THE ROCKET MAIL PAGE, PART 2
By Paul A. Roales
Updated: August 1, 2010 Return to the opening Rocket Mail page here.
NEWS
(Added August 1, 2010) TWO RECENT LAUNCHES
By Paul A. Roales and Others.
ITEM 1: SANDY WARWICK'S LATEST LAUNCH.
On July 20, 2010 Major Sandy Warwick (Ret.) flew her latest rocket mail at Bernie, MO. 30 postcards of each of 2 different designs were flown in her V-2 rocket. Since the Bernie, MO post office was closed she had them postmarked at the Catoosa, OK post office on her way back to Tulsa. The two cards are shown below. One is a 60th Anniversary of the first launch at Cape Canaveral and the other sports a Skylab image. These cards are available from Sandy at Apw45warwick@aol.com
ITEM 2: THE FIRST LAUNCH OF 2010 AT PUFFIN ISLAND, ENGLAND
Darin Jackson has resumed his rocket mail launches from Puffin Island in the Thames River in England. He says: "Puffin Island Resumption of Rocket Mail postcard flown on the first flight of 2010 in the JZ V Mk4 rocket from Puffin Island to the British Mainland on the 21st of June 2010. Only 25 special cards with Puffin Island stamps only were produced. Each card has a new reprint Rocket Post stamp number P60A cancelled 21st of June 2010 on the back plus a By Rocket label.The front has the new 73p lifecycle definitive number P75 cancelled as above."
That postcard is shown below. You can contact Darin at puffinea@hotmail.com
REMINDER.
This page depends upon your information to prosper. Please contact me if you have any rocket mail information or news.
(Added July 1, 2010) A JUNE LAUNCH
By Paul A. Roales.
ITEM 1: SANDY WARWICK'S LAUNCH.
Sandy Warwick had a rocket mail flight on June 6 at Bernie, MO. She flew a total of 28 covers and cards of 4 different varities. The rocket was a V-2 design and reached an altitude of 5200'. Recovery was by parachute.
She flew 6 covers for me. These covers had previously been carried on a flight I took on a Ford Tri-motor airplane on 9/13/07. I added some data and my Signal Corps Rocket Mail label on the reverse and she flew them in her rocket. One of them is shown above.
She also flew 6 copies of each of 2 different postcards. One of each of these cards is shown below.
Finally ten cards of the space shuttle design were flown for the McCain family of Bernie MO. Those cards were to be used at a family gathering this july. I was unable to secure an example of those cards but the picture was the same as Sandy's Space Shuttle cards.
Sandy plans several more launches later this year.
(Added June 2, 2010) ANOTHER RRL LAUNCH
By Paul A. Roales and Others.
ITEM 1: RICHARD KAPP'S RRL LAUNCH.
I recently found out that my covers were not the only ones flown in the April 24 demonstration race of the Rocket Racing League in Tulsa. Richard Kapp tells me: "Mr Kim Jones was kind enough to put my envelopes aboard the #46 T1 X-Racer as well. All of my covers (45) had original 2005 Rocket Racing League PC Postage stamps on them. By the way, the meter date on my covers is 4/23/2010. I think Kim Jones ran them through the meter the day before the race since he would not have time to postmark them on race day; he would be too busy attending to the show activity. I kept all of my covers, but will send a few back to the TASM and to the RRL as a courtesy. I can't sell them because of copyright agreements that I have with the RRL (personal use only)."
A scan of Richard's cover is shown on the left.
ITEM 2: AN EUROPEAN AUCTION.
Christ Stamps of Germany held a major stamp auction which included some rocket mail on May 29. I have not had a chance to review the results yet, but I saw very few US rocket mail covers in the catalog. The US covers listed had VERY high estimates, much higher than you could buy them on eBay.
(Added April 30, 2010) THE FIRST LAUNCHES OF 2010
By Paul A. Roales and Others.
ITEM 1: THE FIRST LAUNCH OF 2010.
Miri Matejka informed me by email of their April 8 launch. He says: "I am glad to inform you about our first rocket launch this year. On April 8, 2010 we launched the rocket AUSTRO-EXPERIMENTAL at Gaissau (Austria) with a lot of interesting covers: 50 years Rhesus monkeys Mr. SAM and Miss SAM 50 years first Nasa X-15 launch 75 years of launch "Wüstenrakete" from Austrian Eng. Schmiedl. The launch was perfect, but the landing ended with a crash - the parachutes didn´t open. Therefore some covers were damaged. The next launch from the GMÜNDER WELTRAUMFREUNDE will take place in September 2010."
Miri tells me that there were 50 covers of each design flow, The covers will only be sold on eBay. Below are the 4 covers.
ITEM 2: MAIL CARRIED BY THE ROCKET RACING LEAGUE IN TULSA, OK.
When the Tulsa Air & Space Museum announced that the first Rocket Racing League demonstration race would be held here in Tulsa on April 24, I immediately thought about getting some rocket mail flown on this historic occasion. I began working with Mr. Kim Jones (Curator at the Tulsa Air & Space Museum) in February 2010 to get covers flown. He handled the problems of getting the Museum and the Rocket Racing League to approve the project. I designed the cachet and the only change they made to the cover design was to substitute an image of the X-Racer with the QT logo painted on its wing, since Quik Trip (a local Tulsa convenience store and gas station) was the major sponsor of the show. After I printed the covers (25 covers for each of two rocket racers) and delivered them to Kim Jones he metered the postage with the date of April 24, 2010 on the Tulsa Air & Space Museum postage meter and delivered the covers to the two pilots to be signed and flown. The pilots were Len Fox and Dave Morss, both experienced test pilots. Fox is an ex-Navy aviator with 20 years Navy flying, a graduate of Top-Gun School, and a civilian test pilot. Morss is a well know civilian test pilot and frequent participant in the Reno Air Races.
