BGuthrie Photos: DC -- Natl Postal Museum -- Exhibit (Gross Gallery 7): Trailblazing: 100 Years of Our National Parks

DC -- Natl Postal Museum -- Exhibit (Gross Gallery 7): Trailblazing: 100 Years of Our National Parks:

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Description of Pictures: Trailblazing: 100 Years of Our National Parks
June 9, 2016 – March 25, 2018
Did you know that a village at the bottom of the Grand Canyon eats most of its mail? Or that America’s newest national park was once so secret it used an undercover address? Trailblazing: 100 Years of Our National Parks chronicles these and numerous other intersections between mail and our national parks. Featuring original postage stamp art from the United States Postal Service and artifacts loaned by the National Park Service, the exhibition explores the myriad – and sometimes surprising – ways that mail moves to, through and from our national parks.

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Copyrights: All pictures were taken by amateur photographer Bruce Guthrie (me!) who retains copyright on them. Free for non-commercial use with attribution. See the [Creative Commons] definition of what this means. "Photos (c) Bruce Guthrie" is fine for attribution. (Commercial use folks including AI scrapers can of course contact me.) Feel free to use in publications and pages with attribution but you don't have permission to sell the photos themselves. A free copy of any printed publication using any photographs is requested. Descriptive text, if any, is from a mixture of sources, quite frequently from signs at the location or from official web sites; copyrights, if any, are retained by their original owners.

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Specific picture descriptions: Photos above with "i" icons next to the bracketed sequence numbers (e.g. "[1] ") are described as follows:
1. TRAILB_160610_001.JPG: Trailblazing: 100 Years of Our National Parks Did you know that a village at the bottom of the Grand Canyon eats most of its mail? Or that America's newest national park was once so secret it used an undercover address? Trailblazing: 100 Years of Our National Parks chronicles these and numerous other intersections between mail and our national parks. Featuring original postage stamp art from the United States Postal Service and artifacts loaned by the National Park Service, the exhibition explores the myriad – and sometimes surprising – ways that mail moves to, through and from our national parks.
2. TRAILB_160610_009.JPG: The first post office established at Sequoia National Park in 1907 was, appropriately enough, named "Ranger."
3. TRAILB_160610_018.JPG: National Seashores Number of Parks: 10 (as of 2015) First Park: Cape Hatteras National Seashore | 1953 Newest Park: Canaveral National Seashore | 1975 Motivated by concern for overdevelopment of beachfront property, Congress has set aside for public use some of the most beautiful capes, beaches, and barrier islands dotting the Atlantic coast between Massachusetts and Florida. Known as the National Seashores, the sites provide visitors with fishing, bird and whale watching, and walks among the ever-changing dunes. The creation of the National Seashores brought some of the country's iconic lighthouses under Parks administration. The lighthouses have been featured on one of the most popular U.S. postage stamp series ever released.
4. TRAILB_160610_020.JPG: AMERICAN SAILOR'S LETTER IN A BOTTLE 1806 During Great Britain's long war against Napoleonic France (1803-1815), the Royal Navy searched American ships at sea looking for British sailors who had deserted. About 10,000 American-born sailors were carried off in these impressment raids, which were an important major cause of the War of 1812. This letter was written by an American taken from the merchant ship Lion, which sailed from New York on November 26, 1805 to trade in the Caribbean. He corked it into a bottle and dropped it into the Atlantic Ocean near the coast of Colombia in South America. Carried by the powerful Atlantic Gulf Stream current, it came ashore at Cape Hatteras, North Carolina nearly six months later. It was found by William Jennett, from whom the U.S. government had purchased the land for the Cape Hatteras Light, and delivered to customs officials.
5. TRAILB_160610_024.JPG: 25¢ CAPE HATTERAS LIGHT STAMP ART (LIGHTHOUSES ISSUE) America's coastal lighthouses, familiar symbols of safety and direction to mariners everywhere, are portrayed in a series of thirty commemorative stamps issued between 1990 and 2013. Artist Howard Koslow, who designed every stamp in the series, created the pencil sketch and oil painting shown here. The National Park Service owns more than three dozen historic lighthouses and light stations.
6. TRAILB_160610_036.JPG: 2¢ CAPE HATTERAS BLOCK OF FOUR (NATIONAL PARKS CENTENNIAL ISSUE) An act signed by President Ulysses S. Grant in 1872 established Yellowstone as the world's first national park. A century later, the USPS celebrated with the four-denomination National Parks Centennial Issue, including this 2¢ Cape Hatteras National Seashore block of four. The sites now protected by the National Park Service illustrate America's grand diversity.
7. TRAILB_160610_047.JPG: National Military Parks Number of Parks: 9 (as of 2015) First Park: Gettysburg National Military Park | 1864; came under NPS 1935 Newest Park: Pea Ridge National Military Park | 1963 National Military Parks protect significant conflict sites on American soil, and so most date to the Civil War. The preservation of battlefields, considered hallowed ground, began after Gettysburg by veterans who fought there. In 1890 Congress designated the nation's first military park, Chickamauga and Chattanooga, administered by the War Department. Administration fell to the National Park Service in 1933.
8. TRAILB_160610_052.JPG: DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER METERED FREE FRANK 1964-1965 Dwight D. Eisenhower, a five-star Army general before he became president, retired to his Gettysburg farm in 1960. As a former president, he could send his mail postage free. A metered mail device printed his signature instead of a stamp. The National Park Service proclaimed Eisenhower's home and farm a National Historic Site in 1969.
9. TRAILB_160610_057.JPG: SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR PATRIOTIC COVER 1898 During the Spanish-American War of 1898, the War Department created a mustering and training camp at Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park, the site of significant Civil War battles. Trainees received mail via the camp's temporary post office. In 1890, Chickamauga and Chattanooga became the world's first federally protected battlefields.
10. TRAILB_160610_067.JPG: 5¢ GETTYSBURG STAMP ART (CIVIL WAR CENTENNIAL ISSUE) More than 51,000 soldiers died or sustained life-threatening injuries at Gettysburg in July 1863. On November 19, 1863, Abraham Lincoln delivered his Gettysburg Address and consecrated the National Cemetery at Gettysburg. A century later, the Post Office Department held a public competition to design a commemorative Gettysburg stamp.
