Smallest Stamps
p. 67 · Read in the full issue
Issuing Community
rE question of which is the smallest stamp-issuing com munity in the world has been resolved by Sir Harry Luke (former Governor of Fiji) in a letter pub lished by the BBC’s Radio Times.
He writes:— “I rejoiced, as a former High Commissioner for the Western Pacific, at the mention by ‘The Eye- Witness’ (May 27) of the magnific ently loyal and all-too-little-known community of the Tokelau Islanders, formerly included in the Gilbert and Ellice Islands Colony and later transferred for greater adminis trative convenience to the jurisdic tion of New Zealand.
“But the Tokelau Islands cannot claim to be the smallest stamp issuing community in the world, or even in the British Empire, or even in the Pacific. That distinction is held by the British Pacific Colony of Pitcairn, very much smaller, though better known through its settlement by the mutineers of the Bounty. Pitcairn, two square miles m area, inaugurated its first issue of postage stamps in 1941, during my High Commissionership, when its total population was under 200.”
J. S ir Alport Barker may retain the title Honourable for life although he has now retired from Fiii Legislative Council.