First stamp scan with my new scanner - and happy Thanksgiving

Yesterday I bought an Epson V600 scanner. It got high marks in reviews. As I continue to catalog and blog about my stamp collection, I plan to do many more scans of stamps and covers. Plus, I have thousands of personal prints, slides, and negative film to start scanning for a digital archive, and one nice thing about this scanner is that it will do all three of those media. I was debating whether to wait to see whether a better price became available during the holiday shopping season, but by asking a customer rep online I was able to get a 10% discount, so I bought it while it was in stock at my local office supplies store.

Here is my first scan of a stamp and its souvenir sheet, the same Moldovan stamp that was on the maxicard from my last blog. I used a black backing paper to better show the perforations. I am very satisfied with the result!

Moldova 2016 stamp and souvenir sheet - Struve Geodetic Arc

I did not note in my last blog the rich content on this stamp and sheet. The inscription on the stamp itself indicates the country, year of issue, and denomination (there are currently about 17 lei to the U.S. dollar, so this stamp is equivalent to about 35¢). The vignette (image) on the stamp shows the triangulation survey through Moldova, the capital Chișinău and the Rudi Geodetic Point from the survey. There is an image of World Heritage Site memorial obelisk, and its latitude and longitude (although by my calculation those coordinates are 4 km off from the location shown on Google maps).

On the remainder of the souvenir sheet, you can also see: the meridian at 26°43' east longitude; the full survey transect which nearly followed this meridian; an image of the intrepid surveyor Struve; vintage theodolite and transit level surveying equipment; the names of the ten countries transected; and the UNESCO World Heritage Site icon. Nicely done!

To those celebrating, Happy Thanksgiving. Here is my wild turkey Wildlife Conservation stamp (1956, Scott 1077), heavily cancelled, from my childhood collection.  Gobble gobble!

Wild turkey portrayed on one of three U.S. wildlife conservation stamps, 1956