Bhopal
Bhopal is the capital city of the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh and the administrative headquarters of Bhopal district and Bhopal division. The city was the capital of the former Bhopal State. Bhopal is known as the City of Lakes for its various natural as well as artificial lakes and is one of the greenest cities in India, it is 131st in the world. A Y-class city, Bhopal houses various educational and research institutions and installations of national importance, including ISRO's Master Control Facility, BHEL, AMPRI. Bhopal is home to the largest number of Institutes of National Importance in India, namely IISER, MANIT, SPA, AIIMS, NLIU and IIIT; the city attracted international attention in December 1984 after the Bhopal disaster, when a Union Carbide India Limited pesticide manufacturing plant leaked a mixture of deadly gases composed of methyl isocyanate, leading to one of the worst industrial disasters in the world's history. The Bhopal disaster continues to be a part of the socio-political debate and a logistical challenge for the people of Bhopal.
Bhopal was selected as one of the first twenty Indian cities to be developed as a smart city under PM Narendra Modi's flagship Smart Cities Mission. According to folklore, Bhopal was founded in 11th century by the Paramara king Bhoja, who ruled from his capital at Dhar; this theory states that Bhopal was known as Bhojpal after a dam constructed by the king's minister. No archaeological evidence, inscriptions or historical texts support the claim about an earlier settlement founded by Bhoja at the same place. An alternative theory says. In the early 18th century, Bhopal was a small village in the Gond kingdom; the modern Bhopal city was established by a Pashtun soldier in the Mughal army. After the death of the emperor Aurangzeb, Khan started providing mercenary services to local chieftains in the politically unstable Malwa region. In 1709, he took on the lease of Berasia estate and annexed several territories in the region to establish the Bhopal State. Khan received the territory of Bhopal from the Gond queen Kamlapati in lieu of payment for mercenary services and usurped her kingdom after her death.
In the 1720s, he built the Fatehgarh fort in the village, which developed into the city of Bhopal over the next few decades. Bhopal became a princely state after signing a treaty with the British East India Company in 1818. Between 1819 and 1926, the state was ruled by four women, Begums — unique in the royalty of those days — under British suzerainty. Qudsia Begum was the first woman ruler, succeeded by her granddaughter, Shah Jehan. Between the years 1844-1860, when Shah Jehan was a child, her mother Sikandar ruled as regent, was recognized as ruler in 1860, she ruled until 1868, when Shah Jehan succeeded her and was Begum until 1901. In 1901, Shah Jehan's daughter Kaikhusrau Jahan became Begum, ruled until 1926, was the last of the female line of succession. In 1926, she abdicated in favor of her son, Hamidullah Khan, who ruled until 1947, was the last of the sovereign Nawabs; the rule of Begums gave the city its waterworks, railways, a postal system, a municipality constituted in 1907. Bhopal State was the second-largest Muslim-ruled princely state: the first being Hyderabad.
After the independence of India in 1947, the last Nawab expressed his wish to retain Bhopal as a separate unit. Agitations against the Nawab broke out in December 1948, leading to the arrest of prominent leaders including Shankar Dayal Sharma; the political detainees were released, the Nawab signed the agreement for Bhopal's merger with the Union of India on 30 April 1949. The Bhopal state was taken over by the Union Government of India on 1 June 1949. On December 1984, a Union Carbide India Limited pesticide plant in Bhopal leaked around 32 tons of toxic gases, including methyl isocyanate gas which led to the worst industrial disaster to date; the official death toll was recorded around 4,000. A Madhya Pradesh government report stated 3,787 deaths, while other estimates state the fatalities were higher from the accident and the medical complications caused by the accident in the weeks and years that followed; the higher estimates have been challenged. The impact of the disaster continues to this day in terms of psychological and neurological disabilities, skin, vision and birth disorders.
