As well as the Eiffel Tower, the renovated Paris Musée de la Poste also has its own ATM issue. Another good idea from La Poste, in a move that could be followed at other unique locations.

Introduction. The La Poste museum in Paris

The Musée postal de France (The Postal Museum of France) was opened on June 4th 1946 at the Hôtel de Choiseul-Praslin, Paris. The first curator of the museum, until 1955, was the postal historian Eugène Vaillé. A stamp, an ATM issue, and some commemorative postmarks were dedicated, in September 2009, to Eugène Vaillé, on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of his death (see article Phila Ouest 2009 - Poitiers >>>, also published in VARIABLE 14). The association Société des amis du musée de la Poste (SAMP) was also created in 1946, to help in managing the museum.

The space in the first museum was very limited, so a new building was built between 1969 and 1972, in the Boulevard de Vaugirard, Paris, close to the Tour Montparnasse.

The new Musée de la Poste, with the prominent front wall (see also the picture below), is a work of the architect André Chatelin, and was inaugurated on December 18th 1973.

The museum is dedicated to the preservation and promotion of postal heritage. It has 15 exhibition rooms on 5 floors, 11 devoted to permanent collections and 4 for temporary exhibitions, plus a documentation centre, a library, and an auditorium. A shop specializing in postally related products and a point of sale for philatelic products (l'Espace Timbres) are located in the entrance hall. During the year, the La Poste museum organizes cultural and educational activities, workshops, displays and lectures.

The new issue L'ADRESSE MUSÉE DE LA POSTE

	After some months remodelling different permanent exhibition spaces, and the commercial and access zones in the hall, the so-called 'opération Image' finished on October 20th 2009, with the introduction of the new name and graphic image of the museum. The new name, L'Adresse Musée de La Poste, claims to be the symbol of the museum’s evolution, making it more open to art and culture.
	A postal kiosk IER - LISA 2 Évolution was installed in the Espace Timbres, in the entrance hall, and became operational on August 11th 2009. During the first few weeks, the machine issued ATMs or vignettes d'affranchissement using rolls of the definitive design - Paper planes, but from October 20th 2009 it was fitted with rolls of new labels with a special design, related to the museum.

The design of the special issue is by Valérie Besser, and depicts the malle-poste berline or horse-drawn postal carriage. This is also the subject of the different illustrated permanent postmarks used in recent years at the museum’s philatelic point.

The malle-poste berline or horse-drawn postal carriage depicted in the ATM, the new illustrated postmark (left picture), and the maximum card (right picture), was used in France from 1873 for mail transport. This carriage has the capability to include an additional box in the back, where a postal employee sorted the collected mail during the trip.

The rolls of labels were manufactured by Phil@poste using offset printing on self-adhesive thermal paper. The label size is 80 x 30 mm., and incorporates a phosphorescent vertical strip at each edge of the design. The first printing was 20,000 labels - 20 rolls of 1,000 labels.

The thermal printing IER - LISA 2 postal kiosk, installed in the museum hall, is programmed with the new extended postage rate programme (more information in the article devoted to the ATM issue Tour Eiffel >), so on the first day of issue (see receipt, right picture), it was possible to obtain ATMs with up to 12 different texts or imprints, as well as face value stamps (with no text) (0,51 EUR ECOPLI - 0,56 EUR LETTRE PRIORITAIRE - 1,50 EUR MINI MAX - R L1 4,36 EUR AR - R L2 4,96 EUR AR - R L3 5,86 EUR AR - 0,70 EUR INTERNATIONAL DOCUMENT PRIORITAIRE - 3,50 EUR INTERNATIONAL MARCHANDISE PRIORITAIRE - 6,00 EUR INTERNATIONAL DOCUMENT PRIORITAIRE R1 AR - 7,00 EUR INTERNATIONAL DOCUMENT PRIORITAIRE R2 AR - 8,80 EUR INTERNATIONAL MARCHANDISE PRIORITAIRE R1 AR - 9,80 EUR INTERNATIONAL MARCHANDISE PRIORITAIRE R2 AR). Since the philatelic point of sale in the museum only accepts basic mail, letters and postcards, any packages and registered mail must be delivered to the nearby La Poste post office - Paris Bienvenue.

Inland economic mail - ECOPLI	Inland priority mail - LETTRE PRIORITAIRE
International priority mail INTERNATIONAL DOCUMENT PRIORITAIRE	Inland priority mail - Small parcels MINI MAX

 

The new autumn-winter temporary exhibition entitled d'Hermès au sms… ou la saga du message was opened in October 19th 2009. The exhibition is dedicated to explaining the history of 20 centuries of messages and messengers.
	Besides the permanent postmark, the museum also prepares a commemorative postmark, with an adjustable date, for the different temporary exhibitions.

2010. BREGUET XIV

Following the philatelic interest generated by the first special ATM issue for the museum, L'Adresse Musée de La Poste decided to continue with further annual releases. The chosen subject in 2010 was the airmail.
	The new thermal imprint issue was available from October 21st 2010, (one year after the first issue), from the IER LISA 2 postal kiosk installed in the museum entrance hall.

The new design is by Monika Nowacka, from the museum's heritage department, and depicts the side view of a Breguet XIV A2 plane, number 189, registration F-AEIZ. The same plane also appears in the airmail stamp published in 1997 by the French post office (see picture below).

