USPS honours American Artist Edward Hopper…

 

Date of Issue : 24 August 2011

Today, the U.S. Postal Service forged ahead with its American Treasures series by issuing the 10th entry, a Forever Stamp featuring Edward Hopper's sailboat painting, "The Long Leg." Hopper's 1935 sunlit painting depicts a boat sailing against the wind near Provincetown, MA.

The oil painting (circa 1935) depicts the coast of the Provincetown area. A boat sailing near the coast can be seen, as well as an isolated house in the background. The work, preserved at the Huntington Library in San Marino, California, is striking due to its use of light. As often in Hopper's oeuvre, light is used to reflect solitude, absence and waiting. There are no characters in The Long Leg, leaving the landscape completely bare and encouraging its viewers to reflect.

Edward Hopper, Self-Portrait, 1906

Edward Hopper

Known as a painter of loneliness, isolation and solitude, Hopper was born in Nyack, N.Y., July 22, 1882.While most popularly known for his oil paintings, he was equally proficient as a watercolorist and printmaker in etching. In both his urban and rural scenes, his spare and finely calculated renderings reflected his personal vision of modern American life.

   

              “Morning Sun” (1952)                                 Lighthouse at Two Lights 

Hopper was a good student in grade school and showed talent in drawing at age five. He readily absorbed his father’s intellectual tendencies and love of French and Russian culture.In his early self-portraits, Hopper tended to represent himself as skinny, ungraceful, and homely. Though a tall and quiet teenager, his prankish sense of humor found outlet in his art. Hopper began painting urban and architectural scenes in a dark palette. Then he shifted to the lighter palette of the Impressionists before returning to the darker palette with which he was comfortable.

       

          Girl at Sewing Machine (1921)              New York Restaurant (1922)

Hopper derived his subject matter from two primary sources: one, the common features of American life (gas stations, motels, restaurants, theaters, railroads, and street scenes) and its inhabitants; and two, seascapes and rural landscapes. Regarding his style, Hopper defined himself as “an amalgam of many races” and not a member of any school, particularly the “Ashcan School”. Once Hopper achieved his mature style, his art remained consistent and self-contained, in spite of the numerous art trends that came and went during his long career.Hopper died in his studio near Washington Square in New York City on May 15, 1967.

 

People in the Sun

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New Stamps from USA

 

Flag Series

Date of Issue 11 August 2011

The US Postal Service continues its Flags of Our Nation series with ten more stamp designs issued on 11 August 2011 that feature the flags of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, and the states of Ohio through Tennessee.

Barbara Jordan

U.S. congressional representative Barbara Jordan will be honored on a commemorative forever stamp in the Black Heritage series on Sept. 16 in Houston, Tex.

 

 

Date of Issue : 16 September 2011

With the 34th stamp in the Black Heritage series, the Postal Service honors Barbara Jordan, one of the most respected and influential American politicians of the 20th century. Her prodigious list of “firsts” includes being the first African- American woman elected to the Texas legislature, the first African- American elected to the Texas State Senate since 1883, and the first African-American woman elected to the U.S. Congress from the South.

Save Vanishing Species

The U.S. non - denominated (44¢+11¢) Save Vanishing Species semi postal stamp will be issued Sept. 20 in Washington, D.C.

Works of artist Romare Bearden

Four commemorative forever stamps will be issued Sept. 28 showing works of artist Romare Bearden. The stamps will be issued in a pane of 16 with decorative selvage.

 

Date of Issue : September 28 2011

Romare Bearden is celebrated for his ground breaking approach to collage along with his work in watercolors, oils, and other media. His art has been praised for depicting African-American experience in its full dimensionality and is in the permanent collections of major museums across USA.

New Stamps on Renewable Energy…

  

 

Keep Earth Alive !!

An Post (Ireland)  released a set of five stamps on 5 August 2011 to celebrate renewable energy technologies.The stamps feature the five main sources of renewable energy  wind, wave, hydropower, solar and bio fuel.

