This 1956 airmail cover
was sent from Burlington, Iowa, to San Francisco, California. It features a
blue and red lozenge border, typical of mid-century airmail stationery. The
circular date stamp marks the departure on June 17, 1956.
The cover is addressed to Geo. D. Austed and includes a signature and purple handstamp from O.J. Hertel, the Burlington Postmaster. This suggests the item might be a philatelic souvenir or a commemorative local mailing.
This First Flight Cover
commemorates the expansion of Air Mail Route A.M. 107 through Muscatine, Iowa.
Postmarked January 9, 1951, it features a distinctive purple "cachet"
illustrating the flight path between Davenport, Iowa, and St. Louis, Missouri.
The envelope is signed by Muscatine Postmaster Albert S. Barry and addressed to Newburgh, New York. It bears two 3-cent commemorative stamps: the 1950 California Statehood Centennial and the Boy Scouts of America issue, totaling the 6-cent airmail rate.
This 1950 philatelic cover commemorates the Cavalcade of Dearborn, a historic civic festival in Michigan. These events often featured parades and historical pageants. The envelope features a black slogan cancel over a 3-cent California Statehood stamp, promoting the event held that October.
On the left, Dearborn Postmaster John A. Vogler personally signed over his official title. This "postmaster-signed" status validate significant local postal events. The piece was sent to Lasus Brothers, a manufacturing chemist firm in Toledo, Ohio.
This fascinating First
Day Cover from August 26, 1985, does more than just commemorate a stamp. It’s a
poignant call to action by the Veterans of World War I of the U.S.A., Inc.,
featuring the 22-cent "Veterans World War I" stamp. The cachet vividly
portrays a "Doughboy" with the powerful plea: "YOU NEEDED HIM
THEN – HE NEEDS YOU NOW."
The urgent purple text,
"PASS HR 1918!", directly advocated for House Resolution 1918. This
legislation aimed to secure crucial service-connected pensions for WWI veterans
and their surviving spouses, highlighting the ongoing needs of those who served
in the Great War, decades after the armistice.
Sent from Yakutat, Alaska, to remote Kokhanok Bay, this cover illustrates the challenges of delivering mail in the vast Alaskan wilderness. Carried by airplane via a "United States Postal Star Route," it is clearly stamped YAKUTAT, ALASKA, OCT 30, 1952. The striking purple "Return to Writer" handstamp, noting an "Unknown" recipient, adds to its unique story by documenting the journey of an undeliverable letter.
Captain Bamburg's
signature at the bottom isn't just a return address; it signifies his role as a
self-censor, a common practice for officers during the war. This ensured that
no sensitive operational details could be accidentally or intentionally communicated,
safeguarding military intelligence. The 6-cent airmail stamp and the legible
1944 postmark further date this artifact, placing it firmly within the crucial
year when the 36th Fighter Group, flying P-47 Thunderbolts, was deeply involved
in the Allied push through Europe after D-Day, providing critical close air
support.
In August 1940, as World
War II intensified in Europe, the S.S. America set sail on its maiden voyage, a
"Neutrality Cruise" through the Caribbean. This postal cover, cancelled
at sea near Puerto Rico, serves as a rare time capsule from that era of
maritime elegance. The striking blue cachet details the ship’s route through
Charlotte Amalie, San Juan, and Havana.
However, the history of this cover is tinged with irony. While the "Sea Post" postmark represents the height of luxury travel, the S.S. America’s career as a civilian queen was short-lived. Just one year after this letter was processed, the ship was stripped of its finery and commissioned into the U.S. Navy as the USS West Point, trading vacationers for thousands of troops. This cover remains a poignant artifact, capturing the S.S. America in its brief moment of peace before it exchanged its white paint for the battleship gray of war.
The Pony Express
(1860–1861)
This stamp celebrates the
100th birthday of the Pony Express. This famous mail service used riders on
horseback to carry letters and news between Missouri and California.
To move the mail fast,
riders worked in a relay team. Each person rode about 75 miles before passing
the mail bag to the next rider. This system cut the delivery time across the
country down to just ten days.
The Pony Express only
lasted for 18 months. It shut down in 1861 as soon as the telegraph was
finished, because messages could then be sent instantly over electric wires.
