Dirigible
The Graf Zeppelin LZ 127 airship was a German aircraft that provided transatlantic passenger and mail service from 1928 to 1937. It was named after Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin – the title count in German is Graf. The head of the company that built the airships was Hugo Eckener.
Among Eckener’s many talents, he was an excellent promoter. In the early years, there were a few promotional, test flights. He would use the press and other means to illicit public interest in the Zeppelin flights. There would be tens of thousands watching when it would arrive in key cities, sometimes over one-hundred thousand people.
In May 1930, the Zeppelin flew with thirty-eight passengers from Spain to Brazil, and then to the U.S. – Lakehurst, New Jersey. The cost to passengers was about six-hundred dollars each, which is something over fifteen-thousand dollars today. Much of the cost of this particular flight, though, was paid for by the sale of postage stamps from each of the three countries. These three Zeppelin stamps on this album page were the ones sold in the U.S. upon its arrival in April 1930. They were only allowed for use in sending mail on the airship.
Incidentally, I wrote this text while crossing the Atlantic on a flight from Paris to Atlanta. My ticket cost me much less and the flight took much less time.
Note
The U.S. Post Office printed a million of each of these stamps, but sold only two-hundred twenty-seven thousand of them in total. Since they weren’t allowed to be used for regular mail, the remainder were destroyed after the flight left the U.S. As a result, they’re moderately rare and expensive – at least for me. In unused condition, the first one costs about two-hundred fifty dollars, the second five-hundred, and the third about seven-hundred fifty. Maybe I can get them for lower amounts at an auction, but not any time soon, not this year.
Contains 3 spots: own 0 – 0 unused, 0 used.
Album or Web Page Last changed Apr 4, 2025
Stamp Details
The table below lists information about the stamps shown on this page of Lighthouse’s stamp album. For more details about a particular stamp, click on its description. That will take you to the related web page of Colnect.
spot |
own |
catalog |
subject |
description |
comment |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
C13 |
65¢ (apr 1930) |
||||
C14 |
$1.30 (apr 1930) |
||||
C15 |
$2.60 (apr 1930) |
Footnotes
Spot refers to the postion of the stamp on the album page (e.g., 3.2 indicates row 3, position 2).
Amt. is an abbreviation for the face amount of the stamp.
Own indicates the stamp status: ✓ for unused; ✗ for used or canceled; ⭑ signifies I ordered one; ; ✨ indicates it was bought recently; ✠ means an auction bid is pending; and ◎ is used, and it costs too much for unused.
To search by catalog number, go to the search box and enter it in the catalog number box. However, it’s a bit broken; I need to fix it.