Date of Issue : 5 August 2011

Renewable Energy

The term 'renewable energy' describes a wide range of naturally occurring energy sources, all of which can be replenished. The stamps illustrate five specific types of renewable energy technologies; wind, hydro, solar, wave and biofuel.

Wind generated electricity has made huge strides in recent years; its capacity currently is close to 1,500 MW, mainly from about 90 on shore wind farms.

Hydro energy is energy that is taken from water and converted to electricity. The most common method of using energy from water is a hydroelectric dam, where water coming down through an area causes turbines to rotate and the energy is captured to run a generator.

Although Ireland has a reputation for rain, there's enough sunshine for substantial use of solar power, using solar panels to capture sunlight and turn it into electricity. A growing number of households are now using solar panels on the roofs of their houses to generate much of their electricity.

Waves and tides along the Irish coast offer enormous possibilities; the sea is a limitless and reliable source of power. It is predicted that Ireland could install 30,000 MW of wave energy conversion facilities by 2030.

Biomass is biological material derived from living, or recently living organisms. In the context of biomass for energy this is often used to mean plant based material, but biomass can equally apply to both animal and vegetable derived material. Biofuel is the term for biomass that has been converted into liquid fuel.

The use of these energy sources reduces  greenhouse gas emissions and diversifies  energy supply.

My Recent covers

Wolfgang Beyer, Germany

Charles Jensen, USA 

 

Special Cancellations

Cancellations issued by Lucknow GPO

Silver Jubilee : Colombo Plan 

Silver Jubilee : Missionaries of Charity

Ashwani Dubey - Gorakhpur 

Club News

Philatelic Clubs in USA

New Stamp Collectors Club forms at Fair Park 

By Tina Taylor

CROSSVILLE — Today, stamp collecting is still one of the world's most popular indoor hobbies. It is estimated that about 25 million people in the United States collect stamps; while worldwide it is closer to 200 million.

Thousands of stamp (philatelic) clubs and organizations enjoy sharing their rare stamps and their history. Everyone specializes in some country with a worldwide collection being enormous, running into thousands of volumes, and incredibly expensive to acquire. The use of the internet has made it much easier to collect, trade, swap, sale, share and auction their stamps.

Currently there does not seem to be a club in this area, until now! Ray Kusmierski has enjoyed being a member of six different stamp clubs in the past 60 years of collecting.  He thinks one of the most rewarding parts of stamp collecting, is making new contacts. He corresponds with people from around the world making many interesting new friends, who also share his love for stamps. Every senior interested in sharing stamp stories is welcome to join the stamp club. The first meeting of the Fair Park Senior Center Stamp Club will be Wednesday Sept. 7 at noon.

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International Homeless Animals' Day

August 20,  marks the  International Homeless Animals Day. It is an effort to raise awareness about the extreme overpopulation affecting animal shelters, The International Society for Animal Rights (ISAR) will hold events and candlelight vigils across the world in honor of those animals that have lost their lives due to overpopulation.

            

 

In 1992, ISAR introduced International Homeless Animals’ Day as an innovative educational vehicle with a purpose of informing society of the global tragedy that overwhelms animal shelters each year – pet overpopulation. Since the conception of International Homeless Animals’ Day, ISAR has reserved the third Saturday of August, commemorating the Day annually, to promote new campaigns, programs, and ideas on the solution to the pet overpopulation epidemic: spay/neuter.

Every year more than 4.5 million dogs and cats die in local animal shelters due to a lack of space. For the past 19 years,  ISAR has promoted new ideas and efforts to maintain the pet population with spay and neuter programs.