11. TRAILB_160610_070.JPG: 5¢ GETTYSBURG STAMP ART (CIVIL WAR CENTENNIAL ISSUE) More than 51,000 soldiers died or sustained life-threatening injuries at Gettysburg in July 1863. On November 19, 1863, Abraham Lincoln delivered his Gettysburg Address and consecrated the National Cemetery at Gettysburg. A century later, the Post Office Department held a public competition to design a commemorative Gettysburg stamp.
12. TRAILB_160610_086.JPG: National Historical Parks Number of Parks: 49 (as of 2015) First Park: Morristown National Historical Park | 1933 Newest Park: Manhattan Project National Historical Park | 2015 Like National Historic Sites, National Historical Parks preserve an aspect or area of America's diverse history. While Historic Sites usually focus on individual properties, Historical Parks encompass multiple themes or a large tract of territory, sometimes across several states. Under the National Historical Parks umbrella, an entire downtown area such as Boston or the area around Philadelphia's Independence Hall might be designated, incorporating centuries of history.
13. TRAILB_160610_090.JPG: USS CONSTITUTION CRUISE COVER circa 1932-1934 USS Constitution, one of the US Navy's first six ships, was retired from military service in 1881. After restoration in the early 1930s, the ship made a three-year, ninety-port tour of the American coastline. At every port, tourists flocked to the historic vessel. They mailed many souvenir postcards and other correspondence, producing diverse covers and cancels.
14. TRAILB_160610_095.JPG: 3¢ USS CONSTITUTION FIRST DAY COVER October 21, 1947 The Post Office Department issued a stamp in 1947 to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the launching of USS Constitution. The first day ceremony took place on the ship in Boston's Charlestown Navy Yard.
15. TRAILB_160610_101.JPG: "B FREE FRANKLIN" CANCEL 1975 The B Free Franklin Post Office at 316 Market Street in Philadelphia lies within Independence National Historical Park. The handstamped cancel used at the post office since 1975 reproduces Benjamin Franklin's signature and the circular postmark he introduced, with the date at the top and two-letter month code below.
16. TRAILB_160610_109.JPG: 2¢ YORKTOWN ISSUE PLATE BLOCK The American Revolution ended at the Battle of Yorktown, Virginia in October 1781. The Post Office Department issued a stamp in 1931 to commemorate the battle's 150th anniversary. The site of the battle was incorporated into the Colonial National Historical Park in 1930.
17. TRAILB_160610_114.JPG: 13¢ THIRTEEN-STAR FLAG AND INDEPENDENCE HALL (AMERICANA ISSUE) LARGE DIE PROOF Americans celebrated the nation's 200th anniversary in a grand way. The USPS kicked off festivities by issuing a stamp picturing iconic Independence Hall, where the Founding Fathers drafted, debated, and endorsed the Declaration of Independence and U.S. Constitution. Independence Hall is part of Independence National Historical Park.
18. TRAILB_160610_118.JPG: LIBERTY BELL CIVIL WAR PATRIOTIC COVER circa 1862 During the Civil War, patriotic covers broadcast political sentiments. Images of Philadelphia's Liberty Bell, now part of Independence National Historic Park, and its slogan, "Proclaim Liberty to All Inhabitants," inspired pride throughout the North. This example was privately hand-carried to abolitionist Anna Dickinson outside the mails.
19. TRAILB_160610_125.JPG: JAMESTOWN EXPOSITION POSTCARD 1907 In 1907, to celebrate the 300th anniversary of the founding of America's first English settlement, enthusiastic Virginians organized the Jamestown Exposition. The Post Office Department issued three commemorative stamps at the exposition. Jamestown became part of Colonial National Historical Park in 1930.
20. TRAILB_160610_132.JPG: 5¢ POCAHONTAS PLATE BLOCK (JAMESTOWN EXPOSITION ISSUE) Scott USA 330 (1970) Pocahontas, featured on one of the three Jamestown Exposition commemorative stamps, was the first recognizable American Indian pictures on a US postage stamp. She married Jamestown settler John Rolfe and returned to England with him.
21. TRAILB_160610_144.JPG: MANHATTAN PROJECT COVER circa 1944 While General Leslie Groves, physicist Dr. J. Robert Oppenheimer, and others developed the atomic bomb at Los Alamos, New Mexico, they sent and received their mail from several secret addresses, including one in nearby Santa Fe -- PO Box 1663. The Los Alamos Laboratory is now a National Historical Park. In the 1940s, people working at the Manhattan Project had to enter through the Los Alamos Project Main Gate, where guards checked passes that allowed access to the mesa.
22. TRAILB_160610_154.JPG: Wish You Were Here Post offices have played a key role in the development of many National Park Service units. Tourists as well as those who live in the parks rely on mail as a lifeline to the broader world. Tourist mail has always been popular to send and receive, and some examples are featured here. Picture postcards and three-dimensional mailings proved particularly popular during the twentieth century's first decades. Three-dimensional mailings are enjoying a bit of a revival since 2010 and the introduction of the non-machine able surcharge rate with its own special stamps. Even in the age of Twitter and Facebook, postcards remain a popular way to let people know you were really there -- and prove it with a postmark! Did you know? The Statue of Liberty, a National Monument since 1924, has appeared on more U.S. postage stamps than any other unit protected by the National Park Service?
23. TRAILB_160610_159.JPG: SCORCHED KILAUEA POSTCARD 1913 Tourism to the active volcano at Kilauea on the island of Hawaii took off when it became a national park in 1916, just a few weeks before the National Park Service was created. A popular early tourist activity was walking out onto the hard crust of an active lava flow and using a stick to thrust their postcards into a fissure and scorch it before mailing.
24. TRAILB_160610_163.JPG: YELLOWSTONE WOODEN POSTCARD September 1, 2015 Postcards made of leather, wood, and other non-paper materials appeared around 1900, and their popularity continued for decades. The Post Office Department discouraged using them, however, claiming they clogged cancelling machines. They now require hand-stamping and additional postage.
