PaulPerger

I recently inherited 3 enormous stamp collections (My father's, His father's, and my father's best friend's collection, which he purchased from his widow after his buddy passed) and I now have tens of thousands of stamps to catalog and organize and eventually sell. About 2/3 of the collection is mounted on pages in albums and about 1/3 still needs to be mounted. My Father and Grandfather both cataloged their collections using Lotus 1,2,3 but I have yet to find one of those spreadsheets. I know they existed at one point in time, but the last time I actually saw them working on those databases was 15 years ago. Honestly, even if I had them, I would want a more detailed representation of the collection. What I am hoping to do is find a program which will identify each of the stamps and create entries for each stamp and allow me to store a scan of my copy of the stamps. Ideally, I would like to find a piece of software that will take a single scan with multiple stamps, automatically separate those images into separate entries and allow me to then put in storage location data. I understand that might not be available, but I am at least hoping to find a software that will allow me to enter a scanned image of my copy of each stamp and enter information on where I have stamps stored, for example Binder #, Section #, Page #, Row # & Column #. And then to also run reports based on those, i.e. I want to be able to see a list of stamps on Page #3 from Section#2 of Catalog#45. Of course, valuation is important as well. Also I need an effective way to keep track of where duplicates are located and how many duplicates I have of certain stamps. My Father's collection is 95% foreign stamps, while my Grandfather's is 95% USA Stamps, and his friend's is a complete mashup of all sorts of stamps. Each collection has a unique organization strategy. My Father's International collection is very much organized by country and date with blank spaces for stamps he had yet to catalog or still needed, while Grandpa's collection is organized by subject matter only, Space stamps in one album, Peanuts and other cartoon subject stamps in another, etc. and the friend's collection appears to be by age with no care given to subject or country, but literally just age of the stamp. There are USA stamps right next to stamps from elsewhere, but it seems that all of the stamps on a given page are from the same year. So, I think what I want to do is catalog everything as is and then go about combining the collections in the best manner I can to maximize their value for sale. And I have to admit with the amount of work in front of me... I may just find the enjoyment my forefathers did and wind up keeping it... Can someone tell me what of my desires this software package can do? Or even if this software can do some of them but you know of a different software that can do the other. I.E. if this can do all of the organization pieces but can't do the single scan automatically separating the separate stamps into separate images, but there is another piece of software that can, any and all help will be very much appreciated.