The soil and ground water near the factory site have been contaminated by the toxic wastes. The Bhopal disaster continues to be the part of the socio-political debate. Bhopal has an average elevation of 500 metres, it is located in the central part of India, is just north of the upper limit of the Vindhya mountain ranges. Located on the Malwa plateau, it is higher than the north Indian plains and the land rises towards the Vindhya Range to the south; the city has small hills within its boundaries. The prominent hills in Bhopal are Idgah hills and Shyamala hills in the northern region, Katara hills in southern region. City's geography has in it two lakes namely lower lake. Bhopal city is divided into two parts where one part, near the VIP and lake is old Bhopal and the other is where malls are situated New bhopal. Bhopal has a humid subtropical climate, with cool, dry winters, a h
American Philatelic Society
The American Philatelic Society is the largest nonprofit stamp collecting foundation of philately in the world. Both the membership and interests of the society are worldwide; the organization named the American Philatelic Association, was established on September 14, 1886 in New York City, the following day elected John K. Tiffany as its first president. Voting membership was granted to 219 individuals; the organization's name was changed to its present name for a few months in 1897 back permanently in 1908. Society membership reached over 4,000 in 1940, included U. S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt and his Secretary of the Interior Harold L. Ickes. At the 1942 APS convention, board member Donald Lybarger argued for the creation of a central office near the geographic center of the philatelic community, but not in a large city; when he was elected APS President in 1943, he was able to turn his vision into reality. At the 1944 APS convention it was announced that the APS would accept applications for the position of Executive Secretary.
H. Clay Musser of State College, was selected and the APS office was established there on April 1, 1945; as a testament to their leadership, the APS became the US representative to the Federation Internationale de Philatelie in 1947. By the mid-1990s, the expanded services and the American Philatelic Research Library had outgrown the facility in State College. A study determined that because of high local real estate values, it was not cost effective to expand the existing building. A search of alternatives identified a property ten miles from State College, sound and could be acquired for a reasonable amount. In 2002, after much discussion and soul searching, the APS committed millions of dollars to purchasing and renovating what was known as the Match Factory in Bellefonte, Pennsylvania; the American Philatelic Center was dedicated in June, 2004. The APS offers several services to its members: The American Philatelist - monthly magazine StampStore - online stamp buying member sales circuits via mail American Philatelic Research Library Insurance for stamp collections American Philatelic Expertizing Service Accreditation of Judges and National Exhibitions Educational opportunities Member Code of Ethics and a Complaint Process APS Stamp Talk with Nancy Clark on internet radio talk station wsRadio.
APS membership includes over about 450 local stamp clubs. In addition, nearly 200 specialty societies are affiliated with the APS. Individual membership reached a high of 57,000 in 1991, stands at just over 28,000 as of June 2018; the organization has two national events each year: APS AmeriStamp Expo is held each Winter and APS StampShow is scheduled in the Summer. Both shows rotate to different locations around the country; the Summer event is the largest annual national show with 150 dealers, 10,000 pages of exhibits, meetings of more than 25 national societies, over 100 educational seminars. Local stamp clubs host smaller shows, some several times each year. According to the ARIPEX website, its 61st annual show to be held 15–17 February 2019 in Mesa, AZ, will be "the last winter show conducted by the APS." The society honors those. The American Philatelic Society Hall of Fame honors those now-deceased philatelists who have served philately. In addition the society honors living distinguished philatelists for their contributions to the field with the Luff Award.