25. TRAILB_160610_170.JPG: YELLOWSTONE LEATHER POSTCARD July 12, 1934
26. TRAILB_160610_174.JPG: SOUVENIR PICTURE POSTCARD circa 1913-1953 Postcards offer an inexpensive means of communication, and were particularly popular before telephones. The postcard industry expanded right along with the growth of tourism and visits to national parks, where visitors mailed untold thousands of postcards. Printers saved ink by leaving a white border.
27. TRAILB_160610_184.JPG: YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK PICTORIAL POSTMARK circa 1997-2004 Souvenirs, mementos of a place or a person, come in many forms. Visitors frequently buy and send postcards from historic sites and parks. The postmark itself can be special. This temporary pictorial postmark commemorates a celebration in Yellowstone Park, and it verifies that the sender was "really there."
28. TRAILB_160610_191.JPG: MAILED PHOTOVIEWS circa 1930-1938 Rather than mail numerous postcards from one location, visitors often preferred souvenir mailers in which the printed "envelope" contained a group of photographs. This replica cotton and leather US mailbag with photoviews of Yellowstone National Park provides an example. Photoviews were extremely popular between 1930 and 1950.
29. TRAILB_160610_195.JPG: MAILED SOUVENIRS circa 1965-2013 Mailable, three-dimensional souvenirs had attached tags for the address and postage. Trinkets like miniature moccasins and small bags filled with salt, corn, coal, or even faux gold nuggets made from bubble gum revealed tourists' sense of humor and desire to share their fun.
30. TRAILB_160610_202.JPG: MAILED SKOOKUM circa 1938-1945 Among the Chinook people of the American Northwest, a skookum is a small doll in native dress. Before World War I, tourists in the West purchased and mailed the dolls, believing in their authenticity. In reality, a company in Los Angeles manufactured them, not the Chinook people.
31. TRAILB_160610_215.JPG: Petrified Wood Specimen Triassic Period Arizona's Petrified Forest formed more than 200 million years ago, when the area had a drastically different, vegetated landscape. Now a desert strewn with the fossilized, brilliantly colored remains of prehistoric trees, it became a national monument in 1906 and a national park in 1962. This status protects it from looters who would carry away the brilliant stones.
32. TRAILB_160610_223.JPG: National Parks Number of Parks: 59 (as of 2015) First Park: Yellowstone National Park | 1872 (came under NPS 1917) Newest Park: Pinnacles National Park | 2013 Park rangers, seasonal employees, and backpackers live deep in many national parks and interact with a range of postal facilities. Grand Canyon, Yosemite, and Yellowstone national parks have full-service post offices on par with those of any mid-sized American city. Other parks are served by postal contractors at part-time or seasonal facilities. Either way, the USPS is the only lifeline to books, movies, magazines, medicines, hardware, and other small articles that would otherwise be difficult to obtain.
33. TRAILB_160610_231.JPG: PHANTOM RANCH MOCHILA AND POSTCARD circa 1940s (Mochila); 2016 (Postcard) Mail also travels by mule to and from Grand Canyon National Park's Phantom Ranch, located at the bottom of the canyon. This service is offered by the ranch's proprietor and is not an official postal route. Postcards and letters dispatched from the ranch receive a unique marking and are deposited in a mochila in the lobby. This World War II cavalry saddlebag collected Phantom Ranch's outgoing mail from the late 1940s until 2005.
34. TRAILB_160610_235.JPG: BRIGHT ANGEL HOTEL COVER circa 1903-1904 The Bright Angel Hotel was owned by Martin Buggeln, who was also the first postmaster of the Grand Canyon post office established in 1902. During his tenure the post office was located in his hotel.
35. TRAILB_160610_243.JPG: BRIGHT ANGEL CAMP COVER AND LETTER circa 1909-1911 Martin Buggeln sold the Bright Angel Hotel to Fred Harvey about 1907. Early mail from employees and visitors often remarked on the rustic and primitive nature of the experience. The letterhead shows a party setting out from the camp for the trip down Ralph Cameron's Bright Angel Trail to the Colorado River.
36. TRAILB_160610_246.JPG: The Grand Canyon Postal service at the Grand Canyon began in 1894, long before it became a national park. The only mule mail routes operating in the U.S. today serve the canyon. One, an official postal route operated by a star route contractor, supplies mail, food, medicine, and other goods to the Havasupai people, who live deep in the canyon. The second is an unofficial route operated for the convenience of visitors to Phantom Ranch, a tourist lodge near Bright Angel Creek.
37. TRAILB_160610_250.JPG: Retail windows and sorting cases are visible in this 1935 photograph of Grand Canyon's New Deal-era post office. A new facility opened in the 1970s and continues to operate today with the ZIP Code 86023.
38. TRAILB_160610_252.JPG: SUPAI, ARIZONA MAILBAG retired 2015 Canvas and plastic mailbags carry first-class mail destined for the Indian village at Supai. Most of Supai's mail, however, travels via Priority Mail or parcel post. With no easy access to markets, the Havasupai people receive personal items such as groceries, furniture, medicine, and small appliances by mule mail train. A walk-in freezer at the Peach Springs post office stores frozen food, which also makes its way down the canyon.
39. TRAILB_160610_258.JPG: 32¢ GRAND CANYON STAMP ART (CELEBRATE THE CENTURY ISSUE) A pre-1920 photograph by Putnam and Valentine inspired Dennis Lyall's artwork for the 1998 Grand Canyon stamp in the Celebrate the Century series. After eleven years as a National Monument, the Grand Canyon became a National Park in 1919. The stamp honored this event as one of the decade's greatest achievements.
40. TRAILB_160610_261.JPG: 32¢ Grand Canyon stamp art (Celebrate the Century Issue)
41. TRAILB_160610_274.JPG: GRAND CANYON POST OFFICE CASH BOOK circa 1902 Sending and receiving money via postal money orders simplified life for local people, travelers, and tourists. Martin Buggeln kept his post office transaction records in this cash book, making it an important source for the community's economic history.
42. TRAILB_160610_287.JPG: SUPAI MULE MAIL RIDING SADDLE retired 2015 The mule train mail route makes some amenities of modern life available to the Grand Canyon's Havasupai people. The postman, a much-anticipated daily arrival, leads the mule train both on foot and by riding the saddled lead mule. The journey down takes approximately three hours.
