Wonderland Stamps and Postal History

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 Steve wrote:

I
have been fortunate to get ownership of a full set of Wonderland stamps, both
the 1940 and 1865 series. These look to be much older than the recent set I
have. I won't list all the differences, but suffice to say many of quite
different colours and different sizes to the recent printings. I see in the
Reference Materials thread a 1st to 4th print listed. Could these be a 4th
printing, when do they date from, and does anyone know what print number Gerry
is up to now? 

I will put them up here as three posts.

Steve, very nice
set of Wonderland stamps with detailed descriptions next to the stamps...
thanks for posting... 

The stamps are all
4th Printing... printed in colours on various coloured papers... and smaller
formats than the previous printings… Please see more below…

I have tried to
update the information for the different printings (Wonderland 1865 and Looking-Glass
Land 1871)... including input from Keith in previous messages…:

1st Printing (1965):

34 stamps (36 stamps,
if the variants of the “National Wildlife Week” and the “Freedom from Hunger”
stamps counts), Large format, Printed in black only on various coloured papers,
Perforated 11 3/4" (poor attempt at perforating the first issue) and Imperforated.

Printed by: Red
Lodge Press (Only the first printing was done by them).

Some of the
printed sheets from Red Lodge Press were sent to Harry Rooke (Cinderella
journalist for the magazine "Stamp Collecting Weekly") who in turn sent
them to someone who had a perforating machine. 
They came back with at least two thirds badly perforated right into the
design. Gerald never used this person again as he by this time had been
contacted by Dave Stirling who had his own machine and was much better at it. 

2nd Printing (Last half of 1970’s):

Large format,
black ink on 10 different coloured papers, Box-rouletted 13 1/2”. 

Printed by: TBD

New stamps: The “Too
Late”-stamp (7 1/2 Winks), the “Mourning”-stamp (2 Golden Slumbers), the “Postage
Due”-stamp (4 Winks), the “Alice’s Coronation”-stamp (20 Winks), a strongly
retouched “2nd Botanical Congress” (2 Golden Slumbers), the “Health”-stamp (4
Winks and 2 Winks), the “Political Prisoner’s Relief Fund” (Half Wink) has been
“relieved” of another ¼ Wink. 

For the “Freedom
from Hunger” (leg of mutton) issue the well-known major plate flaw (Cracked
Plate) in pair with normal, the flaw now appears on the left-hand copy of the
stamps.

Furthermore, the 1
Wink and the 3 Winks Alice heads were printed in blocks of 4.

3rd Printing (Late 1970’s):

To provide
additional definitives for use on covers, a special plate was laid down
providing blocks of nine of the 1 Wink and the 3 Winks values, with designer’s
imprint in the lower left corner “Dodo, Lory & Co.”.

Frame breaks
permit plating of all nine positions of the 1 Wink, but in any case each stamp,
as the 3 Winks, bears code letters: AA- AB – AC / BA – BB – BC / CA – CB – CC etc.

Furthermore, the
third stamp (code letters AC) of the 3 Winks is inverted.

The printing was
carried out by “Storyville Publications & Co.” of Walthamstow, with black
ink on matt surface-coloured paper, imperforate, in 10 colours (white, pale
blue, yellow, pale orange, dark orange, pale green, dark green, pink, red and
mauve).

The layout of the third
printing part sheet: 

The denomination
was cleared from the 1 Wink design, and new values created. These were laid
down in two rows of five stamps, denominations being 1/2, 1/2, 2, 2, 4, 5 (all in
Winks) in the top row, and below 1/2, 1/2, 8, 10, 20 (all in Winks) and the “Political
Prisoner’s Relief Fund” (Half Wink). Two different types of the 1/2 Winks
denominations (diagonal fraction bar versus horizontal fraction bar).

Above the two rows,
the two blocks of nine and between the blocks a new high-value definitive of 1
Golden Slumber, and flanking the se-tenant block another new design, a
super-sized 30 Winks Jabberwocky Centennial value.

The book “Alice
Through The Pillar-box” (from 1979) mainly shows 1st Printing stamps and 2nd
Printing stamps, and the last couple of pages of the book also gives examples
of the 3rd Printing stamps.

4th Printing (1982):

Smaller format
(compared to the previous printings), Coloured stamps on coloured and white
papers, Perforated 11 3/4" and Imperforated.

Six different authentic
ink colours of the Victorian period: deep shades of blue, green and carmine,
reddish-brown and claret as well as black.

Four different
paper colours: white, buff, pale blue and rose.

24 varieties of each
stamp.

Printed by: The
Phantasmagoria Security Printing Co.

Catalogue covering
the 4th Printing stamps: "Curiouser and Curiouser" (January 1982)

5^th Printing
(2000):

Smaller format
(compared to the previous printings), Multi Coloured stamps on white papers,
Perforated 11 3/4". 

Printed by: The
Phantasmagoria Security Printing Co.

Catalogue covering
the 5th Printing stamps: "The Millennium Collection" (June 2000)