Around 1970, numerous newly independent countries realized that issuing stamps was an excellent source of revenue. Because the stamps were sent to other countries, there was little risk of the stamps being used for postage. A country issued stamps to commemorate an event or honor a national figure, but these new nations created stamps that appealed to popular collecting themes, such as Disney figures, airplanes or space, famous people in the world. Instead of releasing a single stamp, they would create a set, with values ranging from a penny to five dollars; the APS was appalled, created the “black blot” program. The society published a monthly magazine for members, began to include a list of new stamp issues that were judged to be overpriced or unnecessary. A country with high illiteracy and a marginal postal service did not require 100 different stamps each year. However, many collectors rebelled at being told to reject some stamps, the program was dropped. Official website APS Tips and Links
United States
The United States of America known as the United States or America, is a country composed of 50 states, a federal district, five major self-governing territories, various possessions. At 3.8 million square miles, the United States is the world's third or fourth largest country by total area and is smaller than the entire continent of Europe's 3.9 million square miles. With a population of over 327 million people, the U. S. is the third most populous country. The capital is Washington, D. C. and the largest city by population is New York City. Forty-eight states and the capital's federal district are contiguous in North America between Canada and Mexico; the State of Alaska is in the northwest corner of North America, bordered by Canada to the east and across the Bering Strait from Russia to the west. The State of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific Ocean; the U. S. territories are scattered about the Pacific Ocean and the Caribbean Sea, stretching across nine official time zones. The diverse geography and wildlife of the United States make it one of the world's 17 megadiverse countries.
Paleo-Indians migrated from Siberia to the North American mainland at least 12,000 years ago. European colonization began in the 16th century; the United States emerged from the thirteen British colonies established along the East Coast. Numerous disputes between Great Britain and the colonies following the French and Indian War led to the American Revolution, which began in 1775, the subsequent Declaration of Independence in 1776; the war ended in 1783 with the United States becoming the first country to gain independence from a European power. The current constitution was adopted in 1788, with the first ten amendments, collectively named the Bill of Rights, being ratified in 1791 to guarantee many fundamental civil liberties; the United States embarked on a vigorous expansion across North America throughout the 19th century, acquiring new territories, displacing Native American tribes, admitting new states until it spanned the continent by 1848. During the second half of the 19th century, the Civil War led to the abolition of slavery.
By the end of the century, the United States had extended into the Pacific Ocean, its economy, driven in large part by the Industrial Revolution, began to soar. The Spanish–American War and World War I confirmed the country's status as a global military power; the United States emerged from World War II as a global superpower, the first country to develop nuclear weapons, the only country to use them in warfare, a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council. Sweeping civil rights legislation, notably the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Fair Housing Act of 1968, outlawed discrimination based on race or color. During the Cold War, the United States and the Soviet Union competed in the Space Race, culminating with the 1969 U. S. Moon landing; the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 left the United States as the world's sole superpower. The United States is the world's oldest surviving federation, it is a representative democracy.
The United States is a founding member of the United Nations, World Bank, International Monetary Fund, Organization of American States, other international organizations. The United States is a developed country, with the world's largest economy by nominal GDP and second-largest economy by PPP, accounting for a quarter of global GDP; the U. S. economy is post-industrial, characterized by the dominance of services and knowledge-based activities, although the manufacturing sector remains the second-largest in the world. The United States is the world's largest importer and the second largest exporter of goods, by value. Although its population is only 4.3% of the world total, the U. S. holds 31% of the total wealth in the world, the largest share of global wealth concentrated in a single country. Despite wide income and wealth disparities, the United States continues to rank high in measures of socioeconomic performance, including average wage, human development, per capita GDP, worker productivity.
The United States is the foremost military power in the world, making up a third of global military spending, is a leading political and scientific force internationally. In 1507, the German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller produced a world map on which he named the lands of the Western Hemisphere America in honor of the Italian explorer and cartographer Amerigo Vespucci; the first documentary evidence of the phrase "United States of America" is from a letter dated January 2, 1776, written by Stephen Moylan, Esq. to George Washington's aide-de-camp and Muster-Master General of the Continental Army, Lt. Col. Joseph Reed. Moylan expressed his wish to go "with full and ample powers from the United States of America to Spain" to seek assistance in the revolutionary war effort; the first known publication of the phrase "United States of America" was in an anonymous essay in The Virginia Gazette newspaper in Williamsburg, Virginia, on April 6, 1776. The second draft of the Articles of Confederation, prepared by John Dickinson and completed by June 17, 1776, at the latest, declared "The name of this Confederation shall be the'United States of America'".