43. TRAILB_160610_297.JPG: National Monuments Number of Parks: 81 (as of 2015) First Park: Devil's Tower National Monument | 1906 Newest Park: Waco Mammoth National Monument | 2015 Congress expanded the idea and role of national parks with the 1906 Antiquities Act, which originally protected geological formations and paleontological sites as well as manmade structures such as cliff dwellings and other ruins. Later, the Act was extended to places related to early explorations, European settlement, and fortifications. These cultural or natural features are known as National Monuments. A number of the National Monuments are icons of the shared American experience, such as the Statue of Liberty, Fort McHenry, and Pearl Harbor. More recently, emphasis has been placed on designating new monuments that recognize America's diversity, including sites related to Black, Hispanic, and women's history.
44. TRAILB_160610_302.JPG: WORLD WAR I ‘SAFE RETURN' POSTCARD 1919 Army transport ships returned U.S. soldiers from Europe throughout 1919. Civic and religious groups provided arriving troops with free postcards to let friends and family know they would be returning home after discharge. This card, provided by the YMCA, featured an image of the Statue of Liberty, the first sight that greeted ships entering New York Harbor.
45. TRAILB_160610_315.JPG: 15¢ FORT MCHENRY AND 15-STAR FLAG LARGE DIE PROOF (AMERICANA ISSUE) When Baltimore became the target of a British invasion in the waning days of the War of 1812, Fort McHenry withstood 25 hours of continuous shelling and blocked the Royal Navy's advance up the Patapsco River. Unable to enter the harbor and short of ammunition, the British fleet retreated. Eight miles downriver, "by the dawn's early light," Francis Scott Key penned a celebratory poem that became the U.S. national anthem more than a century later in March 1931.
46. TRAILB_160610_320.JPG: FORT MCHENRY RED CROSS HOSPITAL COVER 1919-1920 Fort McHenry served during World War I as U.S. General Hospital No. 2. The patients were returning soldiers, a high percentage of whom were shell-shocked, gassed, or blinded. At first, mail for the fort's patients, Army medical officers, and Red Cross nurses was delivered to the gate by a carrier from Baltimore. As the population swelled to more than 20,000, a fully functional post office opened, staffed by convalescent patients.
47. TRAILB_160610_330.JPG: STATUE OF LIBERTY SIGNED PLATE BLOCK (LIBERTY ISSUE) The Statue of Liberty took on new symbolic meaning during the long Cold War with the Soviet Union. Congress added the phrase "In God We Trust" to all U.S. currency in 1956, and it appeared on these Statue of Liberty stamps in the same era.
48. TRAILB_160610_345.JPG: USS ARIZONA COVER 1941 The Japanese surprise attack on the U.S. Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii brought the U.S. into World War II. Nearly 3700 military personnel and civilians were killed or wounded and nineteen ships sunk or damaged. Most of the ships were salvaged and returned to service, but the remains of Arizona and the Oklahoma wreck site are administered by the Park Service as part of World War II Valor in the Pacific National Monument, created in 1998. These envelopes were sent from the two ships' onboard post offices in the months before the attack.
49. TRAILB_160610_355.JPG: Phantom Ranch pack saddle, retired 2015
50. TRAILB_160610_380.JPG: AGATE, NEBRASKA POST OFFICE SIGN James H. Cook purchased his father-in-law's northwest Nebraska ranch in 1886 after discovering agate, fossils, and Plains Indian artifacts there. He invited paleontologists and scientists to excavate and study the fossils and minerals. Members of the Cook family operated a post office at the ranch, which they called Agate, from 1899 until it closed in 1968. Agate Fossil Beds National Monument was established in 1997.
51. TRAILB_160610_389.JPG: Parks In Your Backyard One of the largest concentrations of National Park Service units is in and around Washington, D.C. Much of the District's federal parkland, such as the National Mall, dates to the capital's creation in 1790 and the L'Enfant Plan of 1791. The National Capital Region, administered by the National Park Service since 1933, also includes sites in Maryland and Virginia. Numerous postage stamps recognize parks, some of which are associated with voluminous correspondents such as Clara Barton and Frederick Douglass, who generated much postal history. Did You Know? The Washington Monument was the tallest building in the world when it was completed in 1884?
52. TRAILB_160610_393.JPG: IWO JIMA WORLD WAR II PATRIOTIC COVER circa 1945-1946 Photographer Joe Rosenthal captured this iconic image of the U.S. flag being raised at the 1945 Battle of Iwo Jima. Published in the U.S. within twenty-four hours, the powerful photo soon appeared in magazines and on illustrated envelopes. The Marine Corps War Memorial and its surrounding parkland are cared for by the National Park Service.
53. TRAILB_160610_401.JPG: WOLF TRAP FARM PARK SLOGAN CANCEL 1971 Wolf Trap is the only national park devoted to the performing arts. Located just outside Washington DC in Vienna, Virginia, the park was made possible by Catherine Filene Shouse's donation of farmland in 1966. The first performances were held in 1971, the year of these slogan cancels.
54. TRAILB_160610_413.JPG: 20¢ WOLF TRAP FARM PARK ISSUE STAMP ART Eleven years after it opened, Wolf Trap's main performance venue, the Filene Center, burned to the ground. The 1982 season was held in a temporary bandshell, and the U.S. Postal Service issued a postage stamp to call attention to the rebuilding effort.
55. TRAILB_160610_421.JPG: 3¢ IWO JIMA (MARINES ISSUE) SIGNED BLOCK OF FOUR In response to public demand, the Post Office Department released a stamp bearing Rosenthal's stirring image in the summer of 1945. The three servicemen in the photo who survived Iwo Jima signed blocks of the stamp for autograph collector and philatelist Malcolm MacGregor.
56. TRAILB_160610_434.JPG: CLARA BARTON COVER 1910 Clara Barton, founder of the American Red Cross, addressed this cover to her brother Stephen from her home in Glen Echo, Maryland. The house, which also served as the Red Cross's early headquarters, was her home for fifteen years. It became a National Historic Site in 1975.
