Five cents John Kennedy - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The five cents John Kennedy is the first United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

Postage stamp

A postage stamp is a small piece of paper that is purchased and displayed on an item of mail as evidence of payment of postage. Typically, stamps are made from special paper, with a national designation and denomination on the face, and a gum adhesive on the reverse side...

to pay tribute to President

President of the United States

The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....

John Fitzgerald Kennedy. It was issued May 29, 1964 for his 47th birthday, with a first day of issue

First day of issue

A First Day of Issue Cover or First Day Cover is a postage stamp on a cover, postal card or stamped envelope franked on the first day the issue is authorized for use within the country or territory of the stamp-issuing authority. Sometimes the issue is made from a temporary or permanent foreign or...

cancellation in his hometown of Boston, Massachusetts.

The overall shape of the stamp is a horizontal rectangle, of a size standard for the time. The design consists of two side-by-side squares, the left one with a depiction of the John F. Kennedy Eternal Flame

John F. Kennedy Eternal Flame

The John F. Kennedy Eternal Flame is a presidential memorial at the gravesite of U.S. President John F. Kennedy, in Arlington National Cemetery. The permanent site replaced a temporary grave and eternal flame used during President Kennedy's funeral on November 25, 1963. The site was designed by...

, the right one with a portrait of Kennedy adapted from a photograph taken in 1958 by Bill Murphy for The Los Angeles Times. Textual inscriptions form a frame around the central design, and include a quotation from Kennedy's 1961 inaugural address

Inaugural address of John F. Kennedy

U.S. President John F. Kennedy delivered his only inaugural address at 12:51 Friday, January 20, 1961, immediately after taking the presidential oath of office administered by Chief Justice Earl Warren.-Background:...

"... And the glow from that fire can truly light the world.", along with Kennedy's full name and the years of his birth and death. The required "U.S. POSTAGE" inscription is positioned inconspicuously in small letters vertically next to the Eternal Flame, while the denomination

Denomination (postage stamp)

:This article deals with the price of a postage stamp. For other meanings of the word 'denomination' see Denomination .In philately, the denomination is the "inscribed value of a stamp"...

is in the frame text. The stamp is in a single blue-gray color.

Soon after the assassination of President Kennedy, the United States Post Office Department

United States Post Office Department

The Post Office Department was the name of the United States Postal Service when it was a Cabinet department. It was headed by the Postmaster General....

decided to issue a postage stamp to be issued on his next birthday. This was a challenging deadline, requiring the stamp to be designed, approved by the late President's widow, Jacqueline Kennedy

Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis

Jacqueline Lee Bouvier "Jackie" Kennedy Onassis was the wife of the 35th President of the United States, John F. Kennedy, and served as First Lady of the United States during his presidency from 1961 until his assassination in 1963. Five years later she married Greek shipping magnate Aristotle...

), and printed in large quantities in just a few months (it was estimated that two million first day covers

First day of issue

would need to be available).

The first proposals of the Bureau of Engraving and Printing

Bureau of Engraving and Printing

The Bureau of Engraving and Printing is a government agency within the United States Department of the Treasury that designs and produces a variety of security products for the United States government, most notable of which is paper currency for the Federal Reserve. The Federal Reserve itself is...

were turned down in December 1963 and in early January 1964. The decision was then made to call in the Loewy/Snaith design firm. Raymond Loewy

Raymond Loewy

Raymond Loewy was an industrial designer, and the first to be featured on the cover of Time Magazine, on October 31, 1949. Born in France, he spent most of his professional career in the United States...

accepted the stamp design project more for the firm's reputation than for money; the firm earned $

United States dollar

The United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....

500 for this project, a small and symbolic amount considering the amount of work involved.

Over the next three months, Loewy's designers worked on the project. To maintain secrecy, Loewy locked the papers and projects in his safe every day, putting his thumb's fingerprint on them.

Finally, Mrs. Kennedy was consulted, choosing both the design proposal and its color, a blue-gray similar to that used in the interior of Air Force One

Air Force One

Air Force One is the official air traffic control call sign of any United States Air Force aircraft carrying the President of the United States. In common parlance the term refers to those Air Force aircraft whose primary mission is to transport the president; however, any U.S. Air Force aircraft...

See also