STAMP VIGNETTE ON MEDICAL SCIENCE
The 1964 “Doctors Mayo” Commemorative Postage Stamp David P. Steensma, MD; Marc A. Shampo, PhD; and Robert A. Kyle, MD
M
ore than 1,800 commemorative stamps e ie, postage stamps that are available for sale for a limited time, issued to honor a person or to mark a special event or anniversary e have been issued by the United States since the first commemorative series appeared in 1893 to celebrate the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago. In recent years, the number of new commemorative stamps issued each year by the US Postal Service has dramatically increased: While only 26 commemoratives were issued in 1997, 121 were issued in 2002, and 80 commemoratives as well as more than 80 new “definitives” (ie, standard-design, regular-issue stamps that are on sale for an extended period of time) were issued in 2012. Collectors who purchase commemorative stamps and then do not use them to mail letters or packages contribute more than $200 million dollars in revenue annually to the US Postal Service. The 1993 Elvis Presley stamp, the most popular commemorative issue in US history, alone generated more than $35 million in sales. The expanding US stamp issuing policy, while criticized by some collectors, is still more conservative than the practice of many nations in the developing world, which issue hundreds of new stamps (“philatelic wallpaper”) every year on themes chosen to appeal to collectors. Some Pacific Island nations and countries in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia issue new designs even in the absence of a functioning national postal service. In 1964, the US Postal Service debuted only 21 new types of commemorative stamps, but one of these was of special interest to Mayo Clinic as well as to physicians and historians of medicine: Scott catalog #1251, issued on September 11th, which featured the “Doctors Mayo” and a caduceus (single-serpent staff of Aesculapius). The stamp was designed by Victor S. McCloskey, Jr (1908-1988), an artist who worked for the US Bureau of Engraving and Printing, and depicts profiles of brothers
William James Mayo (1861-1939) and Charles Horace Mayo (1865-1939) based on a bronze sculpture by James Earle Fraser (1876-1953) of Winona, Minnesota. The sculpture can be seen today on the grounds of the Mayo Civic Center in Rochester, Minnesota. The year 1964 corresponded to both the 100th anniversary of the year in which the Mayo brothers’ father, William Worrall Mayo (1819-1911), set up a medical practice in Rochester, shortly after he arrived in the town as a medical examiner for the Civil War Union Army draft board. The year 1964 was also the 50th anniversary of the 1914 construction of the first building called “Mayo Clinic,” built on the corner of First Avenue and Second Street Southwest in Rochester. Later called “The 1914 Building,” this structure was demolished in the 1980s to make way for Mayo Clinic’s Harold W. Siebens Medical Education Building. Because commemoratives were issued infrequently in the United States in the 1960s, the printing of the “Doctors Mayo” stamp represented an unusual achievement for Mayo Clinic. The stamp first had to be recommended to the US Postal Service by an organization known as the Citizens’ Stamp Advisory Committee (CSAC), which was formed in 1957 at the direction of the US Postmaster General to bring “philatelic, history, and artistic judgment and experience” to bear on stamp design choices and to reduce political influence on stamp issues. Today the CSAC answers more than 40,000 inquiries each year about stamp subjects and designs, and even in the 1960s it received at least 10,000 suggestions annually. Roy A. Watson, Jr (1921-2012), president of the Kahler Hotel Corporation from 19521982, and Robert Putnam Kingsbury (19132008), a philatelist and chief financial officer of Mayo Clinic in the 1960s, were the driving forces behind recommending the Doctors Mayo as a suitable subject for a US postage stamp. John Austin Gronouski (1919-1996) of Dunbar, Wisconsin, the 56th US Postmaster
Mayo Clin Proc. n January 2014;89(1):e1-e2 n http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.mayocp.2013.10.031 www.mayoclinicproceedings.org n ª 2014 Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research
From Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA (D.P.S.), and Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN (M.A.S., R.A.K.).
e1
MAYO CLINIC PROCEEDINGS
General e appointed by John F. Kennedy in 1963 e attended the first day of issue ceremonies in Rochester in September 1964. The official first day cover was designed by Mayo Clinic medical artist John Marvin Hutcheson, Jr, (1930-2010) at the request of the Rochester Stamp Club; the engraving on the cover was
e2
Mayo Clin Proc.
n
also based on the Fraser statue, and included a special seal designed for the 1964 centennial of Mayo Clinic. More than 123 million of the Doctors Mayo stamps were printed in a green monotone (“the symbolic color of medicine”) on a rotary press, carrying the then-prevailing 5 cent first class domestic postal rate.