57. TRAILB_160610_443.JPG: CEDAR HILL CORNER CARD 1890 A family member addressed this envelope to abolitionist Frederick Douglass while he campaigned for equality in Maine. An escaped slave, Douglass lived at Cedar Hill, his home in Anacostia, Washington, D.C. for many years. Cedar Hill is now part of Frederick Douglass National Historic Site.
58. TRAILB_160610_456.JPG: SEQUOIA TREE CROSS-SECTION circa 500-1000 years old No visit to Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks in California is complete without viewing the displays of old growth sequoia slabs harvested from dead trees and prepared so that the rings are visible. Besides the age of the tree, these specimens record changes in temperature and patterns of disease, fires, flood, and human damage. Prepared slabs can be up to 30 feet in diameter, weigh 6 tons or more, and be up to 3,000 years old. Sequoia trees are native to the western slopes of California's Sierra Nevada Mountains, but have since been successfully cultivated in Europe and Oceana.
59. TRAILB_160610_465.JPG: HOT SPRINGS, TEXAS POST OFFICE SIGN Near the big bend of the Rio Grande in West Texas, 105°F water bubbles up from hot springs located just a few hundred feet from the cool river. Mississippi salesman Joseph O. Langford came to soak in the springs in 1909, seeking relief from poor health. He returned several years later to develop a tourist attraction that included a bathhouse, store, motor hotel, and post office. The post office closed about 18 months before Hot Springs, Texas became part of Big Bend National Park in 1944.
60. TRAILB_160610_467.JPG: National Parks Number of Parks: 59 (as of 2015) First Park: Yellowstone National Park | 1872 (came under NPS 1917) Newest Park: Pinnacles National Park | 2013 Park rangers, seasonal employees, and backpackers live deep in many national parks and interact with a range of postal facilities. Grand Canyon, Yosemite, and Yellowstone national parks have full-service post offices on par with those of any mid-sized American city. Other parks are served by postal contractors at part-time or seasonal facilities. Either way, the USPS is the only lifeline to books, movies, magazines, medicines, hardware, and other small articles that would otherwise be difficult to obtain.
61. TRAILB_160610_470.JPG: 15¢ GIANT SEQUOIA STAMP ART (AMERICAN TREES ISSUE)
62. TRAILB_160610_484.JPG: The Ochopee, Florida post office shortly after its 1953 conversion from a tomato farm shed. Staffed by one clerk and one rural carrier, it is used by tourists and surrounding populations of Miccosukee and Seminole Indians.
63. TRAILB_160610_491.JPG: 3¢ EVERGLADES NATIONAL PARK ISSUE PLATE BLOCK OF FOUR Everglades was the first National Park to open after World War II. It was the second national park established east of the Mississippi and is the third largest in the continental United States (only Death Valley and Yellowstone are larger). Everglades preserves several unique ecosystems not found in any other national park.
64. TRAILB_160610_502.JPG: PETRIFIED FOREST PETRIFIED FOREST COVER July 7, 1969 Rangers, other staff, and their families live in the Petrified Forest, and so for many years an elementary school and full-time post office served their needs. The Petrified Forest Post Office operates today with the ZIP Code 86028.
65. TRAILB_160610_510.JPG: PETRIFIED WOOD ARROWHEADS circa 800-1600 Petrified wood, which gets its range of colors from elements like manganese, iron, and copper, appeals to tourists and artists and is studied by geologists and paleobotanists. Prehistoric people, however, used it for more practical purposes. Like slate, quartz, and flint, petrified wood was also fashioned into useful and extremely hard tools such as these prehistoric arrowheads.
66. TRAILB_160610_517.JPG: 10¢ PETRIFIED WOOD (MINERAL HERITAGE ISSUE) LARGE DIE PROOF The Arizona petrified wood specimen pictured on this stamp is from the collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History.
67. TRAILB_160610_530.JPG: U.S. FLAG FROM PETRIFIED FOREST POST OFFICE 2016 Today the Petrified Forest's post office is a contract postal unit operated by the Petrified Forest Museum Association. Mail is picked up and delivered once daily by a highway contract carrier from Holbrook, Arizona, who raised the flag on his arrival as a signal to park employees that the mail is in. The postal unit remains open for about an hour, and the flag is lowered. The flag in this photo, the same one on display here, was used for several weeks in 2016.
68. TRAILB_160610_538.JPG: National Historic Sites Number of Parks: 78 (as of 2015) First Park: Salem Maritime National Historic Site | 1938 Newest Park: William Jefferson Clinton Birthplace Home NHS | 2010 National Historic Sites interpret a single theme or event in a relatively compact area. Many, but not all, are devoted to a person, marking their birthplace or adult home. The National Park Service manages most National Historic Sites, which may be designated as such either by Congress or by the secretary of the interior.
69. TRAILB_160610_544.JPG: 8¢ MORRO CASTLE STAMP ART (SAN JUAN 450TH ANNIVERSARY ISSUE) The first national park in a U.S. overseas territory, San Juan National Historic Site was established in 1949. A postage stamp celebrating the site was released in 1971. During the 16th century, Spain built Morro Castle to protect San Juan and its harbor.
70. TRAILB_160610_552.JPG: 8¢ MORRO CASTLE STAMP ART (SAN JUAN 450TH ANNIVERSARY ISSUE) The first national park in a U.S. overseas territory, San Juan National Historic Site was established in 1949. A postage stamp celebrating the site was released in 1971. During the 16th century, Spain built Morro Castle to protect San Juan and its harbor.
71. TRAILB_160610_553.JPG: WHITE HOUSE TO A. PHILIP RANDOLPH COVER circa 1962-1967 Labor leader A. Philip Randolph proposed a civil rights march down Pennsylvania Avenue from the Capitol to the White House in 1941. The march finally took place in August 1963, and is known as the "March on Washington." Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his "I Have a Dream" speech that day.
72. TRAILB_160610_558.JPG: WASHINGTON, DC COLLECTION AND DISTRIBUTION WAGON COVER circa 1898-1900 PICTURE POSTCARD OF OLD POST OFFICE TOWER circa 1920-1929 In addition to hosting parades and protests, Pennsylvania Avenue was for many years the city's main postal route. The Old Post Office, built in 1899, is a cherished landmark. Horse-drawn postal wagons made six daily trips up and down the artery, collecting and distributing all forms of correspondence. The street has been a National Historic Site since 1965.
