450th Anniversary of San Juan 8-cent commemorative

Issued Sept. 12, 1971 at San Juan, P.R.

By Belmont Faries

On Feb. 4, 1970 Gov. Luis A. Ferre of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico wrote to Postmaster General Winton M. Blount requesting a commemorative stamp for the 450th anniversary of the rounding of San Juan and urged that it be issued during the National Governors Conference to be held there Sept. 12-15, 1971. He suggested that Morro Castle be used for the design and enclosed an air view of the old fort.

Unlike most people with ideas for stamps, the governor got almost exactly what he asked.

San Juan and El Morro

San Juan is the oldest city under the American flag, 44 years older than St. Agustine in F!orida. Columbus on his second voyage claimed for Spain in 1593 an island the indians called Borinquen; and named it San Juan Bautista. Juan Ponce de Leon made the first settlement in 1508, and in 1521 moved it to a small island commanding the entrance to an excellent harbor. He called the little outpost Puerto Rico (Rich Harbor} but over the years it came to be called San Juan while the entire island became Puerto Rico.

In the next two centuries the island became one of the military keys to the Caribbean. A powerful fort, El Morro, started in 1539, was completed just in time to repulse an attack by Sir Francis Drake in 1595. Another English attack failed in 1598, a Dutch assault in 1624, and the English failed again in 1798. Puerto Rico was occupied by American troops in 1898 and ceded to the United States by Spain in the treaty ending the Spanish-American War.

Puerto Rico elected its first governor in 1948 and became a commonwealth with its own constitution in 1952. Morro Castle and associated fortifications are now part of the San Juan National Historical Site.

The Stamp

Gov. Ferre's request for a San Juan stamp was on the agenda for the June 25, 1970 meeting of the Citizens' Stamp Advisory Committee. It was held for further consideration. At the committee's next meeting, on Aug. 13, it was recommended as a "high priority" issue for 1971.

The San Juan stamp was one of five for time next year announced by Postmaster General Blount on Dec. 19, 1970 with the added information that it would be issued during the National Governors Conference Sept. 12-15. A news release on March 27 pinned down the date of issue as Sept. 12.

Stevan Dohanos, chairman of the advisory committee, asked Walter Brooks of New Canaan, Conn., to develop a stamp design, suggesting Morro Castle as the subject. Brool felt that the most effective way picture the fort would not be an air view, which would be unimpressive in stamp size, but by its most distinctive feature, the great stone sentry box - technically a bartizan - projecting out from and above the massive stone walls. In an effort to capture the 16th century atmosphere of the old fortress he turned to an artistic technique seldom used in stamp design, wood engraving.

First he made two sketches, one with the lettering in black and the other with inscriptions in white on a darker background. Then he carved five separate wood engravings about 18 inches high, one for each of his colors, and made six prints from the blocks with minor variations in the colors.

Gov. Ferre wanted to unveil the design in Puerto Rico on St. John's Day June 24 and he was concerned about the design.

Back in 1949, when a stamp was issued to commemorate the inauguration of Puerto Rico's first elected governor, Luis Muñoz Marín, the governor's office provided a sketch showing a jibaro or farm worker holding a ballot box and a cogwheel to symbolize industrialization. It was hardly a coincidence that the head of tile jibaro in broad-brimmed straw hat was a full-face version of the profile which appears on the ballot as the official emblem of the governor' victorious Popular Democratic Party.

Gov. Ferre, elected in 1968 by the New Progressive Party, a pro Statehood group associated with the Republicans on the mainland was not interested in getting hi own party symbol, a palm tree, on the San Juan stamp. He just wanted to be sure that the straw-hatted, jibaro didn't turn up again. When he came to Washington shortly be fore St. John's Day he couldn't understand why he couldn't see the design, which the artist had not yet finished.

A call to Brooks produced a de tailed description, and Gordon Morison visited the governor with the information that there would be m farmer and no palm tree, merely the Morro Castle sentry tower Gov. Ferre, something of an art connoisseur, liked both the wood block technique idea and the use, of the sentry tower for the design.

The five-color woodblock print used for the model. It was one of six with minor differences in color.

The timing was close, but a color enlargement of the design was flown to Puerto Rico in time for an unveiling ceremony sponsored by the San Juan Chamber of Cornmerce on June 24. Chief Postal Inspector William J. Cotter represented the Postal Service at the ceremony. Puerto Rican dignitaries included the governor, the mayor of San Juan, the president of the Chamber of Commerce and the San Juan postmaster.

The news release on the unveiling noted the unusual design technique and said the sentry box and fortress wall were in tones of brown and cream, the background in a sandy brown with a wood grain effect and the lettering in black.

Production Data

On June 28 the Brooks woodblock print was sent to tile Bureau of Engraving and Printing with a request for preparation of a model, which was made photographically from the print and delivered to the Postal Service on July 2. It was approved by Assistant Postmaster General William D. Dunlap on July 7.

