It began in 1840, when Britain issued the Penny Black, the first adhesive postage stamp. Since then, millions of people have sorted, traded and treasured these little pieces of paper. Today, with emails, apps and online payments, most of us rarely touch a stamped envelope. It's easy to assume the hobby is gone.
Bruce Pollock, president of the Victoria Stamp Club in Canada, doesn't think so. He agrees children see fewer stamps at home than before, and that matters. But his own story shows how interest begins. In Grade 5, a teacher who collected stamps sparked his curiosity, and he has been collecting ever since. Often it takes just one person who cares to light the flame in someone else.
His club still holds four fairs a year, and he's noticing more young faces among the crowd. His theory is that the young are rediscovering analog things, the way vinyl records found a new audience. Perhaps we are all a little tired of screens, and crave something we can hold.
What I find most beautiful is why people collect. Not for money. Rare "holy grail" stamps exist, but Pollock says they are far too uncommon to be a reason to start. People collect to learn. A stamp carries a country's art, history and culture in a space smaller than your palm. Old postcards go further. Pollock has one written by a young man in Spain, excited to be heading to the Boer War. Research later showed he never came home. A scrap of paper became a human story, a century later.
There is a lesson here for life, too. In a fast world, the things that last are the ones that make us slow down, look closely, ask questions and listen to people who know more than we do. And every great passion usually begins the same way: someone shares theirs with us.
Perhaps today is a good day to pick up something old, and to pass something on.
Inspired by a Victoria News article by Tim Collins (October 30, 2025), shared by the Victoria Stamp Club.
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