Melville, Fred

Melville was born in Edinburgh in the family of Thomas ( Thomas J. Melville ) and Annie ( Annie Melville ) Melville ^[5] . When he was two years old, the family moved to London due to the fact that his father, who worked as a journalist, became a correspondent in the House of Commons from the newspaper ^[6] . Fred had brothers Cecil Balfour, Thomas ( Thomas B. ), William ( William ) and sisters Kate ( Kate ) and Helen ( Helen ; married Helen P. Terry ) ^[5] .

Fred was educated at , where he began publishing the school journal The United Westminster School Field Club Magazine ^{[6] [7]} . His name was always just Fred.

Melville always had poor health, so he did not serve in the army during the First World War.

In addition to philately, Melville was the editor of the publications Heartsease Library , Cozy Corner , and Sunday Magazine . The skills of Melville as a journalist are partly related to the training he received from newspaper tycoon Sir Alfred Harmsworth , later Lord Northcliffe, the founder of The Daily Mirror and Daily Mail ^[6] .

Fred Melville died on January 12, 1940 ^[8] and was buried at the in in London on January 16 ^[6] . He was not married.

As a boy at the age of 11, he begged his father to take him to an exhibition of postage stamps organized by the London Philatelic Society, now the Royal Philatelic Society of London on Arundel Street ^[9] . At the exhibition, he met , who presented him with a copy of The London Philatelist magazine, published by the public ^[10] .

In 1899, the young man submitted an application for admission to the London Philatelic Society, but was refused because he was not yet 18 years old. As a result, in the same year, Fred founded the Junior Philatelic Society (now the ). The society was a huge success, playing on the unmet need for a philatelic society, which everyone can join, and soon the new society had to look for a more spacious meeting place. In 1906, Melville organized the Manchester branch of the company. Melville was the president of the company from the beginning until his death, and he was also the editor of the journal The Stamp Lover, published by the company.

Melville has been active in many areas of philately. He has been a member of the since 1911 ^[11] and has been a member of the jury of many philatelic exhibitions . Melville won the Congress Cup at the in 1935 for his work The Lives of the Forgers , and after the founding of the Postal History Society in 1936. was elected its first president ^[12] . He appears in the 1938 Blue Book of Philately , where he specializes in philatelic literature and has the following home address: 10a Ardberg Road, Herne Hill, London ^[13] .

Melville organized the 1908 Imperial Stamp Exhibition , the War Stamps Exhibition in 1915, and the first APEX international airmail exhibition in 1934. He was also the editor of catalogs of international philatelic exhibitions held in London in 1912 and in 1923 ^[3] . In 1915, Melville organized an exhibition entitled “ War Stamps with Tango Teas” at the Florence Restaurant in London. In addition to the postage stamp exhibition, an orchestra played daily there and, as reported, Melville was “the only one who was not afraid of the intricacies of tango , Boston and the match ” ^[14] .

Mostly a writer and journalist, Melville also traded postage stamps: in June 1920, a full-page ad was published in Stamp Lover magazine offering postage stamps for sale from Fred J. Melville Ltd. ^[6]

In 1941, he was posthumously awarded the honor of being included in the Hall of Fame of the American Philatelic Society . After the death of Melville, the Library of Congress acquired its extensive library of philatelic publications, but in connection with World War II, it was received only in 1947. Today, the Melville Library is split between the Library of Congress and the library of the United States National Postal Museum , part of the Smithsonian Institution Libraries.

Melville has written over 100 books, and his works in English are still among the most common in philately.

In 1897, Fred wrote and independently published an eight-page pamphlet entitled Stamp Collecting , sold for one penny. Fred was so shy about this publication in his more mature years that he bought up all the copies that were on sale, as a result of which this is now a very rare publication ^[7] . In 1899, he became editor of the philatelic section of the small magazine Hardman's Miscellany . Soon after, he began to publish his own magazine, Young Stamp Collector ( Young Stamp Collector ). Six issues of the magazine came out before it merged with Stamp Collectors' Fortnightly (“Two-week stamp collectors”) ^[6] . Melville also wrote philatelic articles for publications such as The Daily Telegraph , , The Straights Times of Singapore , Illustrated London News , ^[6] .

His second philatelic book was The ABC of Stamp Collecting, which was published in 1903, and was awarded a very commendable review in , where it was praised for the “remarkable absence of errors that often found in cheap philatelic guides ”, in spite of one discovered flaw consisting in omitting telegraph and fiscal stamps ^[15] . Its new edition was published in 1922 under the title “The New ABC of Stamp Collecting” . His 1908 book, Postage Stamps worth Fortunes, was translated into Swedish and Dutch ^[16] , and his latest book, Modern Stamp Collecting , was published on May 6, 1940, in the centenary “ Black penny . " Melville was also the editor of Postage Stamp (1909-1929), Stamp Collector's Fortnightly (1921-1939) and British Philatelist (1932-1939). In addition, he wrote the play “The Lady Forger: an original play” (also on the topic of philately), published by the Youth Philatelic Society. The play was first staged in 1906 at the annual event of the Concert-Conversazione Society at the Bijou Theater on Archer Street in London ^[17] . According to Brian Birch, Melville used the pseudonym Miss Fitte , which was a play on words from misfit when he wrote about mistakes on postage stamps ^[5] .

• , Williams M. A "Melville" Bibliography. - L .: HF Johnson, 1941. (Eng.) [Reprint with changes and additions based on publication in the journal: The Stamp Lover , January to May, 1941.]
• Williams LN, Williams M. The Postage Stamp: Its History and Recognition. - Penguin Books, 1956. (English)

• Schofield B. Melville, Frederick John . Who Was Who in Philately: M. L .: (2015). Date of treatment May 4, 2016. Archived April 22, 2016.
• Morgan GH The Philatelic Works of Melville . Site Plan: Publication and Web Reviews: Publication Reviews . stampprinters.info; Glenn H Morgan (2005). Date of treatment December 25, 2016. Archived June 14, 2013.
• Frederick John Melville works in the Gutenberg project .
• The work of Fred Melville or about him in the Internet Archive .