Recent meetings

On 26 October 2005, Alan Rosser and Reg Lyons from the Barry club each gave two displays. Alan's contributions were both related to the Cunard liners, while Reg showed some of his collection of "Lyons" connections and philatelic items with Welsh connections. The first November meeting gave us Chris Baker's Canada. Neil Prior was then the guest with a very fine display of Swansea postal history. The pre-Christmas meeting was the ladies and social evening, with Gwen Hussey showing Christmas stamps and Chris Baker showing Boer War items. The men provided enough food to feed an army.

We started 2006 with a meeting on 4 January. This was a members' evening based round the letter "U", which produced Ukraine, Usk, "U" postmarks of Fiji, Uzbekistan, uniforms, USA, undivided packs (the format of the earliest picture postcards), Uruguay's Antarctic links, UPU, Urabanda (flora and fauna associated with this river in Peru), UN, Ulan Bator and items from the "U" section of the Campbell Patterson New Zealand catalogue. For the five sheets evening two weeks later we had displays from sixteen members. Only the treasurer was unhappy, as he got very few 50p fines. February started with a discussion evening on computers and stamp collecting, followed two weeks later by Roy Holliss bringing his "Cover Love" stock. This gives members more chance to have "a good rummage" than at the stamp fairs.

The competition night had only eight entries, with the prizes going to Alistair Mackinnon in the general class for his entry on "The American Contribution to the IGY in Antarctica", Chris Baker for "Smiles" in the GB class, John Perry for "Norway: To North Cape and Spitzbergen" in the postal history class and to Dennis Martin for "Gibraltar: In Defence of the Rock" in the thematic class.

Gwen Hussey and George Whitfield were the judges for the evening.

The annual auction raised £10 for club funds, with the auctioneers providing lots of added entertainment value.

April started with a visit from Roger Gilbert and Martyn Taylor of the Cardiff club. Roger displayed postal stationery from Kenya, Uganda and Tanganyika including several "specimen" items. Martyn showed Canada se-tenant bocks of four. They were joined by Graham Bean, who is a member of both Newport and Cardiff clubs. Graham displayed postal stationery from the Third Reich.

Visits to other clubs

Four of us visited the Barry Club at their temporary watering hole on 13 February. Alistair showed Falklands, Gwen presented another installment of her thematic display on the history of the postal service, Martyn brought along some Fiji stamps and your secretary showed some Venetian postal history and some postcards from Hell. The same four brave souls then sought out the new meeting place of the Bridgend club on 9 March, where three of the displays were the same as those shown at Barry. Your secretary switched to a give a display of the final engravings of Czeslaw Slania, who died in 2005.

You secretary also visited British Rail Cardiff club, where on a suitably cold evening he displayed stamps and postal history of Iceland and Greenland up to 1945.

South Wales Federation

The Federation Convention is on 6 May. This year's postcard includes something for everyone. It has undated postmarks from the whole of South Wales, including Caerwent and Abersychan.

The date for the Federation Autumn Fair is confirmed as 30 September 2006. It will be at Barry Comprehensive School, Port Road West, Barry.

St David's Day

Your secretary had a unique opportunity with an invitation to the Royal Mail launch of the new miniature sheet to commemorate the opening of the new Welsh Assembly Building in Cardiff Bay. Royal Mail had arranged a champagne breakfast at the new assembly building. This meant a very early start in blizzard conditions, with the M4 down to one lane and traffic crawling along. Still, it was worth the effort. The building itself is very light, being almost all glass, or a "transparent envelope" as the Royal Mail press release was headed.

I was given a copy of the first day cover, which I asked Gareth Davies, the Royal Mail Welsh Affairs Director, to sign.

Rough Notes

On 28 March, local artist Rebecca Spooner presented a video installation of the excavations at Caerwent from around 1900. The videos were shown at three locations, including the post office. This was an opportunity that was too good for a stamp collector to miss. I now have the advertising postcard posted on the day with a fine Caerwent cancellation.

The video was then shown in Newport Museum from 8 to 15 April. The film now included footage from that March evening with proof that your secretary was there and wearing a bright red cagoule to keep the wind and rain out.

Stamp fairs

Please make a note in your diaries for 3 June when the BARRY PHILATELIC SOCIETY SUMMER FAIR takes place at Barry Comprehensive School, Port Road West, Barry from 10am - 4pm