Are you old enough to remember paperboys? I am. So I smile when I look at today's #stampoftheday, a 3-cent stamp, issued in 1952 in honor of America's newspaper boys. Or as the stamp say, it's "in recognition of the important service rendered their communities and their nation." The stamp itself merits a closer look. The …
Topic: Culture & Society
Exploring Americana artifacts and other obscure areas of US history
It is oddly appropriate that I am writing today's #stampoftheday while sitting on my back patio, having just returned from a wonderful and bucolic week on a lightly settled pond in Liberty, Maine. Oddly appropriate because the 3-cent stamp, which was issued in 1952, commemorates the 100th anniversary of the founding of the American Society …
"Law and Order" is one of the most contentious - perhaps even one of the most noxious - political phrases of the last few decades. So I was stunned, when, while looking for something else in one of my late father's stamp albums, I found it on a 6-cent stamp issued in May 1968. The stamp …
Believe it or not, chicken is the focus of today's #stampoftheday, which is a posting I've been looking forward to since I first saw this stamp in my late father's albums. A 3-cent stamp, issued on September 9, 1948, it commemorates 100 years of the poultry industry. (I have no idea how they concluded that …
When he was a kid in the 1960s, my late brother was very proud of the fact that he could recite, from memory, the following statement: ''Crest has been shown to be an effective decay-preventive dentifrice that can be of significant value when used in a conscientiously applied program of oral hygiene and regular professional …
Unable to find a stamp that was issued today or one that honored someone who was born or died today, I went rummaging in the detritus of my late father's collection and turned up a wonderful gem: a leather postcard from Mohonk Lake, NY mailed on September 20,1907. On its own, the postcard - with its …
The death of loved ones is always painful and, it seems to me, the death of your child is particularly painful because, as my father said to me after my brother died, it seems to violate the natural order of things. The power of such a loss is driven home by today's #stampoftheday, which honors …
Sometimes I don't know what to write about the current #stampoftheday; sometimes I know what to write about but not what to say. Today is one of those days. The topic is obvious because the 4-cent stamp, which was issued on September 22, 1958, celebrates "Freedom of the Press" - an ideal that is again …
Why do we hold onto and cherish artifacts from the past, particularly artifacts connected to our ancestors? That's the question raised by today's #stampoftheday, a 3-cent stamp, issued on September 25, 1939 to commemorate the 300th anniversary of the Stephen Daye Press - the first printing press used in Colonial America. In addition to being …