Isle of Man – Landmarks definitives – ½p–8p – Mercury cover – 1978

First day cover details

FDC image	No image uploaded
FDC reverse image	No reverse image uploaded
Country	Isle of Man
Country code	IM
Issue title	Landmarks definitives – ½p–8p – Mercury cover
Date of issue	28 February 1978
Withdrawal or invalidation date	30 June 1983 (stamps withdrawn from sale); 31 December 1985 (stamps withdrawn from sale)
Stamp type	Definitive
Stamp subtype	Country pictorial
Theme or subject	Isle of Man; landmarks; nature and heritage
Text credit
Designer or artist	J. H. Nicholson, R.I., P.S.
Printer	House of Questa
Printing process	Lithography
Colours	Multicoloured; 4 colours
Paper and gum	White security-coated paper, 102 g/m²; PVA gum
Perforation	14 or 14½ according to the catalogue entry; actual cover stamp perforations unmeasured
Stamp dimensions	26 × 34 mm (orientation varies)
Issue format	Sheets of 50 (arrangement varies by value; see text)
Number of stamps	5
Cover type	Standard cover
Cover producer	Mercury
Cover reference
Limited edition	No
Edition limit	N/A
Copy number	N/A
Cachet or cover design	Colour illustration of the Laxey Wheel with First Day Cover lettering and Mercury emblem.
Addressed	No
Postmark type	First-day-of-issue postmark
Postmark location	Douglas, Isle of Man
Postmark date	28 February 1978
Postmark inscription	FIRST DAY OF ISSUE / 28 FEB 1978 / DOUGLAS / ISLE OF MAN
Postmark notes	Douglas circular first-day cancellation. The shared February image illustrates the standard cancellation design; individual strikes and positions differ.
Postmark image
Signed	No
Signed by	N/A
Signature details	N/A
Information sheet included	Yes
Information materials
Information sheet title
Information sheet image	No image uploaded
Information sheet reverse image	No reverse image uploaded
Information sheet notes
Certificate of authenticity included	No
Certificate of authenticity image	N/A
Certificate of authenticity reverse image	N/A
FDC owned	No
Condition
Collection Comment	Wanted cover; supplied photograph is a private reference, not an owned collection scan.

Image notice: Images on these pages may depict copyrighted stamp designs, cover artwork, text or photographs. Unless otherwise stated, they are scans of physical items in the collection of PhantomSteve. Rights in the depicted material remain with their respective rightsholders. See Copyrights.

This cover belongs to the Landmarks and Queen Elizabeth II definitive series, issued in stages: ½p–16p on 28 February 1978, 20p–£1 on 18 October 1978, and £2 on 29 September 1981.

Illustrated cover

This wanted reference bears 6p, 8p, ½p, 7p, 1p (left to right, reading the rows from top to bottom). Its circular Douglas first-day cancellation is dated 28 February 1978. The example is unaddressed.

The shared February postmark image uses the collector’s filename IM-Landmarks-Feb-1978-postmark.jpg. It illustrates the standard Douglas cancellation and is not claimed to show every individual strike on this cover.

Subjects and production

6p — The official sheet identifies the building as the former Bank of Mona premises, later acquired and extended by the Manx Government. It records Tynwald’s first meeting there in December 1894.

8p — The sheet describes Milner’s Tower on Bradda Head as an 1871 public-subscription memorial to William Milner, a Liverpool safe manufacturer and benefactor of Port Erin. It notes the traditional comparison between the tower’s shape and a safe key, with the Calf of Man visible behind it.

½p — The official sheet calls the structure the Herring (Watch) Tower at Langness. It describes a limestone navigation landmark erected in the early nineteenth century, predating the lighthouse shown behind it.

7p — The sheet describes Tynwald Hill as a four-tiered artificial mound linked by a processional route to St John’s Church. It explains the annual promulgation of laws there on 5 July and the approaching 1979 Tynwald millennium.

1p — The sheet identifies the subject as the church dedicated to St Patrick at Jurby, on an elevated coastal site. It dates the present church’s consecration to 1829 and describes earlier churches on the site.

The official sheet credits J. H. Nicholson, R.I., P.S., and the House of Questa. It specifies lithography, four colours for each value, 26 × 34 mm stamps, and white unwatermarked security-coated paper with PVA gum, 102 g/m². Its perforation specification is 14 per 2 cm. The catalogue additionally lists perforation 14½ for twelve denominations.

The catalogue lists perforations 14 and 14½ for the low and medium values, except the 6p SG113, for which only 14 is supplied. The collector has not measured the illustrated cover stamps, so the actual suffixes are not assigned from appearance, filename or the usual bureau combination.

