Zeppelin Weltfahrten 1

Zeppelin world journeys 1

Issued by: Greiling
No. in set: 265
Date of issue:

This series traces the history of German airships from the first airship LZ1 built in 1899, through the first world war to the Graf Zeppelin LZ127 (named after Count (Graf) Zeppelin who pioneered this form of transport). The set includes photos of several long-distance journeys made by the LZ127.

As well as many historical pictures of Zeppelins, the set includes views taken from the LZ127 on the various journeys. Despite their small size, the pictures are very detailed. It was originally possible to buy a viewer to examine the cards more closely. Illustrated on the left is a picture of the alabaster mosque in Cairo roughly full size (i.e. the full size of the card, not the mosque:-) complete with shadow of the LZ127, and on the right, a detail from the card.

		There are at least six different backs to this set. One version notes there are 264 real silver bromide photos in the set (echte Bromsilber-Fotos). A variation of this has real (echte) underlined. Both give the album price as 75 Pfennigs.
		The second version is the same as above except that the album price is given as M1.25
		The third version notes 265 photos in both the underlined and non-underlined versions. The album price is still M1.25. An album may also be obtained by sending in 200 cards or 300 vouchers.

The different numbers appear to arise from the inclusion of an embossed metal foil replica of a special Zeppelin coin in the set, card 177. There are actually only 264 photos in the set but due to the coin in the middle they are numbered up to 265. I don't know whether the first version noted 264 and was later changed to 265 to reflect the 265 different cards, or whether first version was 265 and was changed to 264 because there are only 264 real photos. I suppose really it should say 264 photos and a replica coin but there probably wasn't enough space on the cards for all that. The album notes there are 264 photos and a metal foil coin.