Bureau officials had decided to print the stamp by a combination of lithography and recess engraving with two offset and one Giori pass. Three master dies, two offset and one intaglio, were engraved by Joseph S. Creamer, Jr., who did the picture, and Albert Saavedra, the lettering.

A die proof submitted by the Bureau on July 26 was approved by Dunlap on July 28 and the Bureau was instructed to proceed with the production of 130 million stamps.

For the offset portion of the printing the Bureau made 10 lithographic plates, 33197, 33204, 33214, 33215 and 33221 yellow, and 33198, 33205, 33216. 33217 and 33231 brown.

Plates 33204 yellow and 33205 brown were sent to press Aug. 16 for a trial run of 5,021 sheets of 200. The regular press run began on Aug. 23 with 33214 yellow and 33216 brown, but 33214 had to be removed from the press after only 147 impressions and replaced by 33215 which completed the run. Plate 33216 brown was replaced on Aug. 30 by 33217. Plates 33197, 33198, 33221 and 33231 were never used.

For the intaglio printing the Bureau made a flat master plate, 33170, by transfer and eight curved printing plates by the electrolytic process. Printing on a two-plate Giori press began on Aug. 28 and was completed on Sept. 5 with a total of 883,464 printing sheets of 200 or 176,692,800 stamps.

The production breakdown by intaglio plates was:

Plates Impressions Stamps

When the Bureau cleared out the last of its stocks on Sept. 7, 1972 a total of 148,765,000 stamps had been delivered to post offices and the Philatelic Sales Unit where the stamps remained on sale until Jan. 26, 1973.

Offset plates 33204, 33205 and 33214 were canceled on Aug. 30, 1971, intaglio plate 33218 on Sept. 23, offset plate 33216 on Sept. 30, master plate 33170 on Dec. 8, 1972 and all remaining plates on Jan. 5, 1973.

First Day Ceremonies

The National Governors Conference provided an ideal target for a massive demonstration by the radical fringe of Puerto Rico's Independence movement. Although they had never been able to get more than 3 per cent of the vote in an election they turned out more than 10,000 marchers to picket the luxury beach hotels where the governors were meeting, tying up traffic for miles. Some 2,000 security officers on duty in the area added to the confusion. When the special post office at the San Juan Hotel opened at noon not more than seven or eight collectors were on hand. The luncheon sponsored by the Chamber of Commerce for the governors and visiting philatelists finally started about 2 p.m. as a mass of demonstrators, many carrying "Yankee Go Home" signs, paraded outside in a holiday mood.

There was a distinguished list of speakers: Spain's postmaster general, Gov. Ferre, the mayor of San Juan, the presidents of the Chamber of Commerce and the Puerto Rican Philatelic Society, and Regional Postmaster General Harold R. Larsen of New York to introduce the chief speaker, Senior Assistant Postmaster General Harold F. Faught.

Collectors were surprised to find that there was a special cancellation reading "Governors Conference Sta." in use at the San Juan Hotel post office and the few who were able to reach the hotel and had envelopes available picked up copies.

The Postal Service later reported that 501,668 covers were given first day cancellations and 647,548 stamps with a value of $51.403.84 sold in connection with the first day.

Philatelic Data

Eight-cent multicolor on white wove paper, .84 by 1.44 inches, printed from 200-subject plates by a combination of lithography and recess engraving, with one pass through a Harris offset press for the yellow undertint of the sentry box and wall and the sandy brown wood grain background and a pass through a two-plate Giori press for the intaglio black of the lettering, dark brown of the picture details and lighter brown toning of the wall.

Phosphor tagged on an offset press, perforated 11 on the L-perforator and divided into post office panes of 50.

Marginal inscriptions on post office panes are in black. The plate number is in the narrow side margin adjacent to the top or bottom row of stamps. The Mr. Zip cartoon in the walking version is in the wide top or bottom margin above or below the first of last row of stamps. The "MAIL EARLY / IN THE DAY" slogan is in the top or bottom margin above or below the fourth row of stamps from left or right.

The uncut sheet of 200 shows additional markings not on the post office panes. Across the bottom of the sheet are five color blocks which provide targets for the missing color detector on the L-perforator. Beneath the eighth row from

the left of the lower left pane is a brown offset block, beneath the third and fourth row from the left of the lower right pane a yellow offset block, beneath the fourth row a black intaglio block, beneath the sixth row a dark brown intaglio block and beneath the eighth row a light brown intaglio block. The offset blocks are accompanied by a plate number and three extensions with the color reduced to 60 per cent, 30 per cent and 10 per cent.

Panes have been found with misregistration of color or perforation and without phosphor tagging.

REFERENCES

The account of the San Juan first day ceremony is partly based on a report by Earl H. Wellman, president of the Aerophilatelic Federation of the Americas, in the November 1971 issue of the Jack Knight Air Log.

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