For a long time, the U.S. Post Office used special train cars to move mail. Inside these "Railway Post Offices," workers sorted letters while the train chugged along the tracks. In the late 1930s, America began building better highways. This gave the Post Office a new idea: why not use buses? They created Highway Post Offices, or HPOs. These were large buses that looked like regular post offices on the inside.
The very first HPO trip
took place on February 10, 1941. It traveled 149 miles between Washington,
D.C., and Harrisonburg, Virginia. More routes soon opened in Indiana and
California. However, when World War II began, the government had to focus on
the war, and the HPO program was paused.
Once the war ended, the HPO service became a huge success. On April 30, 1956, a new route began between Parkersburg and Huntington, West Virginia. This day was called the "First Trip" because it was the very first time a mail bus ever drove that path. The stamp on the envelope says "Trip 2" because these buses worked in pairs. "Trip 1" was the bus going in one direction (like North), and "Trip 2" was the return journey heading back the other way (like South).
Date: October 18, 1889.
Time: 5 PM.
The piece is uniquely
valuable because it features signatures from both Commanding Officers: Captain
G.H. Howard (Gold Crew) and Captain Paul L. Callahan (Blue Crew). This
highlights the Navy’s two-crew system, which ensures continuous strategic
deterrence by swapping personnel while the submarine remains on patrol.
For collectors, this
cover represents more than just a hobby; it is a tangible piece of Cold War
naval history.
This Cacheted Naval Event Cover is a remarkable historical artifact from July
15, 1976, capturing the peak of the United States Bicentennial and Operation
Sail '76. Postmarked aboard the USS Constitution (Old Ironsides), the cover
features a classic Type 9 naval cancellation, where the "killer bars"
used to void the postage stamp explicitly display the ship's name.
The cover is particularly
notable for its "Posted on Board" status, indicated by the red
rectangular cachet from the STS Sir Winston Churchill. This British sail
training schooner was a key participant in the International Sail Training Race
No. 4, a transatlantic journey from Boston to Plymouth, England. The presence
of multiple cachets—including the blue oval race details and the Boston
commemorative graphic—marks this as a dual-ship souvenir, documenting the
collaborative maritime spirit between the U.S. Navy and international merchant
sailing vessels.
For collectors, this piece is a "Grade A" specimen due to its crisp markings and the specific narrative it follows. Addressed to West Germany, the envelope traveled as part of the very history it commemorates, serving as a tangible link to the 1976 Fleet Review. It stands as a "maritime time capsule," preserving the moment when the world’s most famous wooden warship and a modern British trainer united to celebrate 200 years of American history and the enduring legacy of the high seas.
Few vessels have
revolutionized naval history quite like the USS Nautilus (SSN-571), the world's
first operational nuclear-powered submarine. Pictured here on a commemorative
philatelic cover, we see a snapshot of a significant moment: April 9, 1979, the
day the Nautilus embarked on its "Final Trip from Groton, CT." The
striking green cachet, merging the submarine's silhouette with an atomic
symbol, perfectly captures the essence of this pioneering vessel.
This "Bon
Voyage" cover marks the end of an era for a true engineering marvel. After
25 years of groundbreaking service, the Nautilus was heading to California for
decommissioning, closing a remarkable chapter in its operational life. Today,
the USS Nautilus has returned to Groton, Connecticut, where it stands proudly
as a museum ship, continuing to inspire awe and educate visitors about its
pivotal role in the Cold War and beyond.
This commemorative envelope was
issued to celebrate the first mail run of the 1980 season for the Detroit River
Mail Boat Service. This unique postal operation is famous for being the only
floating ZIP code (48222) in the United States, utilizing the tugboat J.W.
Westcott II to deliver mail to massive freighters while they are still in
motion. The envelope features a "cachet" (the artwork on the left)
provided by the Motor City Stamp & Cover Club, which depicts the small mail
boat alongside a towering freighter to illustrate the "mail-in-the-pail"
delivery method.
The postmark is dated April 9,
1980, marking the official start of that year's delivery season after the
winter ice had cleared from the Great Lakes. To make it a true collector's
item, it includes both a standard circular date stamp and a special pictorial
cancellation—the ink illustration over the 15-cent flag stamp—which features a
ship and the text "Since 1855." These specific markings verify that
the envelope was actually processed through the Detroit Marine Post Office on
that historic day rather than just being a souvenir print.
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LAST DAY OF CANAL ZONE (US) POSTAL SERVICE : 30.09.1979 1904-1979 |
