1 9 4 5 / R O M A N I A
Dear friends !
During the next twelve months I will present interesting items of the
twelve oldest Volleyball stamps in this space. I hope you will be
interested in them. Today I want to start with the oldest existing
Volleyball stamp. If you have any interesting covers or other material to
enrich this site, please let me know.
Gunter
The very first Volleyball stamp that was issued worldwide comes from ROMANIA. Actually, there were two stamps issued on August 5th, 1945. They have the same design (by I. Cova and I. Molnar), face value (32 + 168 Lei) and reason of issue (Support of the people’s sports), but they have different colours: one is lilac red (comb perforation 13 ˝), and the other one is green (imperforate version). They were both printed in sheets of nine stamps (photogravure). 8.000 sheets were printed of each issue, which means that 72.000 individual stamps existed. Both stamps have watermark number 8 and are so-called semi-postal stamps or charity stamps, because 168 Lei of each stamp went into a fund to help sponsor sports activities in Romania. Considering the actual face value of 32 Lei the surcharge is more than five times the face value. Each stamp was part of a five-stamp series, showing discus, swimming, biathlon and a general motive of a sportsman.
I do have a First Day Cover, which was not used postally. You can see it here.
watermark 8