Ball, BALL!

In the USA everything is bigger, even the stamp balls. Stamp balls??? Yes, indeed.
In Nebraska the Boys Town Stamp Collecting Club started in 1953 to stick stamps on a golf ball. Already in 1955 the ball reached its present size and Ripley, the American counterpart of the Guiness book of records, proclaimed the thing to be the biggest ball, formed from stamps, in the world. The ball is shown in the visitor center in Boys Town. In the mean time it has reached a diameter of 32 inch (81,3 cm), weighs 600 pounds (272,2 kg) and it is estimated that it contains 4.655.000 stamps.
It is forbidden to stick on more stamps or to take off that one stamp that you are just missing in your collection.
Also the "painting" in the background is made from stamps.

Green Machine

In the USA the market for postal stationery is much larger than on our side of the ocean. Many "home manufacturers" spend lots of hours on making the most exclusive envelops. One of the possibilities is to fold your own envelops from advertisment leaflets or pages with advertisements from magazines.
In 2005 US-Post issued a tribute to Jim Henson, father of the Muppets. Recently I could obtain a nice FDC of this issue, with our collection theme. The envelop is folded from a leaflet of Collectibles Today and shows Kermit the Frog on a chopper. It is an image of a statuette called "Lean Green Fly-Eating Machine".

The FDC has been made by John Ranto, a well-known manufacturer of FDC's since 1960. He was lifetime member of the American First Day Cover Society (AFDCS) and always made only 1 to 5 pieces of his self-folded FDC's for his own collection.

The statuette itself

Tengedeng

Already in Newsletter 78, véééééry long ago, the stamp of Teresa Teng from the large sheet of Grenada (1995) was remarked by Nico.

Every time I saw the stamp, I wondered what this image was. Some time ago I suddenly surfed on the internet into an image that brought me the solution.
The image was the cover of the CD of Miss Teng. The CD is called: Chang Huan (Love's Atonement = payed love), after one of her most famous songs. On both the front and the back a similar pictures is printed as on the Grenada stamp.
Teresa was a famous singer in China and Taiwan. She was born in 1953 and died from astma in 1995, the year of issue of the stamps. Although it is nowhere mentioned (or perhaps it is but in Chinese), it is thus a memorial issue. Teresa was especially known because she sang old poems in modern versions in Mandarin and Cantonese.

On the wall a Vespa scooter. Unfortunately I could not find out where the picture has been taken

Frontside of the CD cover

Backside of the CD cover

Hans de Kloet

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