The usually amicable but currently strained relations between the US and Canada are celebrated in today’s #stampoftheday, a 13-cent stamp, issued in 1977.

The stamp, which commemorates the 50th anniversary of the Peace Bridge linking Buffalo, NY and Fort Erie, Ontario, comes from the part of my late father’s collection that consisted of folders and manila envelopes full of blocks and sheets stamps from the 1960s to the 1990s that he bought but never mounted or organized. My sister and I now are having great fun using those stamps and, I think recipients are also getting a kick out of the unusual stamps as well.

As for subject of today’s stamp, the bridge, which was dedicated on August 7, 1927, carries more traffic than any other bridge between the two countries, It’s also one of the oldest cross-border bridges. My admittedly limited research found the Peace Bridge is older than all of the other well-known crossings such as the Ambassador Bridge near Detroit (1929), the Rainbow Bridge near Niagara Falls (1941), the Sault Ste. Marie International Bridge (1962). I did turn up several older railway bridges and one vehicular bridge, the Fort Frances-International Falls International Bridge which connects Fort Frances, Ontario and International Falls, MN and was built in 1912.

The Peace Bridge was needed to address longstanding problems with the border crossing. In the 1800s, ferries frequently crossed the Upper Niagara River between Fort Erie, Ontario, and Buffalo, New York. However, too many boats at once created a bottleneck and strong currents and ice made passage dangerous during several months of the year. Things improved after the opening of a railway bridge in 1873, but by the early 1900s, they worsened because the railway bridge cars, trucks, or pedestrian or car crossing.

In the 1920s, business leaders in the area began to campaign for a new, toll-funded bridge. In 1925 it was approved by International Joint Commission, which established by the US and Canada in 1909 to manage the waters that separate the two countries. Building the just over mile-long million bridge was challenging because it spans fast moving water, with a current of up to 12 miles per hour. The completed bridge cost about $4.5 million (about $65 million in today’s dollars).

The official opening ceremony was an international affair that drew over 100,000 spectators on Buffalo’s west side, who were entertained by three military bands and 200 singers. The ceremony, which was broadcast on dozens of radio stations, was one of the first “round the world” radio broadcasts, reaching as far away as Australia and drawing as many as 50 million listeners. Attendees and listeners heard a host of blandly innocuous speeches celebrating more than a century of peace between the two countries made by a variety of luminaries. US Vice-President Charles Dawes, for example, noted that “we speak the same language, we cherish the same ideals of citizenship, [and] we hold a common principle in government, of individual liberty under the law.” Our shared heritage and values, he added, “bind us together” in an “unbroken tie…[that] will never break.”

While not broken, of course, those ties currently are frayed. Concerned by the US’s inability to control the pandemic, the Canadian government has wisely imposed stringent restrictions on once freer-flowing border crossings. And, of course, in the midst of the worst economic downturn since at least the Great Depression, President Trump this week ratcheted up trade tensions by unexpectedly imposing new tariffs on Canadian aluminum.

Here’s hoping that Dawes was right and that while the bonds may be strained, they won’t break entirely.

Be well, stay safe, fight for justice and work for peace.