NAPEX Show Comes to McLean

Philatelic Exhibition Features Two Stamps

Merrifield, VA — National Philatelic Exhibitions of Washington D.C., Inc. will host a philatelic show June 6-8, 2008. The show will be held at the McLean Tysons Corner Hilton, located at 7920 Jones Branch Drive, McLean, Virginia.

The show will feature the new Mt. Rushmore Priority Mail stamp and the reissued one-cent Tiffany Lamp stamp.

The 2008 Priority Mail stamp features an illustration of Mount Rushmore National Memorial, which is located in the Black Hills of South Dakota near the town of Keystone. Carved into Mount Rushmore, the monument consists of large-scale sculptures of the faces of four American presidents: George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and Theodore Roosevelt. According to a 1929 budget document, the monument was intended “to commemorate the founding, expansion, preservation, and unification of the United States.”

The idea for a monumental sculpture in the Black Hills was first conceived during the 1920s by Doane Robinson, secretary of the South Dakota State Historical Society and superintendent of the State Department of History. Hoping to create an attraction that would bring visitors to South Dakota from all across the country, Robinson contacted sculptor John Gutzon de la Mothe Borglum. In 1925, during his second trip to the state, Borglum selected Mount Rushmore, a granite mountain named for a New York attorney who had visited the Black Hills in 1885.

Work on the memorial officially began on August 10, 1927, when President Calvin Coolidge was present for the first ceremonial drilling; actual carving began nearly two months later.

Between 1927 and 1941, approximately 400 workers helped to create the monument. The four sculptural portraits were dedicated separately: George Washington in 1930; Abraham Lincoln in 1937; Thomas Jefferson in 1939; and Theodore Roosevelt in 1939. Each face measures approximately 60 feet from the chin to the top of the head.

Mount Rushmore was officially completed on Oct. 31, 1941. Because Gutzon Borglum had died earlier that year, final drilling was overseen by his son, Lincoln Borglum.

The Priority Mail stamp features an original drawing of Mount Rushmore by Dan Cosgrove.

For 2008, the United States Postal Service reissues the 1–cent definitive featuring artist Lou Nolan’s rendering of a Tiffany lamp. Nolan evokes the work of Louis Comfort Tiffany (1848–1933), a designer of glass, ceramics, jewelry, enamelware, and metalwork who transformed everyday objects into works of art. Tiffany’s stained–glass lampshades glow with soft, colorful light. Considered one of the greatest designers of glass in his era, Tiffany is also remembered as a leader in the art nouveau movement, a style in the visual arts that transformed design in the United States and Europe from the 1890s to World War I.

Hours for the June 6-8 NAPEX show are:
Friday 10:00 a.m. – 6:00 p.m.
Saturday 10:00 a.m. - 6:00 p.m.
Sunday 10:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m.