Meet the Owners
David Coogle
Co-Chair
David Coogle, Co-Chairman and managing partner of Daniel F. Kelleher Auctions is one of today’s leading, well-respected professional philatelists, and one of the few remaining vocational stamp dealers. He got his start at the age of 8 when his father, an immigrant barber by trade, attended coin shows on weekends. David’s father collected everything, but coins did not hold David’s interests. At age 13, he helped his father acquire a U.S. stamp collection and was instantly in the philatelic business.
In high school, David worked at the stamp department of Pittsburgh’s well-known hobby shop Bill & Walt’s and later opened a mail-order stamp company that did quite well. He attended the University of Pittsburgh and assisted with Pittsburgh Stamp Company and worked as a principal of Keystone Stamp Auctions, prior to helping start the well-known Nutmeg Stamp Sales auction firm, with Andy Levitt.
With the merger of the H.R. Harmer and Nutmeg stamp companies, David served as President until the merged company’s relocation to the West Coast. Having grown up in the Northeast, David, who had been friends with Stanley Richmond of Daniel F. Kelleher Auctions for over 30 years, decided to return to his philatelic roots, and along with Laurence Gibson, he rejuvenated Daniel F. Kelleher Auctions with an inaugural public auction in New York City in Fall 2010.
Laurence Gibson
Co-Chair
Laurence Gibson started in the stamp business professionally in the early ‘80s with Earl P.L. Apfelbaum. During his 15 years tenure, Laurence co-conducted the APS Stamp Camp seminars for “The Financial Side of Stamps.” For 4-5 years, each year, the course was sold.
He remarks, “I started studying Asian philately then…taking several trips to China in the early 1990s. I was the U.S. correspondent for China Philately, the official Chinese government publication in the mid-80s, and was invited to attend the Beijing show for the 100th anniversary of Chairman Mao’s birth in 1993. I even had dinner in the Great Hall of the People….it was a real experience back in those earlier days! I also wrote articles on Far Eastern philately for Linn’s and Scott Stamp Monthly for their Passage to Asia columns. I did a ton of original research on China, Japan, and other Asian stamps and had many articles published.”
Laurence then went to Michael Rogers, the Far Eastern specialist, in the mid-’90s. With Laurence’s help, Michael dynamically increased his market share and revenue. He oversaw many important “One Owner” sales and brokered the famous “Sun” collection of Red Revenues for $2.5 million to a collector who eventually sold it through another auction firm. Laurence spent over five valuable years with the Rogers business in Winter Park, Florida, before joining the Greg Manning firm in 2003. Six months later, he became the Chief operating officer for Manning’s entire philatelic division. After Greg left, Laurence became CEO of the division. In 2003, he acquired John Bull Public Auctions in Hong Kong for the group and held the title of Managing Director until June 2010, subsequently, he joined Daniel F. Kelleher Auctions as Co-Chairman.