Qatar 1965 Fish Stamps

If you have been following my posts, you know by now, that I like solving mysteries hidden in the stamps. The 1965 issue is one such mystery. If you have ever dived or snorkelled around the Arabian Gulf and around the world, you would quickly realise that the fish portraid in the issue are not endemic in the region.

Click to enlarge

So if the fish are not from the region (see below slide for further information on the fish), why issue a full definitive set with them?

The puzzle becomes even bigger when you realise that aquarium fish exports from the Middle East did not begin for, approximately, another 20 years.

Click to enlarge

But for a long time this was a stumbling block for me. Until I came upon a letter from the Political Agency in the Trucial States (Dubai) which contained a description of the Sharjah 1966 Fish stamps, which also included the basis for the fish images. A series of 4 books by some of the well know marine photographers of the time (see slide below).

Click to enlarge

So, all I had to do is somehow connect the Sharjah 1966 Fish stamps to the Qatar 1965 Fish stamps. The same document describing the Sharjah issue had another letter from the Political Officer in Dubai to the British Foreign Office (London) - Arabic Section describing how the Ruler of Ras al Khaimah was frustrated with a Lebanese Philatelic Dealer by the name of Fuad Antoun (probably the same person that in 1961 was arrested in connection to stamp fraud related to 'Middle East Stamps' (more on this on a later post). This letter (18th of September 1965) stated that on forcing Mr. Fuad Antoun out a Qatari - Sheikh Mohamed Bin Jabber Al Thani was appointed the Stamp Concession (see slide below).

Click to enlarge

Qatar was at the time just about to issue its fish stamps, so it is possible that the concept used for the Qatar stamps was extended to the Sharjah by the hands of the new concessionary. This is more evident when one realises the similarities in the issues of Qatar and Sharjah Fish stamps. Both issues are compressed of 17 stamps in the same format. Both only have 9 different fish repeated throughout the issue. See below slide for the Sharjah & Dependencies Fish issue.

Click to enlarge

By the way, I'm still searching for the FDC of the Qatar 1965 Fish issue - should you happen to have an extra one, for my own collection !!!

Qatar National Day

Today Qatar Celebrates its National Day. A day full of Family Events, Military Parades, Fireworks and much more.

The date has been celebrated since 2007 when it was opted to set the date by an Amiri Decree.

The date has not been commemorated every year by a stamp set, but there have been a number that have:

In 2007 a set celebrating all the Rulers of Qatar was issued (see image below).

Click to enlarge

After this set, there were three stamp issues on the 18th of December, but none celebrating the National Day per se.:

• 2008 - Souq Wakif
• 2009 - Qatar Birds
• 2010 - 35th Anniversary of Qatar News Agency

See image below:

Click to enlarge

Then from 2013 there have been 3 issues released on the 17th of December:

• 2013 - New Definitive Series
• 2015 - National Day
• 2017 - National Day

See the slide below:

Click to enlarge

The last of these is shown below:

Click to enlarge

In 2018 although no stamps were issued, a set of 2 commemorative FDC's was issued.

I Love Qatar - a website devoted to all things in Qatar posted a live video of the Parade on the Cornish, you can see it on (Click here to go to the website).

Qatar - FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022 Issue

Leading to next years' (2022) World Cup, Qatar has been issuing a series of beautiful football themes stamps, which I have posted as they entered service:

1 - World Cup 2022 Stadiums

2 - FIFA Arab Cup Qatar

But the tradition of football in the stamps of Qatar goes way back to 1966 when it issued a set of commemorative stamps for the England World Cup.

Click to enlarge

Later in 1976 issue celebrating the 4th Arabian Gulf Cup which was held in Qatar. The tournament was held at the purpose built Khalifa Stadium. This stadium has gone a massive renovation allowing it to be one of the 8 stadiums that will host the Qatar World Cup 2022.

Click to enlarge

Along the next years a nothing much come out, until when in 2002 a full sheet of stamps was produced containing all the World Cup series posters (from 1930 up to 2002).  This was followed up with another stamp in 2006 for the Germany World Cup. That left three world cup posters for which Qatar had no stamps issued: South Africa 2010, Brazil 2014 and Russia 2018. This omission has now been corrected with todays stamp issue.

Click to enlarge

The reason behind the Concorde's Flight into Qatar in 1974.

Qatar has been at the forefront of aviation in the Middle East from very early on.

