- Source: Postage stamps and postal history of New Zealand
Postal services in New Zealand have existed since at least 1831, when the Postmaster-General of New South Wales deputed a Bay of Islands merchant to receive and return mail. Governor William Hobson issued an ordinance covering postal matters, although the British government retained control until 1848.
In these initial years, only a small number of post offices were established. Postal services expanded greatly from the mid-1850s, with the Local Posts Act of 1856 allowing Provincial Governments to establish post offices, and the Post Office Act of 1858, which re-organized postal services under a Postmaster-General.
The New Zealand Post Office continued to operate as a government department until 1987, when postal services were re-organized as New Zealand Post, a state-owned enterprise.
Postage stamps have been issued in New Zealand since around 18 to 20 July 1855 with the "Chalon head" stamps figuring Queen Victoria. The design was based on a full face portrait of the Queen in her state robes at the time of her coronation in 1837, by Alfred Edward Chalon. The stamps were initially hand cut from sheets, but from 1862 on, these sheets started being fed through perforating machines. The Chalon heads were used until 1874 when the lithographed sideface stamps in various designs replaced them.
History
= Universal one penny postage
=On 1 January 1901, New Zealand introduced one penny universal postage from New Zealand to any country in the world willing to deliver them. Australia, the United States, France and Germany would not accept such letters, fearful of having to reduce their own postal charges to match. This also halved the cost of mailing letters within New Zealand.
While concern was expressed that Post Office revenues would fall, mail volumes increased sharply and by 1902 any losses had been recovered.
= First stamp vending machine
=New Zealand was the first country in the world to prototype and install stamp vending machines; one was installed in the General Post Office, Wellington in 1905.
= Postal stationery
=The first items of postal stationery to be issued by New Zealand were postcards on 1 November 1876. The next items of postal stationery to be issued were newspaper wrappers on 1 April 1878. Lettercards were first issued on 1 January 1895, registered envelopes on 21 June 1898, envelopes on 4 June 1899 and air letter sheets or aerogrammes on 17 November 1941.
= Deregulation
=The postal system in New Zealand was deregulated on 1 April 1998, meaning several different independent mail companies now exist. But in practice the state-owned NZ Post still delivers nearly all letters. While this is generally true, there are a number Posts that stand Independent and have their own delivery systems. They operate in the same manner with paid printed envelopes. A few print their own postage stamps and cancel with an identifier – postmark. Their stamps are also made available to collectors.
Independent New Zealand post companies which issue their own stamps include;
DX Mail
Fastway Post
New Zealand Mail
Whitestone Post
Pete's Post (part of New Zealand Mail)
= NFTs
=In 2023, NZ Post released a collection of NFT stamps, which sold out in 24 hours.
Individual stamps
= Rare stamps
=Arguably, New Zealand's rarest postage stamp is the 1949 HMS Vanguard threepence stamp, intended for issue as part of a set of four stamps (2d, 3d, 5d, and 6d) commemorating a royal visit. When the visit was cancelled, all copies of the stamps were ordered to be destroyed, but a small number—possibly as few as seven—of the 3d value survived. One of these stamps sold at auction in 2017 for NZ$67,850.
Another of the country's rarest stamps is the 1904 Pictorial 4d Lake Taupo invert, an invert error made in 1904. It sold in 1998 for NZ$66,500. There is only one of these in existence.
A third highly valuable New Zealand stamp is the 1906 Christchurch Exhibition 1d claret. While almost all of the penny stamps in this set were printed in bright vermilion red, one sheet was accidentally printed in a dark claret colour. Individual 1d claret stamps have sold at auction for over NZ$20,000.
A rare vertical bisect of the one shilling stamp from the country's first stamp issue, the earliest of the eight known instances of London-printed New Zealand bisects, sold at auction for £21,000 in 2019.
= Series
=Since the 1990s a number of series of stamps have portrayed Kiwiana, showing the quirkier and more off-kilter side of New Zealand culture. One such series was the Town Icon set of 1998, including some of the big things in New Zealand such as the Big Lemon & Paeroa bottle, Napier's Pania, the giant carrot of Ohakune, and the shearer statue of Te Kūiti.
See also
Health stamp
List of people on stamps of New Zealand
Postage stamps and postal history of the Ross Dependency
Revenue stamps of New Zealand
Postage stamps and postal history of Australia
References
= Sources
=Campbell Paterson Ltd: Loose Leaf Catalogue of New Zealand Stamps.
Encyclopaedia of Postal Authorities
Laurie Franks: All the Stamps of New Zealand.
Robinson, Howard (1964). A History of the Post Office in New Zealand. Wellington: Government Printer.
Robin Gwynn: Collecting New Zealand Stamps.
Plate reconstructing by Roly Runciman.
Stanley Gibbons Ltd: various catalogues.
Rossiter, Stuart; Flower, John. The Stamp Atlas. London: Macdonald, 1986. ISBN 0-356-10862-7
External links
Australia and New Zealand Revenue and Railway Fee Stamp Catalogue.
Current and Upcoming NZ Post Issues
Further information on the Penny Universal Stamp Issue
Historical Issues, from NZ Post
Register of Postal Operators
New Zealand Stamp Images
New Zealand Society of Great Britain
Kata Kunci Pencarian:
- Postage stamps and postal history of New Zealand
- Postage stamps and postal history of Australia
- Postage stamps and postal history of Aitutaki
- Postage stamps and postal history of the Pitcairn Islands
- Postage stamps and postal history of French Polynesia
- Postage stamps and postal history of the Ross Dependency
- Postage stamps and postal history of Malta
- Timeline of postal history
- Postage stamps and postal history of Fiji
