Collection: The Postal Museum

Collection-level records:

• Collection overview (Cornucopia)

  Historical Collection

  Responsible for the historical collections of Royal Mail, covering more than 360 years of British postal history, and including the archive of Royal Mail containing records from 1636, stamps of Great Britain from the Penny Black onwards with their artwork, and British postal markings from 1661, artefacts including posting boxes, vehicles, uniforms, sorting frames, sorting machines and handstamps. Philatelic material is listed separately under Philatelic Collection, but the collections include “non-philatelic material”, that is products sold or available over Post Office Counters (postal orders, money orders, revenue stamps, telegrams, licences etc) and other documentary material (brochures, hand-outs etc) which provides a context for them. The archives also contain records of potential interest to family historians; material available ranges from appointment and pension records to local history, staff magazines, photographs, recruitment posters and uniforms.

  Philatelic Collection

  Public Records relating to philatelic products and other philatelic material issued by the British Post Office in the UK and abroad; “postal history” material such as letters, covers, labels, postcards and waybills relating to services operated by the British Post Office in the UK and abroad and services operated between the UK and other countries; dies, plates, cylinders relating to postal stamps and stamped stationery issued by the British Post Office and revenue stamps sold by them; foreign philatelic material received via the Universal Postal Union and other postal administrations and their agents for the Stamps of the World Collection; high quality collections of foreign or Commonwealth philatelic material by donation or bequest which serve as reference or research material.

  Transport Collection

  Vehicles including a replica mail coach, a travelling post office, hand-carts, vans, motor bikes and bicycles used in connection with Post Office operations in the UK.

  Ephemera Collection

  Greetings cards, letters and other items sent through the post – the earliest Valentine card is a handmade puzzle Valentine from 1790. During the Victorian period, mass production of cards encouraged more people to exchange Valentine sentiments.

  Art and Design Collection

  Paintings, engravings and prints relating to the operations of the British Post Office, plus original art works commissioned by the Post Office, eg for stamp and poster designs. In the early 1930s the Post Office started to use advertising posters. Large poster hoardings were first used in 1932 followed by special designs created for experimental use on mail vans – the origin of the ‘strip poster’ used today. Following Sir Stephen Tallents’ appointment in 1933 as public relations officer, leading artists, such as Macdonald Gill and Graham Sutherland, were commissioned to work on poster designs.

  Source: Cornucopia

  Date: Not known, but before 2015

  Licence: CC BY-NC