As I have previously posted, Qatar began initially subsidising other airlines that flew into Qatar, such as MEA  (click to open a previous post). Then entering in partnership with the other three Gulf States (Bahrain, Oman and UAE) in the launch of Gulf Air. So much so, that Gulf Air’s first flight to London was from Doha (on the 2^nd of  April 1970) not Bahrain (on the 5^th of April 1970) (click to open a previous post).

But it is not until the reading of the letter from the British Embassy and the press release (see image below) that one can realise how much Qatar was helping in the growth of aviation in the region.

Click to enlarge

Perhaps, it is this perception of excess fluidity in the Qatar coffers, that led the British authorities to think that Sheikh Khalifa Bin Hamad Al Thani would be in the market to buy the Concorde to expand Gulf Air's fleet (See image below).

Click to enlarge

So, when the time came to test the aircraft in hot weather and high altitude conditions (a normal part of the test regime in all aircraft even nowadays) the proposal was to try not only to test the aircraft but take advantage and use if for promotional purposes (See image below).

Click to enlarge

The planned route was clearly design to increase sales of the aircraft. The aircraft flew from London to Tehran which had in October 1972 places an order for 2 Concordes. Iran did operate one Concorde on a charter basis and eventually in 1980, during the Iranian revolution, cancelled the order. It is worth noting, that in the late 1970’s Iran Air was the fastest growing airline in the world as well as one of the most profitable and only second to Qantas in safety.

However, as can be see on the route chart for the flight from London to Bahrain and back see slide below), from the very beginning of the operation, the Concorde had a big drawback. Its inability to fly supersonic over large populated areas due to the fear of the damage caused by the sonic boom.

Click to enlarge

This clearly would reduce the interest for the aircraft as a private jet for someone, as the head of state, whose main destinations would be major cities around the world. Hence, the order for the aircraft never came from Qatar.

Both the British and French preproduction aircraft flew through the region during the flight test phase and taking advantage for a promotional campaign (see slide below). So much so, that eventually, the first commercial flight of the British Airways Concorde was to Bahrain (click to open a previous post).

Click to enlarge

As I said on a previous post, nowadays technology has advanced to the point that the sonic boom maybe eliminated altogether or at least reduced to the point that authorities may finally permit the new designs to safely operate supersonically over densely populated areas changing the complete economics of the aircraft. I look forward to seeing these operate from Doha, Qatar.

Qatar - Universal Postal Union Centenary stamp issue

As you probably know by now. My interest is in the history portrait on the stamps of Qatar. Occasionally this will take on an adventure of its own as is the case of the features on the stamps celebrating the Centenary of the UPU displayed below.

Click to enlarge

At a first glance, it all makes sense. but a closer inspection not all is correct.

2 Dirham stamp - Camel riders delivering mail moving to today's trucks. But in Qatar the main form of desert transport has been the horse.

3 Dirham stamp - this is clearly not correct, until now, no train service includes Qatar. I would still appreciate if someone could let me know what are the trains on this stamp.

10 Dirham stamp - P & O ships. These did not have a regular service to Qatar and so were a little hard to track, the lower ship thanks to the American Philatelist and an Indian Post postcard I was able to identify, while the upper ship appears to be the P&O Iberia but probably did not sail through Qatar.

75 Dirham stamp - clearly identifies the old manual mail sorting to todays automated version.

1 Riyal 25 Dirham stamp - from the old scribe involved in reading and writing letters for others to todays standard postal service centres.

Read more on the three main discrepancies on the image below.

Click to enlarge

 

First recorded mail to Qatar

I have been for sometime looking for covers sent to Qatar prior to the establishment of the Political Officer office in May 1950. Clearly no city or country lives in isolation and so there must have been all types of correspondence.

In the 19th century, most of it would have taken the form of scrolls sent by messenger as can be seen on the 1968 Qatar Stamps celebrating the 10th Anniversary of the Qatar Postal Service:

Click to enlarge

In fact, from the scribe reading the letters, to the pigeon mail, camel / horse rider, boat, all these elements must have been part of the mail system. Notice that the 1.25 Riyal stamp not only has the camel rider mailman on the forefront, but in the sky above a jet aircraft can be seen, already the main method for mail worldwide.

Back to the first recorded cover to/from Qatar. Below is one such example. I would like for my readers to send images of any other covers from prior to 1950 to/from Qatar.

Click to enlarge