Event Schedule for International Homeless Animals' Day: August 20, 2011

Last year, the U.S. Postal Service released this pane of 10 special stamps entitled "Animal Rescue: Adopt A Shelter Pet". The stamps received a boost from talk show host Ellen DeGeneres, a well-known advocate for pet adoption - and Halo, a pet food company she co-owns. After introducing the stamps on the Ellen DeGeneres Show last March, USPS and Halo launched a "Stamps to the Rescue" campaign. Halo set a goal of feeding 1 million shelter dogs and cats by the end of 2010 - and delivered on its promise. Halo has donated food to more than 100 shelters throughout the United States.

The stamps feature photographs of five cats and five dogs taken by veteran stamp photographer Sally Andersen-Bruce. All ten animals were adopted from a shelter in New Milford, CT.

 

This special stamp issue seeks to raise awareness of responsible dog ownership and support the dedicated work of organisations re-homing lost and abandoned dogs. The stamps were  issued by Australia Post  in 2010 .

The UK  released a series of stamps celebrating the 150th anniversary of animal rescue organization Battersea Dogs and Cats Home.  The postage feature seven dogs and three cats who used to reside in the home, but who now are living it up in their new forever homes. 

Love and Care for animals

These stamps were issued by Australia Post in  October 2010 to draw attention to the importance of Australian wildlife carers and their ability to return animals to their native habitat after injury or illness.

New Festival stamps from USA…

 

 

In the month of October USPS will issue 3 Forever stamps on festivals of Jews , Africans and Christians. The stamps feature Hanukkah. Kwanza and Christmas festivals.

Hanukkah — October 14, 2011 

Hanukkah is a joyous yearly festival spanning eight days and nights that is celebrated by Jewish people. It commemorates the successful Jewish revolt led by Judah Maccabee against the oppressive government of Antiochus IV in 165 B.C. Hanukkah is the Hebrew word for "dedication." Tradition relates how a miracle took place during the rededication of the Temple in Jerusalem, which had been desecrated: The remaining supply of sacramental oil, thought to be enough for only one day, burned for eight. Today, family members gather each night during the festival to light candles on a menorah. Other traditions include singing, the exchange of gifts and the spinning of the dreidel.

Kwanza - October 14, 2011

With this stamp, the U.S. Postal Service cel­ebrates Kwanzaa, a nonreligious holiday that takes place over seven days from December 26 to January 1. Kwanzaa draws on African traditions and takes its name from the phrase for “first fruits” in Swahili, a widely spoken African language. This is the fourth stamp design issued by the USPS in celebration of Kwanzaa. The first Kwanzaa com­memorative stamp was issued in 1997.

 

Holiday Baubles – October 13, 2011

Christmas trees were at first trimmed with fruit—apples were a popular choice—and nuts, candies, or paper. Glass ornaments first appeared in the late 19th century, in Germany, and their use quickly spread to other countries. Styles from the 1950s inspired the ornaments depicted in the stamp art.

Special Covers

Maharashtra

 

 

: Ashwani Dubey - Gorakhpur

Great stories by Great authors….

 

The U.S. Postal Service will honor the 150th anniversary of the birth of O. Henry with a 2012 Forever stamp. The design of the stamp is beautiful. Here I just wish to share his most famous story “The Gift of Magi” and  famous  Hindi film ‘Raincoat’ based on this story……The great story by great author….This is all in this Post….Have a Nice Time !

O. Henry is the pen name of writer William S. Porter, 1862-1910. The O. Henry drawing is based on a photograph of the author as a young man. The background image is the elevated rail in New York City, where many of O. Henry's stories were set. O. Henry wrote nearly 300 stories, including "The Gift of the Magi," "The Ransom of Red Chief" and "The Cop and the Anthem." O. Henry has an annual anthology named after him, The O. Henry Prize Stories. The O. Henry stamp will be the 28th stamp in the Literary Arts series by USPS.

