NEW LONDON, CT — The Postal Service continues its popular lighthouse stamp series with the July 13, 2013 issuance of New England Coastal Lighthouses Forever stamps.
The five featured lighthouses, among the oldest in the United States and all on the National Register of Historic Places, are Portland Head, Portsmouth Harbor, New Point Judith, New London Harbor and Boston Harbor. Northeast Area Post Offices are hosting first day of issue ceremonies at each location.
The New London Harbor Lighthouse Stamps First Day of Issue Ceremony is being held at:
The Custom House Maritime Museum
(Outdoors beneath the Custom House tent)
150 Banks Street
New London, Ct
July 13, 2013 at 10:00 a.m.
The ceremony is being held during the weekend of Sailfest with plenty to do for the family.
The public is invited to join in the festivities at the first day of issue ceremony with the USPS, Officer in Charge Donald Lavoie and the New London Post Office team, Mayor Daryl Justin Finizio and Susan Tamulevich, Director of New London’s Custom House Maritime Museum.
Among the guest speakers will be Rick Uluski, Area Vice President, Northeast Area of the U.S. Postal Service. “This is the first time five stamps illustrating New England lighthouses are being issued on the same day. We are excited to unveil these pillars of maritime safety on stamps simultaneously in communities at the respective locations. We hope everyone will enjoy these stamps as much as we do here at the postal service.”
New London Harbor Lighthouse (Harbor Light) is Connecticut’s oldest and tallest lighthouse. Harbor Light was originally established in 1761 though replaced in 1801 due to a crack. Financed by a lottery held by the Connecticut colonial legislature, the first lighthouse was a 64-foot tower that included a wooden lantern.
New London Harbor was one of the earliest American lighthouses with a flashing light, added in 1801 to distinguish it from the lights of nearby homes. This wonderful pillar of light is operational and continues to aid navigation for maritime pilots.
Lighthouses mark dangerous coastlines, hazardous shoals, reefs, safe entries to harbors, and can also assist in aerial navigation. Once widely used, the number of operational lighthouses has declined due to the expense of maintenance and replacement by modern electronic navigational systems. New London’s Harbor Lighthouse Society is currently running a fundraiser to cover the cost of painting the exterior, which exceeds one hundred thousand dollars.
More information about the stamps may be found at www.beyondtheperf.com. To learn more about the London Harbor Lighthouse visit: http://www.nlmaritimesociety.org/calendar.html .
The New England Coastal Lighthouse Stamps and other items go on sale July 13 at post offices countrywide, online at www.usps.com or by calling 800-STAMP-24.
How to Order the First-Day-of-Issue Postmark Customers have 60 days to obtain the first-day-of-issue postmark by mail. They may purchase new stamps at their local Post Office, at The Postal Store® website at www.usps.com/shop, or by calling 800-STAMP-24. They should affix the stamps to envelopes of their choice, address the envelopes (to themselves or others), and place them in a larger envelope addressed to:
New England Coastal Lighthouses (New London Harbor) Stamps
Postmaster
27 Masonic Street
New London, CT 06320-9998
After applying the first-day-of-issue postmark, the Postal Service will return the envelopes through the mail. There is no charge for the postmark up to a quantity of 50. For more than 50, customers have to pay five cents each. All orders must be postmarked by September 13, 2013.
Each of the stamps feature an original acrylic painting by Howard Koslow, an artist in Toms River, N.J., based on recent photographs of the lighthouses.
In addition to many other stamp projects, Koslow has produced the art for the entire Lighthouses series: the five lighthouses in the 1990 stamp booklet; the Great Lakes Lighthouses stamps issued in 1995; the Southeastern Lighthouses stamps in 2003; the Pacific Lighthouses stamps in 2007; and the Gulf Coast Lighthouses stamps in 2009.
# # #
Please Note: For broadcast quality video and audio, photo stills and other media resources, visit the USPS Newsroom at http://about.usps.com/news/welcome.htm.
For reporters interested in speaking with a regional Postal Service public relations professional, please go to http://about.usps.com/news/media-contacts/usps-local-media-contacts.pdf.
A self-supporting government business, the U.S. Postal Service is the only delivery service that reaches every address in the nation, 151 million residences, businesses and Post Office Boxes. The Postal Service receives no tax dollars for operating expenses, and relies on the sale of postage, products and services to fund its operations. With nearly 32,000 retail locations and the most frequently visited website in the federal government, usps.com, the Postal Service has annual revenue of more than $65 billion and delivers nearly 40 percent of the world’s mail. If it were a private sector company, the U.S. Postal Service would rank 35th in the 2011 Fortune 500. In 2011, the U.S. Postal Service was ranked number one in overall service performance, out of the top 20 wealthiest nations in the world, Oxford Strategic Consulting. Black Enterprise and Hispanic Business magazines ranked the Postal Service as a leader in workforce diversity. The Postal Service has been named the Most Trusted Government Agency for six years and the sixth Most Trusted Business in the nation by the Ponemon Institute.
Follow the Postal Service on twitter.com/USPS and at facebook.com/USPS.
