Travel Luggage Label Collector Mike Morant Interview

Mike Morant is a U.K-based collector of luggage labels. He specializes in the digital restoration and documentation of archive transport material from negatives and color slides. He recently took time to explain this very interesting area of ephemera.

ephemera: When did your passion for luggage label collecting begin?

Morant: My introduction to the genre came in the mid-50s, when I was 13 years old. My interest is primarily in the British railway variety prior to 1923, which is known as "the pre-grouping era". A fellow railway enthusiast gave me some North London Railway luggage labels that he’d collected from a station in East London. I was fascinated by them, and I was determined to collect them in my travels.

Except for a small box full of spares, I eventually swapped my collection for some photographic negatives of steam trains in 1968. That, however, was perhaps the beginning rather than the end of this particular collecting bug. I left the spares in the care of my brother until the year 2000. I’d recently met a luggage label dealer, and he guided me through what had by that time become a well-organized hobby. Subsequently, our tables were turned, and I became his labels guru as well as the compiler of his quarterly postal auction catalogs.

ephemera: What challenges or obstacles do you encounter in collecting? How do you overcome these challenges?

Morant: The biggest obstacle is learning about the genre. There was a guide on the subject that dates from 1982, but it could well be out of print. It helps to have an innate understanding of what the railways’ histories comprise and an in-depth knowledge of one’s native topography is undoubtedly useful. The next challenge is to find out who collects what and who deals in what. Neither is an easy task.

The more one collects a specialization then the more difficult it becomes to acquire that extra something that has so far eluded one’s grasp. It seems simple, but it is often difficult to know where to stop.

When people hear that I collect luggage labels they automatically think that I spend life collecting old items of luggage and steaming/soaking the labels off them. Nothing could be further from the truth. One of the objectives of every label collector is to collect pristine examples in as close to newly printed condition. And that’s largely achievable.

ephemera: What are your favorite items in your collection, and how/why do they inspire you?

Morant: The glib answer is that my favourites haven’t yet been collected! And that’s because they’re scarce. Frustratingly, many have passed through my hands whilst compiling auction catalogs or valuing others’ collections.

I collect British railway luggage labels and yet one of favourites is foreign to the British Isles. I was thrilled to acquire this example. What sets it apart is that the letter ‘a’ has been transposed from the second syllable to the first. The aficionado’s bonus is the overstamp which indicates that the original collector acquired it prior to 1933 when Exeter Queen St. station was rebuilt and renamed during which period all traces of the past were disposed of. 

The Great Eastern Railway wouldn’t normally fall within my specialized collecting area, but Croydon does. This is an unusual destination for a luggage label. It is the only example of which I’m aware to Central Croydon.  Another is a French label to a British destination. It is unusual for many reasons. It is addressed to the South Eastern Railway (SER), which dates it to prior to 1899 from when that railway ceased to exist with that title. In addition, the SER was unique in label terms insofar as it and its successor became the only railway that never identified itself on its own labels and so an example that does so is, indeed, in hen’s teeth territory.

My specialized areas of label collecting are the south of England, London Transport, and north of Hadrian’s Wall. With the exception of the SER which never titled its labels all others were meticulous in doing so. Another label I like is titled with the abbreviated forms of two railway titles. The label probably dates from the first decade of the 20th century, although the service, suspended during war periods, continued right up until the mid-60s.  

One of my earliest and most prolific forays into label collection was on a Scottish holiday in 1959 when I ‘raided’ the facilities at Perth and Ayr. I was immediately attracted to the Caledonian labels because of their colors, ranging from pink to a rich purple, and the balanced design. It’s those spares that formed the basis of my revived collecting bug in 2000. I thought that I had nearly a complete set of Perth labels, but that turned out to be not quite so. I found out that there was a rare example to Balquhidder, which differed considerably from the one I had. I was delighted to acquire this example in 2006. ephemera: Those are amazing labels. Thank you for sharing them here. You’ve obviously had a lot of success in acquiring these important items.

ephemera: What’s your advice to achieving success as a luggage label collector?

Morant: Understand your personal reasons for taking up the hobby in the first instance, and avoid willy-nilly collecting, as it serves only to confuse once the collection has grown. The latter is particularly applicable to British railway luggage label collecting as there are tens of thousands of different examples and most cost just a few pence each.

Newly discovered material, even as relatively old as this genre, constantly creep out of the woodwork, often in the form of part of an estate after death, and one has to keep one’s eyes open for items that are more often than not simply consigned to the garbage. So, keep your eyes open.

A major consideration is the responsibility of archival storage, although it’s rarely taken into consideration, and I was no exception. Quality archival storage is expensive!

ephemera: This has been an eye-opening and educational experience, Mike. I had no idea that this area of collecting was so interesting and complex. I’m sure that other collectors will find this interview to be a very enlightening read.