Category Archives: Philatelic Products

New Stamped Card May Show Key Deer

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Deer

The Deer stamped card’s Forever® rate means that its postage will always be equal to the value of the First-Class Mail postcard rate in effect at the time of use, even if the rate increases after purchase. Click the image for details.

The delicate creature prancing across the new Deer stamped card is a bit of a mystery. Because it’s more fanciful than realistic, it’s hard to pin down exactly what type of deer it could be—but if Sherlock Homes were here, he might deduce that it’s a Key deer. Put on your (forgive the pun) deerstalker cap, and follow the trail of clues as we make the case.

  • Cattails: The rare and endangered Key deer is found only in the Florida Keys, where cattails, like the ones that surround the deer in the artwork, thrive in the state’s many wetlands.
  • Small size: Sometimes called “toy deer,” Key deer stand only about two feet high at the shoulder. Newborn fawns are tiny, weighing just two to four pounds. If the cattails in the artwork are growing close to the ground, they’d be the right height in comparison to a Key deer.
  • Tendency to travel: Just like a stamped card, which doesn’t even wait for a stamp to move around the country, Key deer get around. They swim between islands in the Florida Keys when they get the urge to move on.

If you’d like to see the enchanting Key deer in person, you can visit the National Key Deer Refuge on Big Pine Key, about 30 miles north of Key West. This delicate animal is a subspecies of the much larger white-tailed deer, which is found throughout much of the United States.

Q + A With Deer Stamped Card Artist Cathie Bleck

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Artist Cathie Bleck created the striking illustration featured on the 2013 Deer (Forever®) stamped card. We recently caught up with Bleck, who filled us in about her artistic process.

How did you first get involved with the Postal Service?

My first project was in 2007. I created the Pineapple stamped card working with art director Ethel Kessler.

Did you like working on the Deer stamped card? And what made it interesting to you?

It was not a favored subject at first foDeer-2013-Forever-envelope-TC-BGv1r the U.S. Postal Service as there was concern that people perceive deer to be pests. I have always loved the elegant prance of deer, however, and their posturing. When they are native to where you live, they become like an old friend peering through the woods. They are probably one of the most native animals to our country and resilient—coming back from low populations and then resurging. Beauty is a very powerful thing, however, so I persisted and the prance won over. How majestic the deer is, and how often we encounter her stance that lifts the spirit.

What was your inspiration for the art? (Did you look at lots of photographs of deer?) 

I rarely look at photos, usually I look inside my personal sketchbooks filled with flora and fauna and animals that I adore. I also love to look at other artists’ portrayals on the subject, especially the sculptor Paul Manship.

From start to finish, was it a fairly quick project?

I like to tell people each piece takes me 30 years of knowledge as a working artist in order to master the perfect line.

Do you enjoy illustrating wildlife?

It is my favorite subject, and developing a mythology around wild animals is even more intriguing to me.

The Deer Forever® stamped card was issued March 8, and it is available now online and in Post Offices around the country.

Seven Uncommon Surprises About the Common White-tailed Deer

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Earlier this month, we issued a stamped card featuring a graphic of a golden deer. More than 40 species of deer are found around the world, and the white-tailed deer is the most common deer species in the United States. Here are a few other things you might not know about this graceful animal:

  • Deer-2013-Forever-envelope-TC-BGv1As many as 30 million white-tailed deer are estimated to live in the U.S., but the animals range as far north as Canada and as far south as Bolivia.
  • European settlers eventually hunted whitetails nearly to extinction, reducing a population of some 25 to 40 million down to 500,000 or fewer by the late 1800s. People on the frontier fashioned deerskins into jackets, clothing, and moccasins, and even traded the skins, known as buckskins, as a form of currency. As a result, a dollar bill is known as a “buck” to this day. With game management, the whitetail population eventually rebounded.
  • Excellent runners and swimmers, whitetails can exceed speeds of 30 miles per hour when fleeing a predator.
  • Some of the largest whitetails can be found in northern populations, where adult males can stand three feet high at the shoulder and weigh more than 300 pounds.

    First Day Cover

    The Deer stamped card was issued March 8, 2013, in Middleburg, Virginia. Mark the occasion with an official first day cover. Click the image for more details.

