Our February auction re-affirmed that demand for stamps from all areas continues unabated. The sale exceeded our pre-sale estimate by nearly 10%, with extraordinary prices obtained for better Canada, Canadian Varieties, British Commonwealth and other Foreign. 

We are very pleased to have this current auction sale wrapped up and off to the printers, and a lot of work has gone into getting the sale prepared a bit earlier than our usual last week of June. Hopefully we will catch some of you before you head out to the cottage, or trade your stamp tongs in for barbecue utensils. 

This auction contains the first part of the Kasmir Bileski estate, a legendary name in Canadian philately. We believe this to be the largest remaining philatelic stock in Canada, (it arrived in many hundreds of huge cartons) and its contents will be suitably broken down and offered over the next few sales. It contains many better individual lots as well as wholesale quantities of stamps, varieties, Revenues, collections, etc, and there were days when we could hardly walk between boxes to get around the office. We have paused on more than one occasion to think of how excited having this many cartons in the middle of the office for months would have made Bill Maresch before he retired from the business. 

The Canada sections in this auction are well represented, with many large collections, better Pence, First Cents, Small Queens, Jubilees, Quebecs, Admirals, modern varieties, Airmails and Flight covers, Revenues, etc, as well as a nice section of Provinces. It also contains an exceptional British Commonwealth collection which we broke down into many collector sized lots, but still leaving a few intact collections for those with appetites for larger lots, and there were also two significantly better Airmail collections which came in for inclusion in the same sale. Some of these airmails we have not seen in many years, only to offer them now in duplication. Just because these rarities appear common, don't be fooled into thinking you can wait for another one to show up next time. Failing to bid on rare stamps when you have the chance can lead to years of regret. In the Foreign section, we have better than usual France, Russia, Switzerland (censored and semi-official Airmail) and USA. This certainly is a good sale to use your "either/or" or "limit" bidding options on your bidsheet, and if you are not familiar with how to do that, please ask us. 

Our new format, used for the first time in the last catalogue was well received and we thank you for your positive feedback, we have therefore continued to use in text photos and photoplates in this catalogue which we hope you will enjoy. 

Once again, as we write the foreword for this sale we have a number of wonderful consignments on hand for the next auction sale, as well as part two of the Bileski estate. Please call or email us to find out how to include your collection in our Fall auction, and guarantee yourself top prices when selling.

April 2008