The United States Stamp Society is pleased to announce the publication of Guide to United States Vending and Affixing Machine Perforations 1907 – 1927 by Steven R. Belasco.  This is the first book in 65 years to tell the fascinating and complex story of the proprietary coils developed by manufacturers of stamp vending and affixing machines in the early 20th Century.  This Guide covers more than 250 major varieties of coil stamps made by the six companies that created these perforations, discusses their history and proprietary perforations, stamps to which the perforations were applied, scarcity of these stamps on and off cover, and factors to be considered to identify the many fakes of these coils. 

This book will be indispensable to anyone who wishes to collect or understand these stamps, since it organizes in one place the scattered information about Vending and Affixing Machine Perforations and provides much new research about these stamps and the companies that made them.

The 220-page hard cover full-color book, produced in an 8½ by 11 inch format, will be available postpaid for $55 to nonmembers and $44 to USSS members, postpaid. 

About the Author 

Steven R. Belasco has been an award-winning collector, author and exhibitor of U.S. Vending and Affixing Machine coils for more than 25 years.  He has published more than two dozen articles about U.S. Vending and Affixing Machine Perforations.  In 1982 he was awarded the United States Stamp Society’s Hopkinson Memorial Award for his series of articles in The United States Specialist about the “Characteristics of Genuine and Fake Vending and Affixing Machine Perforations.”  He has served as a consulting expert about these stamps for many years for The Philatelic Foundation, Professional Stamp Experts and the American Philatelic Society.  Mr. Belasco has lectured about U.S. Vending and Affixing Machine Perforations at national and international forums.  His collection of these stamps has been awarded gold medals and other awards.  He lives with his wife, Fran, and their younger daughter in Scarsdale, N.Y.  Their two older children are married.