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In the second half of the 19th century, the Pacific Steam Navigation Company almost entirely controlled the postal operations between or from Chile, Peru, and Ecuador via Panama to the United States or Europe. In a period of expansion of communications all over the globe, that particular company dominated the Pacific coastline of Central and South America. We follow Mike Roberts, the author, as he introduces his work on the RPSL website:

The book is intended to give a broad commercial background to this historic Steam Ship Company and it is hoped will appeal to some outside the narrower philatelic world.  Having set a broader scene I then set about updating all the philatelic and postal history data before applying this to the known examples in each of the relevant categories whether they be the “VAPOR” marks, the numbered hand stamps or the postage stamps themselves.

I have tried to incorporate all the necessary tools for the postal historian to be able to analyse existing and new material, thus a full list of vessels, vessel movement, timetables and postal rates are all included.  The additional chapters concerning the development of company contracts,  British Post Offices on the west coast of South America, cargo services and publicity help to give the fullest picture and give the reader some knowledge of the non-philatelic material available to the collector. 

The book was presented to the public during the 2nd Crawford Festival in June.
You may order a copy here: https://members.rpsl.org.uk/Shop/product/250

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