Telling & Circulating History on Stamps

Sheila A. Brennan, PhDAssociate Director of Public Projects, Center for History and New Media, GMUConstructing & Circulating Historical Narratives on Stamps

Federal govt in the history bizNew Deal, NPS?USPOD Worlds FairCommemoratives?

US Post Offices for Distribution189062,401190076,688191059,580192052,6411921Philatelic Agency opens to handle philatelic requests193049,063194044,024

Statistics drawn from: USPS, Publication 100: The United States Postal Service - An American History 1775 2006 (Washington, DC, May 2007) http://www.usps.com/cpim/ftp/pubs/pub100/pub100_075.htm.

Stamps, miniature memorials & types of federal documents

John Wanamaker, Postmaster Gen

Columbians, 1st set of commems

Collectors

Organizing into clubsDefining practicesEncouraging others to collectExhibiting their collectionsPublishing journals & newsletters1864-1906: 900+ stamp papers published in US alone, hundreds more from around world

Popularity in Periodicals, Newspapers

Popularity, Books

Fairs: Conquest, Technology

Fairs Anniversaries

What of Attucks & Douglass?

Chicago Defender, May 9, 1925, A10.

War Heroes from Poland

Stamp Content Matters

Chicago Defender, June 7, 1930, 14.

Army-Navy Series

Imagery & Content on Stamps Matters Why should such men, fighting for the principle contrary to our present standard of life and liberty, be given honors in advance of an individual who gave her services freely for the cause of freedom for all of the peoplemen and women alike? Letter, Sue Brobst (Business Womens Legislative Council of CA) to Postmaster General James A. Farley, June 1, 1936.

It is absurd that these men should be commemorated when you refuse to have such a great and noble person as Susan B. Anthony commemorated. Letter, Olive E. Hurlburt (National Womens Party) to James A Farley, June 9, 1936.

Susan B. Anthony, 1936 16th Anniversary of Suffrage

Stamp as Political Victory

Maj. Richard Robert Wright

Booker T. Washington, 1940Famous American Series, Educator

Celebrating Different Images of Washington

Atlanta Constitution, April 8, 1940,2. Los Angeles Times, April 5, 1940, 32.

75thAnniversary 13th Amendment 1940

Stamp used totalk about present:preparing for war.

ResourcesProquest databases of historic newspapers & American periodicalsGoogle Books holds many gems on collecting.Smithsonian National Postal MuseumArago, digital collections database: http://arago.si.eduStamp design filesPhilatelic Journal collectionsMy Zotero LibrariesSecondary sources on collecting, generally, & stamp collecting, specifically: http://www.zotero.org/sheila/items/collection/76QGZMR2Primary sources on stamp collecting: http://www.zotero.org/sheila/items/collection/VC59BKW6