A postage stamp on O Henry was also issued by then USSR in 1962,

 O. Henry (1862-1910) was a prolific American short-story writer, a master of surprise endings, who wrote about the life of ordinary people in New York City. A twist of plot, which turns on an ironic or coincidental circumstance, is typical of O. Henry's stories. O. Henry’s real name was William Sydney Porter and he was born in Greensboro, North Carolina on September 11, 1862. At age of 20 (1882) he moved to Texas, where he had various jobs.

In 1894 while working for First National Bank in Austin, Porter was accused of stealing $4000. He went to prison in Columbus, Ohio for 3 years eventually.While in prison Porter first started to write short stories and it’s believed that he has found his writer’s pseudonym there. After Porter was released from the prison in 1901, he changed his name to O. Henry and moved to New York in 1902.From December 1903 to January 1906 o. Henry wrote a story a week for the New York World magazine, and published several short stories in other magazines.O. Henry’s short stories are famous for their surprise endings and humor.O. Henry's wrote such classic short stories as The Ransom of Red Chief, “The Gift of the Magi” and “The Furnished Room”.In his last years O. Henry had financial and health problems.  O. Henry died on June 5, 1910 in New York City. 

"The Gift of the Magi" is a popular Christmas story about love and sacrifice. The work is one of the most famous stories by O. Henry.

"The Gift of the Magi" is a short story written by O. Henry , about a young married couple and how they deal with the challenge of buying secret Christmas gifts for each other with very little money. As a sentimental story with a moral lesson about gift-giving, it has been a popular one for adaptation, especially for presentation during the Christmas season.

 

Young married couple Della and James "Jim" Dillingham Young are very much in love with each other but can barely afford their one-room apartment due to their very bad economic situation. For Christmas, Della decides to buy Jim a chain for his prized pocket watch given to him by his father's father. To raise the funds, she has her long, beautiful hair cut off and sold to make a wig. Meanwhile, Jim decides to sell his watch to buy Della a beautiful set of combs made out of tortoiseshell and jewels for her lovely, knee-length brown hair. Although each is disappointed to find the gift they chose rendered useless, each is pleased with the gift that they received, because it represents their love for one another.

Read full orignial story….

Raincoat is a 2004 Hindi film directed by Rituparno Ghosh, and starring Ajay Devgan and Aishwarya Rai. It tells the story of two lovers, separated by destiny, who meet again one day. This encounter allows each to realize the truth about the lives they are living. It is an adaptation of the short story The Gift of the Magi (1906) by O Henry .

The story begins with unemployed Manu (Ajay Devgan), from Bhagalpur in search of money to finance his new business as he has lost his earlier job at a jute mill. On his quest, he visits Neeru (Aishwarya Rai) in Calcutta, to whom he was engaged six years ago. During the rainy evening, the couple reminisce about their former love and how each ended up in their current situation.

Neeru pretends to lead a happy and prosperous life. She gestures to her former lover during various instances, particularly when the door bell rings and she persuades Manu not to open the door. They go on talking about their past and present with multiple flashbacks.

The raincoat comes to play when Neeru wears it to fetch some food. The landlord speaks of the real situation of the household, and prompts Manu to give his borrowed money as rent for the house. Manu leaves a letter under the bed sheet explaining things. When Neeru returns he does not say anything about his encounter with her landlord. After some time Manu leaves. Later, when he puts his hand inside the pocket of his raincoat, he finds a pair of gold bangles that belonged to Neeru, along with a letter saying that she had a lot of money and he should have told her about his financial situation. She had actually read a letter that was inside the raincoat that informed her about Manu's condition.

RAINCOAT: An excellent touching movie to heart with its most simplicity based on O Henry’ s story “ The Gift of Magi”

New themes for US 2012 stamps….

 

 

US Postal Service will issue stamps on Dance, Literature and Nature in 2012.  Three new U.S. stamp subjects were unveiled by the U.S. Postal Service in early August. These are: Innovative Choreographers, O. Henry and Earthscapes.

