Cuba-1927-Plaza Hotel Havana-Advertising Card

Thought I would share this recent purchase

Only picked it up because I had nothing from Cuba in my collection and I liked the look of it

Will have to do a bit of research on it - I believe the stamp is a Sc281 (imperforate)

What you have is a First Flight Cover from Havana to Key West, which was completed on October 29, 1927. (It was rain delayed from October 28, 1927, which explains the Havana postmark date). If you want more information, the cover is referenced at the bottom of page 2 at this link:

http://www.nwpl.org/documents/augus...ectronic.pdf

As for the advertising component for the Plaza Hotel (or Hotel Plaza) it still exists and operates today:

http://www.hotelplazacuba.com/hotel_details.asp

Finally, as it relates to the addressee of the cover, George T. Street, he was a noted correspondent and cover specialist of Cuba and Central American countries back in the day. In fact, you might very well be interested in this bibliographical record of a letter published in the Scott Stamp Journal from 1928:

thanks for the information wt1 especially the pdf link - very much appreciated - I find it fascinating that their is so much history attached to such a little inexpensive cover

Your nice first flight cover is catalog number F4-3 and is the return flight of the Miami to Havana flight, catalog number F4-2. The cachet was applied in three different colors so there are three different varieties of your Havana to Miami cover. The three colors of ink that were used were magenta, blue and violet. What is really interesting about these is they are the very first flights ever flown by what was to become a very famous airline, Pan American. They are quite common flight covers and so are available for very modest prices, but they are interesting because of the Pan Am connection.

Hey Kimo thanks for the additional information - What catalog are you talking about? - I am clueless as to FFCs etc

The American Airmail Catalog. This is compiled and sold by the American Airmail Society which was founded in 1923 and is the primary flight cover and airmail stamp collecting club in the US. Here is a link to their website http://www.americanairmailsociety.org/index.html and you can find the American Airmail Catalogs there. You can also find used copies and older editions of these catalogs on Ebay. I am not positive, but I think that the first editions of the Catalogs were issued around 1940 or so, and they have been periodically updated and refined over the years. The most recent edition is the Sixth edition. These catalogs are the standard ones used for all first flight covers that are inside of the US or related to US airlines flying internationally. They also include other major international first flights such as Zeppelins and others.