Docents On Wheels!!!
By Ida Marie Giusti, Volunteer Docent
Docents from the Postal Museum have been gathering lately for tours in the Washington area, looking for unique ways to connect museum visitors to different aspects of the NPM collection. In this spirit, a group of Postal Museum docents (Ida Marie, Tadas, Robin, Tanika, Meredith and Jeff) traveled to the Springpex Stamp Show on Sunday, March 7th. We started our day off with breakfast then the “Docents on Wheels,” as we like to call ourselves, hopped into the new Postal Museum minivan. Such an adventure through Virginia, we almost got lost! (Note to self – next time carry a GPS because Jeff can’t remember where he’s going!) Getting slightly lost was promptly forgotten when we arrived at the show and were happily greeted by the designer of the new Pony Express and Boy Scout Caches. It was a thrill to meet him and have the envelopes signed!
Springpex was the first stamp show for most of us, so we didn’t know where to start: Ida Marie rummaged through several boxes to find unusual covers; she found one marked “the smallest post office in Florida.” Ida Marie and Jeff also got into the spirit of trading collections, swapping “Riverboat covers” for Chinese New Year covers. Meredith found quite a few interesting items as well, and quickly realized that she was buying philately for her friends and family! Tanika discovered several gems complimenting her Jamaican heritage and collection of African stamps.
On the way home, we had a little “show and tell” to discuss what we found at the show. Jeff was happy with his “Legends of the West” souvenir sheet, Robin found some great Eastern European philately, but Tadas ruled the day with a huge binder of Civil War letters! Of course, he’s the pro philatelist in the group so he actually knew what he was looking for. The rest of us just had a great time perusing the cover boxes and circuit books from various clubs. Now that we’ve been to a stamp show, we can better understand the collecting mentality. We look forward to sharing our Springpex adventure with visitors on our tours, and we look forward to the next docent outing!!!
