical illustrations of such well-known
Liberty series variants as the wet and dry printings and large- and
small-hole coil varieties will prove of interest and value to many
collectors, as will the stories of the rare tagged 3-cent Liberty coil
variety used by Look magazine in 1967 and the 2-cent Jefferson sheet
stamp printed on experimental Silkote paper in 1954. Examples of these
and other elusive and valuable Liberty series varieties still come to
light from time to time half a century later, detected by savvy
specialists who know what to look for.

Included and of value to any reader with an interest in modern mail
and stamps is a chapter on mail processing technology and its little-
known collectible artifacts, a chapter on dummy (test) stamps, a
brilliant chapter on cover collecting and two indexes for readers to
consult as they build their collections. The total of 11 chapters are
supplemented by fascinating sidebars throughout the book, on subjects
including rating a cover, tagging, postal card usages, and the end of
the Liberty series.

A color-coded six-page table shows plausible periods of use of the 3-
cent stamp and its multiples to pay important contemporary rates,
while a second table displays selected U.S. postal rates during the
Liberty Series era over 24 different changes and adjustments between
February 1954 and March 2, 1974. These two helpful and user-friendly
features alone guarantee The Liberty Series a place on the short list
of must-have references for 20th-century U.S. postal history buffs.

"The Liberty Series" is available for $48 to APS members, a 20-percent
discount from the nonmember's price of $60. To order, send your
remittance and your name and address (and your APS number for members'
orders) to American Philatelic Society, 100 Match Factory Place,
Bellefonte PA 16823-1367, or order online at www.stamps.org