Stamp of the Day

In December 1941, a few days after the United States declared war, Winston Churchill secretly boarded a British battleship, which made a dangerous 10-day journey to the United States. The journey was so secret that Eleanor Roosevelt later wrote that while President Franklin Roosevelt told her "that we would be having some guests visit us," in …

I'm a longtime member of the intramural softball team fielded by Tufts University's Art History Department. But, as anyone who knows me can attest, I do not have a strong sense of design. This is salient because today's #stampoftheday was the first US stamp to feature an abstract piece of art. A 5-cent stamp honoring "the …

Sometimes a thin stamp contains layers of meaning. Today's #stampoftheday, a 3-cent stamp issued on December 9. 1948 that pictures Joel Chandler Harris, is one of those stamps. Before I started writing this post, I didn't know who Harris was. But it turns out I am indirectly familiar with his work because Harris, who was born …

I haven't thought about Jean Shepherd for a long time. But there was a time - I think it was when I was in junior high school - when, like many adolescent boys in metro New York, I couldn't get enough of him. You may know Shephard are the voiceover of and inspiration for the movie …

Consider the following, which appeared in the December 14, 1952 edition of the Sunday New York Times: "Philatelists, an impatient species in the hobby world, are prone to consider attention to their demands as one of their own special human rights." So wrote Kent Stiles, who from 1937 until his death in 1961 wrote a weekly …

For obvious reasons, the 5-cent stamp honoring "Amateur Radio" that is today's #stampoftheday made me think of the "Brooklyn Pirate Radio Sound Map," an amazing website curated by David Goren, my talented brother-in-law. An award-winning radio engineer, Goren has been tracking these stations since the mid-1990s. In July 2018, he launched the sound map, which now …

We've all been there. Asked to say meaningful and appropriate remarks at some important occasion, we blow it. Maybe we went on too long. Maybe we said something we shouldn't have. Maybe we were expressing some unresolved anger. Or maybe we were deliberately expressing our hostility. If it's any solace, Mark Twain has been there as …

What do I "want" to say about New Jersey? And what "should" I say about the "Garden State." I ask, in part, because on December 18, 1787 New Jersey became the third state to ratify the U.S. Constitution, which I mark with today's #stampoftheday, a 5-cent stamp, issued in Jun 1964 to commemorate the 300th anniversary …

"From a distance the world looks blue and green And the snow-capped mountains white." I don't know if the iconic picture of "Earthrise" taken from Apollo 8 on December 24, 1968 inspired Julie Gold to write "From a Distance" in 1985. But, I always think of that image when I hear it. From a distance the ocean meets …