January 2014;89(1):e1-e2
n
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.mayocp.2013.10.031 www.mayoclinicproceedings.org
The 1964 “Doctors Mayo” Commemorative Postage Stamp David P. Steensma, MD; Marc A. Shampo, PhD; and Robert A. Kyle, MD
M
ore than 1,800 commemorative stamps e ie, postage stamps that are available for sale for a limited time, issued to honor a person or to mark a special event or anniversary e have been issued by the United States since the first commemorative series appeared in 1893 to celebrate the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago. In recent years, the number of new commemorative stamps issued each year by the US Postal Service has dramatically increased: While only 26 commemoratives were issued in 1997, 121 were issued in 2002, and 80 commemoratives as well as more than 80 new “definitives” (ie, standard-design, regular-issue stamps that are on sale for an extended period of time) were issued in 2012. Collectors who purchase commemorative stamps and then do not use them to mail letters or packages contribute more than $200 million dollars in revenue annually to the US Postal Service. The 1993 Elvis Presley stamp, the most popular commemorative issue in US history, alone generated more than $35 million in sales. The expanding US stamp issuing policy, while criticized by some collectors, is still more conservative than the practice of many nations in the developing world, which issue hundreds of new stamps (“philatelic wallpaper”) every year on themes chosen to appeal to collectors. Some Pacific Island nations and countries in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia issue new designs even in the absence of a functioning national postal service. In 1964, the US Postal Service debuted only 21 new types of commemorative stamps, but one of these was of special interest to Mayo Clinic as well as to physicians and historians of medicine: Scott catalog #1251, issued on September 11th, which featured the “Doctors Mayo” and a caduceus (single-serpent staff of Aesculapius). The stamp was designed by Victor S. McCloskey, Jr (1908-1988), an artist who worked for the US Bureau of Engraving and Printing, and depicts profiles of brothers
William James Mayo (1861-1939) and Charles Horace Mayo (1865-1939) based on a bronze sculpture by James Earle Fraser (1876-1953) of Winona, Minnesota. The sculpture can be seen today on the grounds of the Mayo Civic Center in Rochester, Minnesota. The year 1964 corresponded to both the 100th anniversary of the year in which the Mayo brothers’ father, William Worrall Mayo (1819-1911), set up a medical practice in Rochester, shortly after he arrived in the town as a medical examiner for the Civil War Union Army draft board. The year 1964 was also the 50th anniversary of the 1914 construction of the first building called “Mayo Clinic,” built on the corner of First Avenue and Second Street Southwest in Rochester. Later called “The 1914 Building,” this structure was demolished in the 1980s to make way for Mayo Clinic’s Harold W. Siebens Medical Education Building. Because commemoratives were issued infrequently in the United States in the 1960s, the printing of the “Doctors Mayo” stamp represented an unusual achievement for Mayo Clinic. The stamp first had to be recommended to the US Postal Service by an organization known as the Citizens’ Stamp Advisory Committee (CSAC), which was formed in 1957 at the direction of the US Postmaster General to bring “philatelic, history, and artistic judgment and experience” to bear on stamp design choices and to reduce political influence on stamp issues. Today the CSAC answers more than 40,000 inquiries each year about stamp subjects and designs, and even in the 1960s it received at least 10,000 suggestions annually. Roy A. Watson, Jr (1921-2012), president of the Kahler Hotel Corporation from 19521982, and Robert Putnam Kingsbury (19132008), a philatelist and chief financial officer of Mayo Clinic in the 1960s, were the driving forces behind recommending the Doctors Mayo as a suitable subject for a US postage stamp. John Austin Gronouski (1919-1996) of Dunbar, Wisconsin, the 56th US Postmaster
Mayo Clin Proc. n January 2014;89(1):e1-e2 n http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.mayocp.2013.10.031 www.mayoclinicproceedings.org n ª 2014 Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research
From Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA (D.P.S.), and Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN (M.A.S., R.A.K.).
e1
MAYO CLINIC PROCEEDINGS
General e appointed by John F. Kennedy in 1963 e attended the first day of issue ceremonies in Rochester in September 1964. The official first day cover was designed by Mayo Clinic medical artist John Marvin Hutcheson, Jr, (1930-2010) at the request of the Rochester Stamp Club; the engraving on the cover was
e2
Mayo Clin Proc.
n
also based on the Fraser statue, and included a special seal designed for the 1964 centennial of Mayo Clinic. More than 123 million of the Doctors Mayo stamps were printed in a green monotone (“the symbolic color of medicine”) on a rotary press, carrying the then-prevailing 5 cent first class domestic postal rate.
January 2014;89(1):e1-e2
n
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.mayocp.2013.10.031 www.mayoclinicproceedings.org
