S21 - World Space Week First Day - The Big Mistake

Thanks to our European correspondent, we now know that UNPA New York made a big mistake. The first day of the S21 United Nations personalized sheet is 4 October 2007. The sheets sent to Jim Matyasovich by UNPA New York have a 25 October 2007 (see my 13 December 2007) post. Unfortunately, while this may be the first day of the "Space for Humanity - 50th Anniversary of the Space Age" stamps, it is not the first day for the World Space Week personalized stamps.

So to summarize; October 1st was originally projected in a press release about one month earlier, as the first day of release. October 4th was the opening date of the Space Week Conference and official first day of release in Vienna. Our correspondent picked up his sheets at the Vienna UNPA counter in the afternoon of October 5th and the cancelled sheets had the date 4.10.2007. October 25th was the first day of issue of the "Space for Humanity - 5oth Anniversay of the Space Age" stamps and souvenir sheets.

Needless to say, Jim is returning the the personalized sheets with the 25.10.2007 Vienna working day cancel, and has asked to have them replaced by sheets with a 4.10.2007 Vienna working day cancel. If anyone else has received these sheets with the wrong first day cancel, they should be returned to UNPA for immediate replacement. They are nothing more than used stamps dated three weeks after release.