The rocket powered X-Racers flew two demonstration flights. The first was at 1:35 PM and the second was at 3:25 PM. Below I picture the cover of the Souvenir Program and the two rocket racers coming in for a landing.
Both times the craft took of from the 10, 000' main runway (not visible to the spectators) and landed on the secondary runway in front of the crowd. Below are three views of the rocket racers in flight.
The second flight was supposed to have the two planes flying closer to each other, but it was aborted when one of the planes had to land immediately after take off and the fire trucks scrambled down the runway to see if they were needed (they were not). The second plane also landed early as a precaution. The covers are shown below. On the back of each cover I have written my initials "PAR" on the envelope flap.
I received only this one set of covers. The other 24 sets belong to the Tulsa Air & Space Museum. Right now, they have no plans to sell the covers, but will give them to dignitaries and important guests.
ITEM 3: THE LATEST ASTROPHILE.
The January-April, 2009 issue of THE ASTROPHILE is a massive 96 pages of articles. But there are no rocket mail articles in the issue.
(Added March 31, 2010) SOME OBSERVATIONS
By Paul A. Roales.
ITEM 1: AN OBSERVATION.
No launches to report for last month, so I thought I would make some observations. First some numbers.
1) As I write this there are 535 items listed under "rocket mail" on eBay and an additional 38 under "rocket post". Most of these are common covers.
2) The upcoming April 17 Goldberg Space & Aviation Memorabilia Sale only has 5 rocket mail covers for sale. But they are all high dollor items. The US covers being auctioned are EZ 0D1 and EZ 4C1.
3) The upcoming April 16-17 Regency Superior Space & Collectables Auction has 21 rocket mail lots for sale. Again these are all high dollar items. The US covers being auctioned include two EZ 25C1's and one EZ 54C1.
So what does all this mean? From watching the market over the past few years it appears to me that the high dollar "rare" rocket mail items are usually available at auctions. if you are willing to spend the money you can add one to your collection. Likewise, the common items are readily available on eBay. The true rarities of rocket mail collecting are the flights with only a small number of covers flown. They do not even have to be from the vintage years. Most of the covers I am talking about were flown in the 1970's up to the present time. Some examples of these US covers from the past include Doc Nichol's covers, and Ed Engelman's covers. Covers currently being launched by Sandy Warwick and Jim Roth also fall into this catagory. These covers were flown in very limited numbers from about 25 down to only 1 or 2. They are usually launched by individuals and not organizations or clubs. These are the covers that are the hardest to find in the market. Whenever you get a chance to add one of these "lesser" rocket mail
covers to your collection you should jump at it. That is my gem of wisdom for this month.
ITEM 2: THE KAUFMANN-ROALES UNITED STATES ROCKET MAIL LIST THROUGH 2003.
In the past few months I have received two requests for the THE KAUFMANN-ROALES UNITED STATES ROCKET MAIL LIST THROUGH 2003. That list IS still available. The list prints the information in Bill Kaufmann's unpublished 1996 update and revision of the EZ Catalogs plus my additions to Bill's list and my update of the information through 2003. It covers the United States only. The list has no illustrations and does not reprint the entries in the EZ Catalogs, just the omissions and over 30 years of U.S. updates since 1972. It lists 116 covers and many more varities that are not in the EZ Catalogs. The book measures 8.5" x 11" and has 12 pages. I am selling these for $5 each postage paid in the US (outside the US contact me at paroales@ionet.net for additional postage costs). Send check or money order to: Paul Roales; 1804 S. 117th. East Ave.; Tulsa, OK 74128; USA.
(Added March 1, 2010) 2009'S LAST FLIGHT AND UPDATES
By Paul A. Roales and Others.
ITEM 1: THE BERNIE, MO LAUNCH LAST YEAR.
As promised last month I have received examples of the rocket mail that Major Sandy Warwick (retired) who lives here in Tulsa flew on Nov. 23, 2009. She says: "One set was flown on my new rocket that carried a parasite glider which carried the post cards. The second one is the same except it was flown and recovered by the glider at night." Each set consisted of 10 cards.They are pictured below. The other side of both postcards pictures the Tulsa skyline at night. The same card was used on some of Sandy's previous launches.
ITEM 2: LAST YEAR'S FLIGHTS.
As I do every year I have compiled a list of last year's rocket mail flights which I will expand into an article for THE ASTROPHILE magazine. I thought I would post it here first. If you know of any flights I have missed I would appreciate hearing from you.
GMÜNDNER WELTRAUMFREUNDE
Jan 30 AUSTRIA
Feb 6 AUSTRIA
March 23 AUSTRIA
May 9 SWITZERLAND
May 23 CZECH REPUBLIC
Aug 15 AUSTRIA
Nov 9 SWITZERLAND
Ralf Schulz
May 13 GERMANY
Darin Jackson PUFFIN ISLAND ENGLAND
May 12
June 6
July 7
Aug 4
Sept 1
Oct 7
Jim Roth
April 18 COLORADO USA
Oct. 4 COLORADO USA
Oct 24 COLORADO USA
Sandy Warwick
May 16 MISSOURI USA
Nov 23 MISSOURI USA
ITEM 3: THE TULSA ROCKET RACING DEMONSTRATION.
As I mentioned last month the Rocket Racing League is having their first "Demonstration" race in Tulsa. The date has changed from what I previously reported. It is now scheduled for April 24.
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Page and all contents copyright 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009 & 2010 by Paul A. Roales