The final version of the Articles sent to the states for ratification in late 1777 contains the sentence "The Stile of this Confederacy shall be'The United States of America'". In June 1776, Thomas Jefferson wrote the phrase "UNITED STATES OF AMERICA" in all capitalized letters in the headline of his "original Rough draught" of the Declaration of Independence; this draft of the document did not surface unti
Gibbons Stamp Monthly
Gibbons Stamp Monthly is a leading British philatelic magazine which can trace its roots back to 1890. GSM is published by the famous stamps and collectables firm of Stanley Gibbons and each issue includes updates to their various catalogues. In 1890 Charles James Phillips bought the business of Stanley Gibbons. Phillips was producing and editing a philatelic journal called The Stamp Advertiser and Auction Record but, soon replaced with the new Gibbons Monthly Journal. In 1905 a new magazine was introduced, Gibbons Stamp Weekly, in June 1908 the Journal was discontinued. However, producing a quality weekly magazine was too much, in December 1910 the Weekly ceased and Gibbons Monthly Journal returned from January 1911 until it ceased with the outbreak of war in 1914. Stanley Gibbons did not produce a journal during the First World War, but in September 1919 Stanley Gibbons Monthly Circular was introduced, which lasted for 49 issues. In October 1923 Stanley Gibbons Monthly Journal returned once again.
The new Journal lasted until September 1927 when it was replaced by Gibbons Stamp Monthly from October 1927. GSM did not close during World War Two, although it was much reduced in size, the whole of the May 1941 issue was destroyed by enemy bombing, leading to an "Emergency Issue" being produced. Post-war paper rationing and electricity cuts were a problem, the staff sometimes had to work by candlelight; the first all-colour cover was introduced in September 1963, in 1967 an American sister journal was introduced named the Gibbons-Whitman Stamp Monthly but this ceased in 1969. In June 1970 the word Gibbons was dropped from the title so that it became just Stamp Monthly but the old name was reinstated in June 1977. Apart from minor changes the magazine has continued in the same format since then; the contributors to the magazine over the years have included many of the most eminent philatelists from Britain and around the world. The first two editions of the Monthly Journal were edited by Charles Phillips, after which Major Edward B. Evans took over.
The current editor of GSM is Dean Shepherd The magazine is available from newsagents and by subscription or alternatively there is an archive of the magazine going back to 2010 online. Edward Stanley Gibbons The person. Stanley Gibbons The firm. Hugh Jefferies talking about the magazine
Die cutting (web)
Die cutting is the general process of using a die to shear webs of low-strength materials, such as rubber, foil, paper, corrugated fiberboard, paperboard, pressure-sensitive adhesive tapes and sheet metal. In the metalworking and leather industries, the process is known as clicking and the machine may be referred to as a clicking machine; when a dinking die or dinking machine is used, the process is known as dinking. Produced items using this process include gaskets, corrugated boxes, envelopes. Die cutting started as a process of cutting leather for the shoe industry in the mid-19th century, it is now sophisticated enough to cut through just one layer of a laminate, so it is now used on labels and other stickers. Die cutting can be done on either rotary presses. Rotary die cutting is done inline with printing; the primary difference between rotary die cutting and flatbed die cutting is that the flatbed is not as fast but the tools are cheaper. This process lends itself to smaller production runs where it is not as easy to absorb the added cost of a rotary die.
Rotary die cutting is die cutting using a cylindrical die on a rotary press. A long sheet or web of material will be fed through the press into an area known as a "station" which holds a rotary tool that will cut out shapes, make perforations or creases, or cut the sheet or web into smaller parts. A series of gears will force the die to rotate at the same speed as the rest of the press, ensuring that any cuts the die makes line up with the printing on the material; the machines used for this process can incorporate multiple "stations" that die cut a particular shape in the material. In each of these stations lie one or more of these geared tools or printing cylinders, some machines use automatic eye registration to make sure the cuts and / or printing are lined up with one another when lower tolerances are required. Dies used in rotary die cutting are either solid engraved dies, adjustable dies, or magnetic plate tooling. Engraved dies have a much higher tolerance and are machined out of a solid steel bar made out of tool steel.