  • According to Connecticut’s Department of Energy & Environmental Protection, female deer (does) will often leave their offspring (fawns) alone in the woods. But for a very good reason: “Frequently, well-meaning people find a fawn alone in the woods and bring it home without realizing that the doe was nearby all the time. To divert the attention of predators, female deer only visit their fawns three or four times a day, for about 15 minutes per visit, in order to feed them.”
  • Male deer’s antlers fall off in winter, providing an important source of calcium and minerals for small animals such as mice, squirrels, porcupines, and even the deer themselves, which seek out the antlers and gnaw on them.
  • Whitetails are named for the white undersides of their tails. When bounding away from danger, these deer raise their tails like a signaling flag, exposing the pale hair underneath.

If you’d like to learn more about the white-tailed deer, visit National Geographic.

The Deer Stamped Card is currently available in Post Offices and in our online store. Because it is a Forever® stamped card, its postage will always be equal to the value of the postcard rate in effect at the time of use, even if the rate increases after purchase. Why not stock up today?

Deer Stamped Card Prances Into Hearts & Mailboxes Today

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Nature and animal lovers alike will be enamored with the new Deer Forever® stamped card, perfect for writing short personal notes, business communications, or just whatever strikes your fancy.

Deer-2013-Forever-envelope-TC-BGv1

U.S. Postal Service Northern Virginia District Marketing Manager Kimberley Timberlake dedicated the Forever stamped card earlier today at the Middleburg Post Office. “We think our customers will find these beautifully designed postcards perfect for sending quick notes to loved ones and friends,” said Timberlake. We think so, too!

If you missed the First Day of Issue Ceremony this morning, don’t worry. You can still obtain the official First Day of Issue postmark. Just purchase the new stamped cards at your local Post Office, online at usps.com/stamps, or by calling 800-STAMP-24. Address the stamped cards to yourself or others and place them in a larger envelope addressed to:

Deer Stamped Card
Postmaster
113 W. Washington Street
Middleburg, VA 20117-9998

After applying the first-day-of-issue postmark, USPS will return the stamped cards through the mail. There is no charge for the postmark if requests are for less than 50. There is a 5-cent charge per postmark for orders exceeding 50. All orders must be postmarked by May 8.

The 37-cent stamped card (33-cent postage plus a 4-cent surcharge) is available as individual postcards or as a 74-cent double-reply product consisting of two stamped cards.

“To embrace the whole of America”: The Legacy of Hattie McDaniel

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As movie fans eagerly await the Oscars, it’s worth remembering the night when black history forever became Hollywood history, too. At a banquet in 1940, Hattie McDaniel became the first African American to win an Academy Award—and quietly bequeathed a legacy of hope to other black performers.

USPS06STA004BIn 2006, McDaniel was featured on a Black Heritage stamp—a potentially controversial decision for the Postal Service, because the actress dealt with withering scorn for playing maids and other stereotypical roles. “I’d rather play a maid than be one,” she often quipped, working behind the scenes to battle racism and discrimination in ways that her critics came to appreciate only later.

McDaniel won praise from the NAACP and the National Urban League when she played the title role on The Beulah Show, a radio program that aired from 1947 to 1952. As the lead in the first radio show to feature a black star, she insisted that her character not speak in dialect, and she successfully negotiated the right to alter scripts that didn’t meet her approval.

Of course, McDaniel’s ultimate claim to immortality remains her turn in the 1939 classic Gone with the Wind. Unfortunately, her actual award—not a statuette, but a small plaque—has long since vanished. Prior to her death in 1952, she bequeathed the plaque to Howard University, but it went missing sometime in the 1960s. The search for the award prompted a recent Washington Post feature story and a fascinating law journal article—and hope that it may someday reappear.

In the meantime, we’re pleased to have honored McDaniel on a stamp that shows her in the dress she wore on the biggest night of her career, and to have told her story on a commemorative panel. Her accomplishment was aptly and movingly summed up by actress Fay Bainter, who presented her with the Academy Award: “It opens the doors of this room, moves back the walls, and enables us to embrace the whole of America.”

We have two copies of the 2006 Hattie McDaniel commemorative panel to give away today. The 8 ½ x 11 ¼-inch panel includes a background narrative about McDaniel as well as historic images and a block of four mint Hattie McDaniel stamps in a protective acetate mount. To enter to win, all you have to do is email your name and address to uspsstamps [at] gmail [dot] com. Two winners will be selected at random. The deadline for entries is 10 p.m. EST, Friday, February 22. Good luck!

CONTEST UPDATE: Congratulations to our two winners: Tomekia Walker and Mark Pawelczak! If you didn’t win this time, don’t worry. We’ll have plenty more contests and giveaways throughout the year.