73. TRAILB_160610_567.JPG: PICTURE POSTCARD OF OLD POST OFFICE TOWER circa 1920-1929
74. TRAILB_160610_568.JPG: COVER ADDRESSED TO TUSKEGEE INSTITUTE circa 1914-1915 Founded by Booker T. Washington in 1881, Tuskegee Institute offered a practical curriculum for teachers, farmers, and industrial laborers. Teachers emphasized education and self-reliance as the path of equality, a legacy that made Tuskegee the birthplace of the civil rights movement. The Tuskegee Institute became a National Historic Site in 1976.
75. TRAILB_160610_580.JPG: Tom of Ganado, also known as Naaltsoos Neiyehe (mail carrier), was a Navajo man employed on John Lorenzo Hubbell's mail route between Ganado, Arizona and Gallup, New Mexico. Hubbell operated a trading post on the Navajo reservation in 1878 and opened a post office about 1885. It became a National Historic Site in 1960 and remains an active trading post offering native-made rugs, baskets, pottery, and jewelry -- but is no longer a post office.
76. TRAILB_160610_585.JPG: A relocation center post office is staffed by Japanese American internees from Washington State and Alaska, circa 1942.
77. TRAILB_160610_588.JPG: JAPANESE AMERICAN INTERNMENT CAMP COVER 1942-1943 In February 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, which made it legal for the military to incarcerate people of Japanese ancestry in the United States indefinitely and without trial. Nearly 120,000 people – two-thirds of whom were U.S. citizens – were forcibly detained in ten relocation centers scattered around the country. The remoteness of these facilities meant that postal services were the only connection to the outside world. The most well-known of these camps, Manzanar in California and Minidoka in Idaho, became National Historic Sites in 1992 and 2001 respectively.
78. TRAILB_160610_598.JPG: FEDERAL ART PROJECT NATIONAL PARKS POSTER circa 1935-1943 During the Great Depression, President Franklin D. Roosevelt created the Works Progress Administration (WPA) to provide work for artists and craftspeople. WPA artists designed fourteen different posters promoting various national parks. Although more than a thousand copies of these posters were printed, only about forty survive today.
79. TRAILB_160610_604.JPG: SCOTT'S UNITED STATES STAMP CATALOGUE OWNED BY HAROLD L. ICKES 1938 Secretary of the Interior Harold LeClair Ickes examines one of his stamp albums. The signed stamp sheet on display here is framed on the wall in front of him.
80. TRAILB_160610_607.JPG: NATIONAL PARKS YEAR ISSUE FIRST DAY COVER AND LETTER 1934 The National Parks Year Issue was released simultaneously in Washington, DC and at the various parks depicted on the stamps. Postmaster General Farley sent first day cancellations and letters from each of the parks to his friends, family, and political supporters.
81. TRAILB_160610_613.JPG: CIVILIAN CONSERVATION CORPS LETTER AND COVER FROM WIND CAVE NATIONAL PARK 1939 Families of CCC enrollees received form letters describing camp life, encouraging frequent written communication, and threatening "dishonorable discharge" for "desertion." Although a civilian organization, the CCC was headed by Major General Douglas MacArthur and operated with a distinctly military air.
82. TRAILB_160610_615.JPG: CIVILIAN CONSERVATION CORPS LETTER AND COVER FROM WIND CAVE NATIONAL PARK October 18, 1939 Families of CCC enrollees received form letters describing camp life, encouraged frequent written communication, and threatening "dishonorable discharge for "desertion." Although a civilian organization, the CCC was headed by Major General Douglas MacArthur and operated with a distinctly military air.
83. TRAILB_160610_622.JPG: AUTOGRAPHED NATIONAL PARKS YEAR ISSUE IMPERFORATE PRESS SHEET 1934 When the National Parks Year Issue appeared in 1934, it was perforated and gummed like most ordinary stamps of the time. Soon, however, the public learned that Postmaster General James Farley had purchased imperforate, ungummed full press sheets as gifts. The outcry from stamp collectors led Farley to order the National Parks stamps reprinted and sold to anyone who desired them in similar condition. This minor scandal and the reprinted stamps are known to collectors as "Farley's Follies." The sheet shown here is one of the original gifts that created the uproar, as attested by the 1934 dates in Farley's and Ickes' handwriting.
84. TRAILB_160610_625.JPG: Franklin D. Roosevelt
85. TRAILB_160610_627.JPG: Harold Ickes Secretary of the Interior Nov. 20, 1934
86. TRAILB_160610_636.JPG: STONY MAN CAMP COVER circa 1894-1903 CCC workers built an entirely new national park -- Shenandoah -- on land that once boasted several small towns and a resort called Stony Man Camp (later Skyland). Stony Man Camp's owner and postmaster from 1895-1934 was the colorful George Freeman Pollack, who lives in park legend as the man whose bugle joyfully announced the daily mail's departure.
87. TRAILB_160610_640.JPG: Extra clerks were brought in to help Yosemite Post Office's regular staff cancel first day covers of the 1¢ Yosemite National Parks Year Issue stamp, July 16, 1934. First sale of the Yellowstone National Park stamp made form the Mammoth Post Office, July 30, 1934. The first sheet was sold by Postmaster General (PMG) Farley to Senator J.C. O'Mahoney of Wyoming, who presented several of the stamps to W.H. Jackson, who in turn donated the stamps to the park museum. The stamps were autographed by PMG Farley and Senator O'Mahoney.
