Download or read book The One Cent Magenta written by James Barron and published by Algonquin Books. This book was released on 2017-03-07 with total page 188 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An inside look at the obsessive, secretive, and often bizarre world of high-profile stamp collecting, told through the journey of the world’s most sought-after stamp. When it was issued in 1856, it cost a penny. In 2014, this tiny square of faded red paper sold at Sotheby’s for nearly $9.5 million, the largest amount ever paid for a postage stamp at auction. Through the stories of the eccentric characters who have bought, owned, and sold the one-cent magenta in the years in between, James Barron delivers a fascinating tale of global history and immense wealth, and of the human desire to collect. One-cent magentas were provisional stamps, printed quickly in what was then British Guiana when a shipment of official stamps from London did not arrive. They were intended for periodicals, and most were thrown out with the newspapers. But one stamp survived. The singular one-cent magenta has had only nine owners since a twelve-year-old boy discovered it in 1873 as he sorted through papers in his uncle’s house. He soon sold it for what would be $17 today. (That’s been called the worst stamp deal in history.) Among later owners was a fabulously wealthy Frenchman who hid the stamp from almost everyone (even King George V of England couldn’t get a peek); a businessman who traveled with the stamp in a briefcase he handcuffed to his wrist; and John E. du Pont, an heir to the chemical fortune, who died while serving a thirty-year sentence for the murder of Olympic wrestler Dave Schultz. Recommended for fans of Nicholas A. Basbanes, Susan Orlean, and Simon Winchester, The One-Cent Magenta explores the intersection of obsessive pursuits and great affluence and asks why we want most what is most rare.
Download or read book Blue Mauritius written by Helen Morgan and published by Atlantic Books Ltd. This book was released on 2015-06-04 with total page 245 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In September 1847 coloured squares of paper were stuck to envelopes and used to send out admission cards to a fancy-dress ball on the tropical island of Mauritius. No-one at the party would have guessed that the envelopes bearing these stamps would one day be worth more than a million dollars. When a two pence 'Blue Mauritius' surfaced on the fledgling French stamp-collecting market in 1865 it gained instant celebrity. Then in 1903, when a perfect specimen, discovered in a childhood album, was bought at auction by the Prince of Wales, the Blue Mauritius gained super-star status. Even now, the stamps of 'Post Office Mauritius' remain synonymous with fame, wealth and mystery. Helen Morgan tells the fascinating story of the most coveted scraps of paper in existence, from Mauritius' Port Louis to Bordeaux, India and Great Britain, Switzerland and Japan, into the fantasies and imagination of stamp collectors everywhere.
Download or read book Every Stamp Tells a Story written by Cheryl Ganz and published by Smithsonian Institution. This book was released on 2014-12-02 with total page 415 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Every stamp and piece of mail tells a story. In fact, each often tells multiple stories, ranging from concept to art design to production to usage, often with tales of politics, history, technology, biography, genealogy, economics, geography, disaster, and triumph. The lens of philately offers a fresh and engaging story of American history, culture, and identity, and it can also help deepen the understanding of world cultures. The William H. Gross Stamp Gallery, opened at the Smithsonian National Postal Museum in September 2013, has many such stories to tell. Chief philately curator Cheryl R. Ganz guides readers through some of the gallery's nearly 20,000 objects that together illustrate the history of our nation's postal operations and postage stamps.
Download or read book 100 Greatest American Stamps written by Janet Klug and published by Whitman Publishing. This book was released on 2007 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book An Unbroken Agony written by Randall Robinson and published by Civitas Books. This book was released on 2008-05-06 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: On February 29, 2004, the first democratically elected president of Haiti, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, was forced to leave his country. The president was kidnapped, along with his Haitian-American wife, by American soldiers and flown to the isolated Central African Republic. In An Unbroken Agony, best-selling author and social justice advocate Randall Robinson chronicles his own cross-Atlantic journey to rescue the Haitian president from captivity in Africa while also connecting the fate of Aristide's presidency to the Haitian people's century-long quest for self-determination.
Download or read book The 33 Strategies Of War written by Robert Greene and published by Profile Books. This book was released on 2010-09-03 with total page 496 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The third in Robert Greene's bestselling series is now available in a pocket sized concise edition. Following 48 Laws of Power and The Art of Seduction, here is a brilliant distillation of the strategies of war to help you wage triumphant battles everyday. Spanning world civilisations, and synthesising dozens of political, philosophical, and religious texts, The Concise 33 Strategies of War is a guide to the subtle social game of everyday life. Based on profound and timeless lessons, it is abundantly illustrated with examples of the genius and folly of everyone from Napoleon to Margaret Thatcher and Hannibal to Ulysses S. Grant, as well as diplomats, captains of industry and Samurai swordsmen.