Adjustable dies have removable blades that can be replaced with other blades, either due to wear or to cut a different material, while magnetic plate tooling has a cylinder that has magnets placed in it, an engraved metal plate is attached or wrapped around the base cylinder holding onto it by the force of the magnets. Dinking is a manufacturing process. Dinking uses hollow cutters; the edges of the dies are beveled about 20° and sharpened. The material is punched through into a wood or soft metal block in order to not dull the edges; the die may be pressed into the material with a mechanical press. Postage stamp separation Steel rule die Cutting E. Paul. Materials and Processes in Manufacturing, Wiley, ISBN 0-471-65653-4
Perfin
In philately, a perfin is a stamp that has had initials or a name perforated across it to discourage theft. The name is a contraction of perforated insignia, they are sometimes called SPIFS. Great Britain was the first country to use perfins, beginning in 1868; the practice spread to Belgium. S. allowed perfins in 1908. In Britain unused postage stamps could be redeemed for cash at the post office. By agreement with postal authorities, a perfin stamp on a letter could be used only by the owner of the perfin. Therefore, a stolen perforated stamp would be of no value to the unauthorized bearer, thus the use of perfins gave organizations better security over their postage. The demise of the perfin came about by the widespread use of postage meter machines which obviated the need for perfins. A number of countries have perforated stamps to denote official mail. Denmark punctured stamps for use by the Danish Home Guard; the United States has punctured stamps for use by various Federal organisations and Australian states such as Victoria and Queensland used perfins on their stamps.
Considered damaged and not worth collecting, perforated postage stamps are now sought after by specialist collectors. It is difficult to identify the originating uses of individual perfins because there are no identifying features. A K perfin still affixed to a cover that has some company identifying feature, like the company name, address, or a postmark or cancellation of a town where the company had offices, enhances such a perfin. Note that the block of 12 stamps illustrated on the right includes two copies of the sought-after erroneous 5-cent denomination instead of 2 cents. In addition to stamps, postal stationery envelopes and newspaper wrappers were perfinned. Perfinned British postal orders were used to pay out winning bets on the football pools and these postal orders are sought after by collectors. Specimen stamps have been perfinned with the word specimen to denote their status. International reply coupons have been issued by the Channel Island Jersey in which the country is identified by the letters'JE' perfinned into the coupon.
German Perfin Association - In German The Perfins Club - United States based perfin society The Perfin Society - Great Britain based perfin society Canadian Perfin Officials Canadian Perfins of the Victorian Era Hong Kong Perfins King George V Silver Jubilee - Perfins Scout PERFINs & SPIFS Official Site of Italian Perfins — In Italian and English Perfins on the Stamps of Cuba Perfin stamps of Australia
Van Diemen's Land
Van Diemen's Land was the original name used by most Europeans for the island of Tasmania, part of Australia. The name was changed from Van Diemen's Land to Tasmania in 1856; the Dutch explorer Abel Tasman was the first European to land on the shores of Tasmania in 1642. Landing at Blackman Bay and having the Dutch flag flown at North Bay, Tasman named the island Anthoonij van Diemenslandt, in honour of Anthony van Diemen, the Governor-General of the Dutch East Indies, who had sent Tasman on his voyage of discovery. Between 1772 and 1798, only the southeastern portion of the island was visited. Tasmania was not known to be an island until Matthew Flinders and George Bass circumnavigated it in the Norfolk in 1798–99. Around 1784–85, Henri Peyroux de la Coudrenière, an army officer serving in Spanish Louisiana, wrote a "memoir on the advantages to be gained for the Spanish crown by the settlement of Van Dieman's Land". After receiving no response from the Spanish government, Peyroux proposed it to the French government, as "Mémoire sur les avantages qui résulteraient d'une colonie puissante à la terre de Diémen".
