1950-S Postcard From London To New York Why So Expensive ?

i am trying to figure if theres any logic for the huge amount of postage on this card in a time when a letter went for 2 1/2 p ??

Probably the sender an American thought the 1S/3p stamps were only
one third of a penny stamps and the total she applied was 2p.

Bingo! From the written dialog I have to assume that the writer is about as sharp as a marble. She's delighted to discover that they speak English in England............

I know they speak English in London...was there last September..makes life easier !!

A relation Philb?
English in London, the capital of England

Well she did draw a smiley face after the everyone speaking English sentence. Perhaps we should give her the benefit of the doubt and assume she was speaking tongue in cheek, so to speak.

Well, this thread somehow got kidnapped but its an interesting piece !!

Perhaps the sender was trying to send a postcard with some nice stamps on it. Having said that they might have placed them better Just maybe it was their first visit and their first sight of UK stamps with the Queen's head. Postmark is London.

That's a great card, philb. The sender's interpretation of the denomination as one-third pence has to be the answer.

Imagine the great travel stories she could regale her friends with upon her return..."well, yes, they sort of speak English, but do you know that a third-of-a-penny stamp costs fifteen cents there?"

Except for the buying-the-stamps part (where you just shelled out better than a third of a pound for enough stamps to mail a postcard), it is a perfectly understandable mistake for someone accustomed to a dollars-and-cents world.

CJD I guess we all think differently..as a universal stamp collector I just would have asked the clerk for the correct stamp !

Maybe she did ask the clerk - who spotted a gullible tourist and pocketed the difference?...

She would have to have been very unlucky...evidently she did not care !!

Phil,

I think I have the answer. The rate for a letter to the US weighing less than ½oz sent via air was 1s3d for most of the 1950s. That's what those stamps were for, airmail to Zone B.

The tourist was not clear in the post office that she are talking about a postcard nor about air or surface and didn't mark the card as going by air, so it looks like it needed just the surface rate of 2d.

So, the tourist had a handful of stamps for airmail letters to the US and just slapped a few on and thats what you have.

Larry

Most probably the answer. After looking at it a bit further, if she did make the mistake of thinking that the Stamps were 1/3 instead of 1-/3d that would have only brought the rate to 2d, when it should have been 2 1/2d for the letter rate.