88. TRAILB_160610_645.JPG: The New Deal Home > Exhibit > The New Deal Secretary of the Interior Harold LeClair Ickes examines one of his stamp albums. Secretary of the Interior Harold LeClair Ickes examines one of his stamp albums. The signed stamp sheet on display here is framed on the wall in front of him. Courtesy Smithsonian Institution Libraries, National Postal Museum Library Thanks to the booming economy of the 1920s, affordable automobiles, and new roads, the national parks became an inexpensive alternative to European vacations during the Great Depression and World War II. To entice visitors, the government created an extensive visual culture around the parks, including posters and a natural architectural style known as "Parks Rustic." Postage stamps -- visual, inexpensive, and widely disseminated -- entered this mix in 1934 with the National Parks Year Issue. President Franklin D. Roosevelt reorganized the National Park Service in 1933, and his Civilian Conservation Corps made many park improvements that are still in use today. Did You Know? The first stamp to picture a US national park was issued by the Philippines in 1932, two years before the US issued its first park stamps?
89. TRAILB_160610_653.JPG: Take only pictures, leave only footprints More than 300 million people visit U.S. national parks every year. A very few surrender to temptation and carry away rocks, shells, and other tokens of their trip. Later seized by remorse, some return their mementos to the parks via mail with apologetic notes called conscience letters. The writer sometimes imagines having been cursed by their theft, but the only curse involved is visited on future generations who might not enjoy public lands in the same condition. The National Park Service encourages visitors to preserve the parks and "take only pictures, leave only footprints."
90. TRAILB_160610_655.JPG: PINE CONE MAILED TO YOSEMITE NATIONAL PARK 2015 In addition to being a source for future trees, the nuts (seeds) inside the park's pine cones are food for squirrels and chipmunks. Taking even a small keepsake can affect a park's ecosystem.
91. TRAILB_160610_665.JPG: CONSCIENCE LETTER MAILED TO PETRIFIED FOREST NATIONAL PARK circa 1984-1989 Wood theft has been a problem at Petrified Forest National Park for years, but a 2007 project compared historical photographs to the current landscape and proved that the loss has been limited to small pieces.
92. TRAILB_160610_671.JPG: PARK SIGN MAILED TO SEQUOIA NATIONAL PARK circa 1926-1940 A teenaged visitor to Sequoia National Park took this directional sign as a souvenir in the 1940s and mailed it back to the park in 2005 -- about sixty years later!
93. TRAILB_160610_680.JPG: Origins of our National Parks During the 1890s, as settlers claimed the last of America's frontier territories, dedicated private citizens fought to protect Western landscapes for posterity. Conservationists joined with John Muir and others to campaign for the establishment and protection of national parks. Enlightened politicians such as Theodore Roosevelt joined the crusade, and his administration added sites of historic significance to the system. Finally, in 1916, Congress established and funded the National Park Service, whose umbrella now protects natural wonders as well as heritage sites. Did You Know? The only post office that does not fly a US flag or cancel its mail with a ZIP Code is Benjamin Franklin Post Office in Philadelphia's Independence National Historic Park?
94. TRAILB_160610_684.JPG: John Wesley Powell's boat Emma Dean, with his chair and lifebelt, are pictured on the banks of the Colorado River in one of the first-ever photographs of the Grand Canyon, 1872.
95. TRAILB_160610_690.JPG: JOHN MUIR STAMP ART (CELEBRATE THE CENTURY ISSUE) Scottish immigrant John Muir (1838-1914) first visited Yosemite in 1868 and was captivated by its magnificence. He lived in the valley for ten years, studying its wildlife, botany, and geology and preaching his "gospel of the mountains" to visitors. The remainder of his life was devoted to Yosemite's preservation as a national park and to the Sierra Club, which he founded in 1892.
96. TRAILB_160610_692.JPG: JOHN MUIR STAMP ART (CELEBRATE THE CENTURY ISSUE) Scottish immigrant John Muir (1838-1914) first visited Yosemite in 1868 and was captivated by its magnificence. He lived in the valley for ten years, studying its wildlife, botany, and geology and preaching his "gospel of the mountains" to visitors. The remainder of his life was devoted to Yosemite's preservation as a national park and to the Sierra Club, which he founded in 1892.
97. TRAILB_160610_694.JPG: 8¢ OLD FAITHFUL, YELLOWSTONE STAMP ART (NATIONAL PARKS CENTENNIAL ISSUE) Congress created Yellowstone National Park in 1872. The first national park anywhere in the world, it became a model for the rest of the globe. Today, national parks exist in more than 100 countries. Yellowstone is notable for its geothermal features, especially geysers such as Old Faithful, depicted here. More than half the world's geysers are in Yellowstone.
98. TRAILB_160610_698.JPG: 6¢ JOHN WESLEY POWELL ISSUE STAMP ART Civil War veteran John Wesley Powell (1834-1902) led two expeditions to the Colorado River, in 1869 and 1871. He and his companions produced the first photographs, reports, and maps of the Grand Canyon and its native people, awakening public interest and spurring further exploration.
99. TRAILB_160610_704.JPG: 8¢ OLD FAITHFUL, YELLOWSTONE STAMP ART (NATIONAL PARKS CENTENNIAL ISSUE) Congress created Yellowstone National Park in 1872. The first national park anywhere in the world, it became a model for the rest of the globe. Today, national parks exist in more than 100 countries. Yellowstone is notable for its geothermal features, especially geysers such as Old Faithful, depicted here. More than half the world's geysers are in Yellowstone.
100. TRAILB_160610_706.JPG: 6¢ JOHN WESLEY POWELL ISSUE STAMP ART Civil War veteran John Wesley Powell (1834-1902) led two expeditions to the Colorado River, in 1869 and 1871. He and his companions produced the first photographs, reports, and maps of the Grand Canyon and its native people, awakening public interest and spurring further exploration.
101. TRAILB_160610_711.JPG: 5¢ NATIONAL PARK SERVICE ISSUE DIE PROOF To celebrate the 50th anniversary of the National Park Service, the Post Office Department released this stamp featuring the service's recently designed "triangles and cannonballs" logo. Intended to symbolize the service's natural and historical functions in a modern, abstract way, the logo proved unpopular and was discontinued within a few years.
102. TRAILB_160610_720.JPG: YELLOWSTONE HOTEL OWNEY TAG circa 1888-1893 Railroads opened the national parks to tourism, and railway mail service enabled visitors to write home about the natural wonders they witnessed. Owney, the railway mail service's beloved canine mascot, visited Montana sometime between 1888 and 1893. He received this Yellowstone Hotel token at Glendive.