Download or read book Scaling Up Excellence written by Robert I. Sutton and published by Crown Currency. This book was released on 2014-02-04 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Wall Street Journal Bestseller "The pick of 2014's management books." –Andrew Hill, Financial Times "One of the top business books of the year." –Harvey Schacter, The Globe and Mail Bestselling author, Robert Sutton and Stanford colleague, Huggy Rao tackle a challenge that determines every organization’s success: how to scale up farther, faster, and more effectively as an organization grows. Sutton and Rao have devoted much of the last decade to uncovering what it takes to build and uncover pockets of exemplary performance, to help spread them, and to keep recharging organizations with ever better work practices. Drawing on inside accounts and case studies and academic research from a wealth of industries-- including start-ups, pharmaceuticals, airlines, retail, financial services, high-tech, education, non-profits, government, and healthcare-- Sutton and Rao identify the key scaling challenges that confront every organization. They tackle the difficult trade-offs that organizations must make between whether to encourage individualized approaches tailored to local needs or to replicate the same practices and customs as an organization or program expands. They reveal how the best leaders and teams develop, spread, and instill the right mindsets in their people-- rather than ruining or watering down the very things that have fueled successful growth in the past. They unpack the principles that help to cascade excellence throughout an organization, as well as show how to eliminate destructive beliefs and behaviors that will hold them back. Scaling Up Excellence is the first major business book devoted to this universal and vexing challenge and it is destined to become the standard bearer in the field.
Download or read book Broken Glass written by Alex Beam and published by . This book was released on 2020 with total page 353 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "In 1945, Edith Farnsworth asked the German architect Mies van der Rohe, already renowned for his avant-garde buildings, to design a weekend home for her outside of Chicago. Edith was a woman ahead of her time--unmarried, she was a distinguished medical researcher, whose discoveries put her in contention for the Nobel Prize, as well as an accomplished violinist, translator, and poet. The two quickly began an intimate relationship, spending weekends together, sharing interests in transcendental philosophy, Catholic mysticism, wine-soaked picnics, and architecture. Their collaboration would produce one of the most important works of architecture of all time, a blindingly original house made up almost entirely of glass and steel. But the minimalist marvel, built in 1951, was plagued by cost over-runs and a sudden chilling of the two friends' mutual affection. Though the building became world-famous, Farnsworth found it impossible to live in the transparent house, and she began a public campaign against him, cheered on by Frank Lloyd Wright. Mies, in turn, sued her for unpaid monies. The ensuing trial covered not just the missing funds and the structural weaknesses of the home, but turned into a trial of modernist art and architecture itself. Interweaving personal drama and cultural history, Alex Beam presents a stylish, enthralling tapestry of a tale, illuminating the fascinating history behind one of the twentieth-century's most beautiful and significant architectural projects"--
Download or read book A Glossary of Philatelic Terms written by Philatelic Congress of Great Britain and published by . This book was released on 1912 with total page 38 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The King of Vinland s Saga written by Stuart W. Mirsky and published by . This book was released on 2021-03-12 with total page 498 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Vikings and Indians vie for supremacy on the shores of North America -- five hundred years before Columbus and the Spanish Conquistadors arrived.
Download or read book Stamp of the Century written by Kellen Diamanti and published by . This book was released on 2018-05 with total page 403 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Stamp of the Century recounts the stories of passionate collectors and dealers, society women, captains of industry, and even thieves and murderers who bought, sold, stole, fenced, and mutilated the Inverted Jenny.
Download or read book The Queen s Stamps written by Nicholas Courtney and published by Methuen Pub Limited. This book was released on 2014-12-01 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first and definitive history of the finest stamp collection in the world, now in paperback with a new index and epilogue This elegant book is the definitive account of one of the world's most important and extensive stamp collections, and the monarchs and keepers who have contributed to it. Inaugurated by Queen Victoria, and enlarged by five successive British monarchs, the main body of the Collection came into being under George V, whose passionate and shrewd acquisition of many other private collections has ensured the unique and comprehensive character of his own. This is a story told through the stamps themselves, many of the most famous of which are produced here in full color, as well as through astonishing anecdotes featuring the kings, queens, and courtiers who brought them together. This informative, surprising, highly illustrated volume is written to appeal to the general reader with an interest in Royal history, as well as to the specialist enthusiast.
Download or read book By M rck written by Jon Nordstroem and published by . This book was released on with total page 218 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The World s First Postage Stamp written by Alan Holyoake and published by . This book was released on 2013 with total page 159 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Postage Stamps and Postal History of British Guiana written by William Augustus Townsend and published by . This book was released on 1970 with total page 424 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Guyana / Demerara / Georgetown / airmail service B1927- / inland post / postal rates B1850- / post offices.
Download or read book Every Record Tells a Story written by Steve Carr and published by . This book was released on 2020 with total page 190 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Lucy s Bones Sacred Stones Einstein s Brain written by Harvey Rachlin and published by Garrett County Press. This book was released on 2013-07-14 with total page 309 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Leap across time with bestselling author Harvey Rachlin as he collects over 50 of the most fascinating objects in the world, under one book. The Mounted Hide of Stonewall Jackson's Battle Horse, The Black Obelisk, The Rosetta Stone, George Washington's False Teeth, Vice Admiral Lord Nelson's Uniform Coat, The Elephant Man's Skeleton, and Lincoln's Death Bed are just some of the objects Rachlin explores with wit, pick and an amazing sense of spectacle. Publisher's Weekly calls Lucy's Bone's, Sacred Stones, and Einstein's Brain "entertaining and enlightening." Library Journal declares Rachin's work "fascinating." Parade says it is "detailed and authoritative." It is also intensely moving as Rachlin weaves together seemingly disparate histories into a holistic statement that celebrates human endeavor. This book is not simply wonderful -- it is full of wonder.
