“Research is creation of new knowledge.” – Neil Armstrong
As this is National Stamp Collecting Month, what is always of interest to the APRL staff is our mission to provide the best services and comprehensive resources that aid in the research of the hobby. Whether a collector is just starting out or has progressed to becoming a highly specialized philatelist the library is here to meet and exceed the research needs of our members and patrons.
With an eye to research we eagerly anticipate the Twelfth Winton M. Blount Postal History Symposium, a joint undertaking by the APRL and the Smithsonian’s National Postal Museum that will take place December 8 and 9 at the museum in Washington, D.C. Working alongside the leadership of NPM Research Chair Susan Smith, we have finalized the presentations and speakers for the two-day research event.
The theme of this year’s symposium is “Political Systems, Postal Administrations, and the Mail.” After evaluating all of the submitted research proposals and presenters, this year’s symposium will consist of 17 speakers presenting 15 research presentations.
In the weeks leading up to the event we will, on the APS website, provide more biographical details and summaries of the accepted research abstracts for each of the presenters. Here for now is the list of presenters and the title of their planned presentations:
- Zach Agatstein – “Hitler’s Mundane Messengers: The Banal Nationalism of Third Reich Postage Stamps”
- Alison Bazylinski – “Rethinking Postal Politics: The National Association of Letter Carriers Ladies’ Auxiliary, 1905-1925”
- Diane DeBlois and Robert Dalton Harris – “Big Mail: from Public Good to Private Profit”
- Laura Goldblatt and Richard Handler – “The Eagle, the Rocket, and the Moon: U.S. Postal Iconography at the End of History”
- Pérola Goldfeder – “Gathering Vassals Around the Throne: The Political Economy of Postal Communications in 19th Century Brazil”
- Rebecca Brenner Graham – “The End of Sunday Mail, 1888-1912”
- M. Lavey – “Politico-Philatelic Semiosis in Russia’s 2014 Crimea Issues”
- Rocio Moreno Cabanillas – “The Reform Postal Systems in the Process of Structuring and Construction of Imperial States in the 18th Century”
- Francesco Morriello – “From Three Months to Three Seconds: The Evolution of Mail Delivery from the Renaissance to the Present Day”
- Guillermo Navarro Oltra – “Historical Figures on Franco’s Postage Stamps: The Catholic Monarchs”
- Daniel A. Piazza – “The Fascist Style in Italian Philately, 1922-1941”
- Mark Piper – “Camaguey 1994-1995 Mother’s Day Cards: Structural Adaptions at the Cuban Ministry of Communications after the Dissolution of the USSR”
- Andrea Rusnock – “Postal Politics: Soviet Stamps of World War II”
- Roger Santala – “Lion or Eagle: Sovereignty, a Postal Authority, and the Mails, Finland 1890-1918”
- Earl Toops – “Regime Change in Vietnam: Issues of the Provisional Revolutionary Government and Restoration of Postal Services in the Defeated South”
The research presentations provide a wide range of worldwide subject matter on the symposium’s theme and in the coming weeks we will further organize these presentations into more specific panels or subsections. Be sure to visit the Postal History Symposium page on the APS website for further details and logistics regarding this year’s symposium.
Library use and the pandemic
Back in August at the Great American Stamp Show in Sacramento, I had the unique opportunity to present a session titled “American Philatelic Research Library: A Post-Pandemic Status Report.” The presentation focused on three recent periods for the APRL: pre-pandemic (2017-2019), pandemic (2020-2021) and post-pandemic (2022) highlighting library services and library use.
Before the pandemic, the APRL would receive in-person, via email or phone between 200 and 220 requests per month. In order to answer these requests, the service entailed one or more of scans, photocopies, help with book borrowing or research. During the pandemic period requests dipped slightly to 180 to 190 requests per month as the APRL was closed for a period of time starting in April 2020 and then slowly opened up over a period of six months. Initially, the library was staffed by one person and gradually over that period returned to the full staffing levels of four.
As we have moved into the post-pandemic period (keeping in mind that we are not necessarily past the pandemic in terms of national health measures), library requests have stabilized to 175 to 185 requests per month. This change in the library use data seemed worthy of further analysis, and after further examination, actually presented a welcome upswing in another mission of the APRL, specifically the use and access of our digital resources.
Librarians by their very nature see their role as one of providing access to the critical resources necessary to fulfill the research needs of their patrons. In a nutshell, by pointing researchers in the right direction they enable patrons to conduct their own research. Digital resources provide that pathway to resources for patron research as well.
Back in the pre-pandemic period, the David Straight Memorial Philatelic Union Catalog, the online database listing the library holdings of the APRL and 12 other philatelic libraries, saw moderate use with between 355 and 365 access events (i.e. number of times the online catalog was accessed) per month. During the pandemic period this rose slightly to 385 to 405 access events.
Now in the post-pandemic period the rate has increased significantly to 525 to 535 access events per month. One of the conclusions to be drawn is that as library patrons during the pandemic still continued to research their collections and were homebound, they accessed the online catalog more and more. Many of those accessing the online catalog became more comfortable with conducting, at least in part, their research from home using the online catalog.
What was equally, if not more, gratifying for the library staff concerned the use data of the Robert A. Mason Digital Library. As the digital library has grown from nine journal runs to now 18 complete journal runs since March 1 of this year, so too has its use by library patrons. In the pre-pandemic period the digital library hovered around 175 to 185 access events per month. During the pandemic period with the library closed, we saw a noticeable rise to 325 to 355 access events. Following this, in the current post-pandemic period, an exponential increase of 950 to 1,000 use events per month has occurred as patrons, as before with the online catalog, become more comfortable with the database and conducting their own research remotely.
As we continue to grow both the Philatelic Union Catalog and the Robert Mason Digital Library we will continue to monitor the use of both resources and continue our commitment to making the resources of the APRL accessible and usable to everyone.