I hope I am not wrong in stating that this is the biggest single holding of the 1925 Lambert shipping labels. My attention was directed to this collection after I uploaded a 28-label collection last month. There is no intent on my part to belittle the first collection with its 33 labels as against the 61 in the this collection.  Without doubt both complement each other. Both provide valuable insight as to how the Lambert Sales Co. used the security stamps.

Bill Grimaud in his article entitled PHILIPPINE IMPERFS INTENDED TO CURB THEFTS (published by Linn's Stamp News, February 26, 1988) state that the "It is estimated that 80 percent of the total postal value of the 1925 issue was used by the Lambert Sales Co. to send registered packages from the Philippines to the United States between June 22 and Oct. 26, 1925. The last known package shipment date recorded is Oct. 21."

The first collection that I uploaded amended  from October 21 to October 26  the last known package shipment date. This is  verified by the second collection through four October 26 primary shipping labels. Although the labels in the two collections do not have date cancels, their Certificate of Origin and Package Numbers confirm the fact that they were indeed used on the said date. Likewise, the  presence or absence of similar shipping date labels on both collections provide us an idea as to what dispatch dates are scarce, very scarce or even rare. 

I hope that with two Lambert collections on hand, someone from the Philippine collecting community will be tempted to do a survey to find out how many of these labels have survived the test of time. I will try to track as many as I can.  There are four labels in the collection entitled Commercial Security Stamps of the Philippines (primary labels for July 2, August 9 and August 29 shipments and one undated supplementary label) If you have any in your collection please advise me of its Certificate of Origin number, Manila Registry Number and Package Numbers.

There are still so many things that need to be studied about the Lambert issue. I might sound like a broken record already but I must say again that the hobby will never advance if collections (and even collectors) are kept locked in a closet.

Thank you

A. Luspo, Jr.