103. TRAILB_160610_729.JPG: RALPH H. CAMERON HOTEL COVER circa 1905-1906 Establishing the early national parks sometimes provoked battles with commercial interests. Ralph H. Cameron (1863-1953) owned enterprises within Grand Canyon and fought the national park's creation every step of the way. Elected U.S. senator from Arizona in 1920, he used his one term in office to antagonize the new Park Service and its first director, Stephen Mather.
104. TRAILB_160610_735.JPG: 3¢ DEVILS TOWER ISSUE PLATE BLOCK Congress passed the Antiquities Act in 1906, enabling the president to protect historically and culturally significant sites from vandalism and looting by declaring them to be national monuments. Later that year, President Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919) used this power for the first time when he declared Devils Tower in Wyoming as the first national monument. 7¢ ACADIA (NATIONAL PARKS YEAR ISSUE) DIE PROOF The national parks idea gradually migrated to the more thickly-populated East. Acadia, on Maine's Mount Desert Island, became the first national park east of the Mississippi River in 1919.
105. TRAILB_160610_758.JPG: ANSEL ADAMS'S STAMP ALBUM Photographer Ansel Adams received his first camera on a family trip to Yosemite National Park in 1916. He later settled in the valley and became celebrated for his iconic photographs of western national parks such as Yosemite, Glacier, Sequoia, and Kings Canyon. His work reflects the influence of composition and framing techniques Adams first encountered as a young stamp collector.
106. TRAILB_160610_762.JPG: Ansel Adams took this photograph of Yosemite's Half Dome in the snow in April 1933. Some of the park's apple trees, which predate the Civil War, are visible in the foreground with snow on their branches.
107. TRAILB_160610_768.JPG: Ansel Adams (1902 - 1984) Photo taken by J. Malcolm Greany, circa 1950.
108. TRAILB_160610_772.JPG: Tourism From the beginning, Congress intended the national parks to be open to everyone -- unlike the private hunting grounds and exclusive gardens for aristocrats found in Europe. At first, access was by foot, stagecoach and railroad, limiting tourism to the adventurous. The booming economy of the Roaring Twenties, however, brought better roads and affordable cars with middle-class tourists behind the wheel. National parks and historic sites contribute to local economies, while tourism in turn can contribute to the parks' long-term sustainability.
109. TRAILB_160610_774.JPG: English immigrant Frederick Henry Harvey (1835-1901) made millions operating a chain of hotels and restaurants that catered to tourists visiting the American Southwest and the national parks. Did You Know? It was while he was working as a railway mail clerk that Fred Harvey observed the deplorable food, lodging, and service offered to train travelers and saw an opportunity to do better.
110. TRAILB_160610_784.JPG: Introduction to the Golden Eagle Pass GOLDEN EAGLE PASS 1988 The Golden Eagle Pass program allowed the public to pay a single fee for entrance to all national parks for one calendar year. In 1988, the National Park Service issued revenue stamps for the program; participants detached the two right-hand stamps from the sheet and affixed them to a carrying card. The system was cumbersome and the stamps were never issued again.
111. TRAILB_160610_788.JPG: FRED HARVEY COMPANY SOAP AND CHAPSTICK late 1940s-early 1950s Much of the Fred Harvey Company's success was due to anticipating tourists' needs. By 1900, many people carried lip balm in their purses and pockets, but did they remember to pack it for hikes in the national parks? Harvey Hotels offered these niceties.
112. TRAILB_160610_792.JPG: FRED HARVEY COMPANY COLLAPSIBLE TIN CUP early twentieth century The Harvey Company catered to a wide spectrum of tourists. A visitor to the Grand Canyon could rent a tent for 75 cents per night and buy this aluminum camping cup for 15 cents, or rent a room at Harvey's luxurious El Tovar Hotel for $5.
113. TRAILB_160610_799.JPG: FRED HARVEY COMPANY PAINTED DESERT INN PLATE circa 1947-1962 Many tourists welcomed the relative elegance offered by the Fred Harvey Company's restaurants and hotels. They preferred being served by a "Harvey Girl" on china dishes to more rustic aluminum dinnerware. This plate once graced tables at Petrified Forest National Park's Painted Desert Inn.
114. TRAILB_160610_823.JPG: $1 TRAILER PERMIT STAMP ON LICENSE circa 1939-1940 House trailers grew in popularity during the Great Depression as an economical alternative to hotels. From the 1930s through the ‘50s, operating trailers in a national park or monument required a special license with a trailer permit stamp affixed.
115. TRAILB_160610_836.JPG: ARIZONA LICENSE PLATE circa 1980-1996 The slogan "Grand Canyon State" first appeared on Arizona auto license plates in 1941.
116. TRAILB_160610_848.JPG: NATIONAL PARK SLOGAN CANCELS circa 1917-1921 Promoters and politicians, knowing that a nearby national park meant tourist dollars for the local economy, turned to the post office for cheap and effective advertising. Special postmarks bearing slogans such as "Visit Glacier National Park" carried the message across the country and worldwide.
117. TRAILB_160610_855.JPG: PARK HOTEL ADVERTISING COVER circa 1916-1917 The railroads opened many of the early national parks to tourism, including Yellowstone, Glacier, and Grand Teton. Hoping to increase passenger traffic, railroad companies built some of the first hotels and amenities in the parks. Visitation boomed during World War I, which closed off most European travel.
AAA "Gem": AAA considers this location to be a "must see" point of interest. To see pictures of other areas that AAA considers to be Gems, click here.
Bigger photos? To save server space, the full-sized versions of these images have either not been loaded to the server or have been removed from the server. (Only some pages are loaded with full-sized images and those usually get removed after three months.) I still have them though. If you want me to email them to you, please send an email to guthrie.bruce@gmail.com and I can email them to you, or, depending on the number of images, just repost the page again will the full-sized images.
Connection Not Secure messages? Those warnings you get from your browser about this site not having secure connections worry some people. This means this site does not have SSL installed (the link is http:, not https:). That's bad if you're entering credit card numbers, passwords, or other personal information. But this site doesn't collect any personal information so SSL is not necessary. Life's good!
Photo Contact: [Email Bruce Guthrie].