In 2012, USPS will pay tribute to Isadora Duncan, Jose Limon, Katherine Dunham, and Bob Fosse. Designed to look like posters advertising a performance, the stamp art captures the luminosity and mystery of a live dance performance.

USPS will also commemorate the 150th anniversary of the birth of O. Henry with a stamp in its Literary Arts series. The short stories of O. Henry are beloved for their irony and skillful unfolding of plot; often, they end with a surprise twist. This prolific author wrote nearly 300 tales, most in the final eight years of his life. By the time of his death, he was the most widely read storyteller in America and was internationally admired.

Finally, the Earthscapes issuance offers stamp customers an opportunity to see the world in a new way. The stamp pane presents examples of three categories of earthscapes: natural, agricultural, and urban. The photographs were all created high above the planet's surface, either snapped by "eyes in the sky" - satellites orbiting the Earth - or carefully composed by photographers in aircraft.

Club News

From our Readers…

Mr Sanjiv Jain of Dehradun  has prepared Maxim Cards on recent stamps issued on Rashtrapati Bhawan.

Note :  For these  Max cards New Delhi is the most appropriate place for cancellation.

Owney, the canine mascot of US Rail Mail Service..

 

Date of Issue : 27 July 2011

The U.S. Postal Service commemorated Owney, the canine mascot of the Railway Mail Service on Forever stamp, issued on 27 Jyly 2011. The stamp art features an original illustration of Owney, with many of his famous tags and medals gleaming in the background.

Beloved of clerks on mail-sorting trains at the end of the 19th century, Owney was hailed as a symbol of good luck. Today he is an icon of American postal lore whose story highlights the historical importance of the Railway Mail Service.

Owney the Postal Dog FDC with Digital Color Postmark

In the 1880s, during the height of the Railway Mail Service, clerks in the Post Office in Albany, New York, took a liking to a terrier mix named Owney. Fond of riding in postal wagons, Owney followed mailbags onto trains and soon became a good-luck charm to Railway Mail Service employees, who made him their unofficial mascot. Working in the Railway Mail Service was highly dangerous: According to the National Postal Museum, more than 80 mail clerks were killed in train wrecks and more than 2,000 were injured between 1890 and 1900. However, it was said that no train ever met with trouble while Owney was aboard.

As Owney traveled the country, clerks affixed medals and tags to his collar to document his travels. When John Wanamaker, Postmaster General from 1889 to 1893, heard that Owney was overburdened with tags, he gave him a special harness to display them all. During his travels, Owney accumulated more than a thousand medals and tags. Today Owney is on display at the Smithsonian Institution's National Postal Museum in a case that includes some of his medals and tags.

: US Postal Service

Russia Honors Obama with Postage Stamp for 50th Birthday

 

Russia’s Post Office has issued a collection of stamps and envelopes to mark the 50th jubilee of the US President Barack Obama. The US leader is celebrating his birthday on the 4th of August.

In one of his recent interviews Mr. Obama said that fifty years ago nobody could imagine Russia and the US as partners. He added that confrontation ended together with the Cold War.

He said that the Internet and mass media have made people from all over the globe closer to each other. “It is important to contribute to mutual understating between Russia and the US, one of the world`s leading countries”, Mr. Obama said. 

Russia`s Post Office also presented the US leader with a postmark featuring his portrait. Mr. Obama liked the gift, stamped several envelopes and then signed one of them with dedication to the museum of the Russian Post Office.  

The Voice of Russia

Note : The stamp on Obama has not been listed on the official website of Russian Post so far.

Obama turns 5o today…

Stamp on Obama’s 50th Birthday from Guyana

Date of Issue : 20 June 2011

 

From Russia With Love: Obama’s Own Postal Stamp….

This is a present from Russia to say Happy Birthday Marxist Obama, you have done well. Russia has  commemorated  Postal Stamps  in Obama’s honor of his 50th Birthday. Isn’t that special?

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Why is Russia Honoring Obama with Stamp?

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More stamps on Obama by other countries