Perforation and first-day-cover combinations

The catalogue states that both perforations of the ½p–16p stamps were printed at the same time, but some were not recorded in use until later. It gives these earliest recorded uses: SG112a (1p), August 1979; SG114a (7p), August 1978; SG115a (8p), June 1980; SG117a (10p), August 1979; and SG119 (12p), September 1980. Those are earliest-use records, not exact issue dates.

For the three low and medium value FDCs, the catalogue records the common Edinburgh Philatelic Bureau combination as SG111a, SG112–115, SG116a, SG117–118, SG119a, SG120, SG121a, SG122 and SG123a. It also records some examples with SG111, SG118a or SG120a instead. Island-prepared dealer or collector covers are recorded with SG111–118, SG119a–120a, SG121, SG122a and SG123. These are recorded preparation patterns, not a measurement of the collector’s copies.

Sheets, plates and imprints

• ½p: sheets of 50 (10 × 5). Plate numbers: 1A, 1B, 1C and 1D (each × 4). Imprint: Left-hand corner, top margin, and right-hand corner, bottom margin.
• 1p: sheets of 50 (5 × 10). Plate numbers: 1A, 1B, 1C and 1D (each × 4), explicitly for SG112. The 1p listing also records 1A–1A–2A–1A, 1B–1B–2B–1B, 1C–1C–2C–1C and 1D–1D–2D–1D (each × 4); the supplied wording does not explicitly assign those combinations to a perforation. Imprint: Left-hand corner, top margin, and right-hand corner, bottom margin.
• 6p: sheets of 50 (10 × 5). Plate numbers: 1A, 1B, 1C and 1D (each × 4); also 1D–1D–2D–1D. Imprint: Left-hand corner, top margin, and right-hand corner, bottom margin.
• 7p: sheets of 50 (5 × 10). Plate numbers: 1A, 1B, 1C and 1D (each × 4), explicitly for SG114. Imprint: Left-hand corner, top margin, and right-hand corner, bottom margin.
• 8p: sheets of 50 (10 × 5). Plate numbers: 1A, 1B, 1C and 1D (each × 4). Imprint: Left-hand corner, top margin, and right-hand corner, bottom margin.

Withdrawal

6p, 8p, 7p, 1p: withdrawn from sale on 30 June 1983.

½p: withdrawn from sale on 31 December 1985.

No quantity-sold figures are supplied for this series; the sales fields remain blank.

Related covers

• Isle of Man – Landmarks definitives – ½p–8p – Official cover – 1978
• Isle of Man – Landmarks definitives – 9p–12p – Official cover – 1978
• Isle of Man – Landmarks definitives – 13p–16p – Official cover – 1978
• Isle of Man – Landmarks definitives – 9p–12p – Mercury cover – 1978
• Isle of Man – Landmarks definitives – 11p–16p – Mercury cover – 1978
• Isle of Man – Landmarks definitives – 13p–16p – Mercury cover – 1978
• Isle of Man – Landmarks definitives – ½p–10p – Stuart cover – 1978
• Isle of Man – Landmarks definitives – 1p, 7p, 11p and 13p – Church of St Sanctain cover – 1978
• Isle of Man – Landmarks definitives – 20p–£1 – Official cover – 1978
• Isle of Man – Landmarks definitives – 20p–£1 – Mercury cover – 1978
• Isle of Man – Landmarks definitives – 20p–£1 – Stuart cover – 1978
• Isle of Man – Queen Elizabeth II definitive – £2 – Official cover – 1981
• Isle of Man – Queen Elizabeth II definitive – £2 – Mercury cover (Laxey Wheel design) – 1981
• Isle of Man – Queen Elizabeth II definitive – £2 – Mercury cover (map design) – 1981

Stamps on this cover

The stamp images are shared design illustrations from the collector’s owned official covers; they are not scans of the wanted example.

Where two perforations are catalogued, the row’s identifier is left unassigned and the linked alternatives are given in Notes. No suffix is inferred from the scan filename.

Image	Identifier	Face value	Subject	Format	Other catalogues	Notes
	IM-SG-113	6p	Government Buildings, Douglas	Stamp		Scan from the collector’s official cover.
	IM-SG-115	8p	Milner’s Tower, Bradda Head	Stamp		Perforation not measured: IM-SG-115, IM-SG-115a.
	IM-SG-111	½p	Watch Tower, Langness	Stamp		Perforation not measured: IM-SG-111, IM-SG-111a.
	IM-SG-114	7p	Tynwald Hill	Stamp		Perforation not measured: IM-SG-114, IM-SG-114a.
	IM-SG-112	1p	Jurby Church	Stamp		Perforation not measured: IM-SG-112, IM-SG-112a.