What's in Your Attic?
Free no obligation advice for those who want to learn more about inherited stamp albums, old family collections, or where to find people who know about stamps.
The "What's in Your Attic?" table is open at all times during show hours. We look forward to seeing you!
The What's in your Attic? program brings together local experts
with guests who bring their collections to the Rocky Mountain Stamp Show searching for information.
You go to a stamp show or a stamp bourse to look for material to add to your collection. You do this because you enjoy the search and the satisfaction of finding something new. At the What's In Your Attic? table our evaluators, who are all collectors, are searching as well. They want to help people who know nothing about stamps figure out the value of the stamp collection that they have inherited or found in their attic, and what they might do with it. We want to teach these inadvertent collectors to understand the language of stamps and, perhaps, to attract new collectors.
Stamps do have their own language. Even if it looks like English or French or Chinese, there is a vocabulary used by collectors to describe stamps and covers. Beyond this, though, stamps speak in a language all their own in a variety of ways. They offer many different meanings to different collectors. It can be geographical, historical, or topical, or it may create a link to one's past. Stamps offer an opportunity to spend some time in a different world. For beginners, stamps can open up subjects of which they had not been aware. They can learn about the rich history of America or another part of the world, corral the different types of dinosaurs, or find out how mail was carried in the 1800s.
At the Attic table we begin by searching through what people put in front of us, trying to help them understand exactly what they have. If they want to know more, we can tell them something about the stamps. If their main goal is to dispose of the stamps, we can present them with options, although we can't put a dollar value on their material. For example, they can give them to someone in their family. They can keep the collection themselves and pick up where the original collector left off. Perhaps, one of the dealers at the show will buy them. Many local and national groups will take stamp collections as donations. Our goal at the table is to help those who do not understand stamps learn enough to decide what to do with the collection that they have in their possession. What's In Your Attic? speaks Stamps.