In January 1793, a French expedition under the command of Antoine Raymond Joseph de Bruni d'Entrecasteaux anchored in Recherche Bay and a period of five weeks was spent in that area, carrying out explorations into both natural history and geography. In 1802 and 1803, the French expedition commanded by Nicolas Baudin explored D'Entrecasteaux Channel and Maria Island and carried out charting of Bass Strait (Baudin had been associated, like Peyroux, with the resettlement of the Acadians from French Canada. Sealers and whalers based themselves on Tasmania's islands from 1798 and in August 1803, New South Wales Governor Philip King sent Lieutenant John Bowen to establish a small military outpost on the eastern shore of the Derwent River to forestall any claims to the island arising from the activities of the French explorers. Major-General Ralph Darling was appointed Governor of New South Wales in 1825, in the same year he visited Hobart Town, on 3 December proclaimed the establishment of the independent colony, of which he became governor for three days.
The demonym for Van Diemen's Land was "Van Diemonian", though contemporaries used the spelling Vandemonian. In 1856, the colony was granted responsible self-government with its representative parliament, the name of the island and colony was changed to Tasmania on 1 January 1856. Main articles: Port Arthur, Convicts on the West Coast of TasmaniaFrom the 1800s to the 1853 abolition of penal transportation, Van Diemen's Land was the primary penal colony in Australia. Following the suspension of transportation to New South Wales, all transported convicts were sent to Van Diemen's Land. In total, some 73,000 convicts were transported to Van Diemen's Land, or about 40% of all convicts sent to Australia. Male convicts served their sentences as assigned labour to free settlers or in gangs assigned to public works. Only the most difficult convicts were sent to the Tasman Peninsula prison known as Port Arthur. Female convicts were sent to a female factory. There were five female factories in Van Diemen's Land.
Convicts completing their sentences or earning their ticket-of-leave promptly left Van Diemen's Land. Many settled in the new free colony of Victoria, to the dismay of the free settlers in towns such as Melbourne. On 6 August 1829, the brig Cyprus, a government-owned vessel used to transport goods and convicts, set sail from Hobart Town for Macquarie Harbour Penal Station on a routine voyage carrying supplies and convicts. While the ship was becalmed in Recherche Bay, convicts allowed on deck attacked their guards and took control of the brig; the mutineers marooned officers and convicts who did not join the mutiny without supplies. The convicts sailed the Cyprus to Canton, where they scuttled her and claimed to be castaways from another vessel. On the way, Cyprus visited Japan during the height of the period of severe Japanese restrictions on the entry of foreigners, the first Australian ship to do so. Tensions sometimes ran high between the settlers and the "Vandemonians" as they were termed during the Victorian gold rush when a flood of settlers from Van Diemen's Land rushed to the Victorian goldfields.
Complaints from Victorians about released convicts from Van Diemen's Land re-offending in Victoria was one of the contributing reasons for the eventual abolition of transportation to Van Diemen's Land in 1853. Anthony Trollope used the term Vandemonian: "They are united in their declaration that the cessation of the coming of convicts has been their ruin."In 1856, Van Diemen's Land was renamed Tasmania. This removed the unsavoury criminal connotations with the name Van Diemen's Land, while honouring Abel Tasman, the first European to find the island; the last penal settlement in Tasmania at Port Arthur closed in 1877. The critically acclaimed award-winning film The Last Confession of Alexander Pearce tells the true story of Alexander Pearce through his final confession to fellow Irishman and colonial priest Philip Conolly; the film was nominated for a Rose d'Or, an Irish Film and Television Award, an Australian Film Institute Award and won an IF Award in 2009. The ABC telemovie The Outlaw Michael Howe is set in Van Diemen's Land and tells the story of bushranger Michael Howe's convict-led rebellion.
U2's 1988 album Rattle and Hum has a song called "Van Diemen's Land" with lead vocals sung by The Edge. Tom Russell sets Van Diemen's Land as the ship's destination in his song "Isaac L
