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What else can I collect?
Like Airplanes? First Flights Covers are For You.
A first flight cover is a cover that has been carried on the first flight between two points and which can be identified as such by either postmarks thereon, or by some special cachet.
In the early days of the development of airmail service in the US, the inauguration of a new air mail route was a major event, often accompanied by ceremonies and souvenirs.
First Flight souvenirs became popular, and both the postal service and the airlines aided collectors by providing special service for First Flight Covers. The dates of first flights on new routes were published. One could submit a cover, marked to show the flight one wanted it carried on, and addressed to General Delivery at the flight terminus, with a return address on the back, and a note "Return to Sender". In the earliest days airline pilots signed such covers. At the originating end of the flight, the post office applied appropriate handstamps and/or cachets, and made sure the covers were placed on the proper flight; at the receiving end such covers were back-stamped to prove they had actually travelled on the designated flight. Finally, the postal clerk on the receiving end would, as requested, return the cover, sometimes with a "Return to Sender" handstamp, but often without, preserving the integrity of the souvenir. Note that nothing like an RPO cancel existed, so the whole arrangement was somewhat a matter of faith. In later days one did not need to use the General Delivery method, the system was more like First Day Covers: one sent the cover to the city of origination, addressed to oneself, and it was cacheted, flown, and forwarded from the flight terminus to the address on the envelope.
They can be a foreign country to foreign country destination.
Batavia to Calcutta (KLM), 1937
First Flight Netherlands Indies 1937 with Scout Stamps.
This cover postmarked June 15, 1937 has a commemorative cachet as the June 16, 1937 first flight to Calcutta, India on a Douglas DC-3.
They can be In Country to different Cities.
Back of cover usually have a receiving date stamp.
Here is a first flight starting at Saipan, Mariana Islands going to Japan.
There are just hundreds of destinations. Charlston, SC to Columbus, Georgia. on this one.
What else can I collect?