The Breguet XIV made its first flight in 1916. It was used during the First World War as a military aircraft. Since 1919, the Lignes Aériennes Latécoère - later Compagnie Générale Aéropostale-, acquired some of these aircraft for the new airmail route between France and Africa. Over 8,000 aircraft of this type were manufactured between 1917 and 1926, of which over 200 were in use, shipping airmail, between 1919 and 1934.

As in the 2009 issue, the rolls of labels were manufactured by Phil@poste and used offset printing on self-adhesive thermal paper. The label size is 80 x 30 mm., and incorporates a phosphorescent vertical strip at each edge of the design. In view of the number of rolls actually used during the previous year, the total printing was reduced to 15,000 labels - 15 rolls of 1,000 labels.

According to current postage rates and the IER LISA 2 postal kiosk tariff program, on the date of issue, the basic postage rates for the first weight step, excluding registered shipment options, are: - Domestic mail: 0.53 EUR LETTRE ECO (economic mail up to 20 g.); 0.58 EUR LETTRE PRIORITAIRE (high-priority mail up to 20 g.); 1.50 EUR MINI MAX (high-priority shipping option for small packets, up to 2 cm. thick and weighing up to 1 kg). - For international mail (postage rates for shipments to the European Union and Switzerland): 0.75 EUR LETTRE PRIORITAIRE INTERNATIONALE (high-priority mail up to 20 g., documents) - 2.00 EUR PETIT PAQUET PRIORITAIRE INTERNATIONALE (high priority mail up to 100 g., merchandises). In 2009, to avoid printing large quantities of 0.01 EUR labels, the machine official programmed a minimum face value equal to the current postage rate for inland economic mail (0.51 EUR at that time). Despite the change in postage rates, in July 2010, this minimum value was kept and became the minimum face value available on the date of issue of the new design.

Minimum face value programmed	Inland economic mail - LETTRE ECO
Inland priority mail - LETTRE PRIORITAIRE	International priority mail LETTRE PRIORITAIRE INTERNATIONALE
Inland priority mail - Small parcels MINI MAX (version 1)	Inland priority mail - Small parcels MINI MAX (version 2 - change in programmation)
International priority mail - Merchandises up to 100 g. PETIT PAQUET PRIORITAIRE INTERNATIONAL

	L'Adresse Musée de La Poste made available to collectors a special dated postmark illustrated with a l'Aéropostale pilot profile, so appropriate to the new issue theme. The design is also by Monika Nowacka.

Maximum cards created for the Breguet XIV ATM issue

2011. Rural postman on bicycle, 1894 (Facteur rural à bicyclette 1894)

On October 20th 2011, coinciding with the 2nd anniversary of its renovation, L'Adresse Musée de La Poste put the third special ATM issue, for the museum, on sale.
	As usual, the issue is available for one year, until October 2012, but only from the IER LISA 2 Évolution postal kiosk installed in the entrance hall.

For the new release, the museum has chosen the image of a 1894 rural postman on a bicycle, from the institution's archives. This is the contribution by L'Adresse Musée de La Poste to the 150th anniversary of the velocipede, which incorporated the pedals, and was created and produced by Pierre Michaux and his son Ernest in 1861. It can be considered the origin of modern bicycles. Through a circular, dated 1893, the French postal administration encouraged rural postmen to use this means of transport on their collection and delivery routes.

The ATM composition and design is by Bruno Ghiringhelli. It reproduces the image of a rural postman, with blue jacket, on a bicycle, which also appears on the 'Journée du Timbre' stamp released of 1972 (Yvert 1710 - images below), by the French engraver and designer Jean Pheulpin (1907-1991), with some modifications ...

	The most striking change is, without doubt, the removal of the pipe that the postman in the original 1972 design is smoking, both in the stamp and the postmark, as can be seen in the different images. This is as a direct consequence of the 'Loi Évin', a law enacted in 1991 by the former Minister for Health Claude Évin, which prohibits any direct or indirect favourable advertising of tobacco consumption and alcoholism. The pipe does not appear in the special date postmark design for the ATM (images below). A similar history can be found on the stamp issued in 1996, commemorating the 20th anniversary of the death of André Malraux. In this case, La Poste used and modified the well-known portrait taken by Gisèle Freund in 1935, removing the cigarette from the mouth of the French novelist and politician.

The rolls of self-adhesive labels were manufactured by Phil@poste on thermal paper using offset printing. The label size is 80 x 30 mm., and incorporates a phosphorescent vertical strip at each edge of the design. The total production for this design was 20,000 labels - 20 rolls of 1,000 labels.

The images show the ATMs with the face values ​​of the first weight step for the most common text and shipment types, both for domestic and international mail, with the current postage rates on the date of issue. On that date, the minimum programmed value in the IER LISA 2 postal kiosk installed in the museum was 0.55 EUR, the current national rate of economic mail.
	Inland economic mail - ECOPLI
Inland mail - LETTRE VERTE	Inland priority mail - LETTRE PRIORITAIRE
International priority mail LETTRE PRIORITAIRE INTERNATIONALE	Inland priority mail - Small parcels MINI MAX
International priority mail - Small parcel PETIT PAQUET PRIORITAIRE INTERNATIONAL	Registered domestic mail, first security level R L1

 

	Maximum cards created with the Facteur rural à bicyclette 1894 ATM issue