PEACE STAMPS

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume 80, 7 August 1945, Page 3

PEACE STAMPS

FULL SERIES PREPARED appropriate designs , Wellington, August 5. In amplification of his reply to a recent Parliamentary question about New Zealand peace stamps to be issued following the conclusion of hostilities with Japan, the acting-Postmaster-Gen-eral, Mr Jones, stated to-day that the full series comprised 11 denominations ranging from a halfpenny to one shilling. The halfpenny denomination depicted a beautiful and peaceful New Zealand Scene-Lake Matheson and the Southern Alps—and was a fitting introduction to a peace series of stamps. The highest denomination in the series, the one shilling stamp, incorporated in the design the National Memorial Campanile, Wellington, a symbol of remembrance of the fallen in both wars, while the ninepenny denomination, depicting the Southern Alps and Franz Josef Glacier as seen through the chapel window at Waiho Gorge, had been highly commended by those who had seen the proof as an outstanding example of the designing and engraving arts and as an eminently suitable representation of the spirit of thankfulness for saving of our ways of life. TRIBUTES TO THE SERVICES In the remaining denominations, tributes were paid to our system of government (Id); to the people of Britain (lid), toi therfßoyal family (2d), to the Royal New v Zealand Air Force (3d), to the Army in its various branches (4d), to the Navy and the Mercantile Marine <sd), to workers on the home front (6d), to the service and devotion of youth in the nation’s cause (Bd>. All the stamps had been designed by Mr J. Berry, of Wellington, who had designed a considerable number of New Zealand stamps. The peace stamps were to be printed in England; With the exception of the lid and Is values, for which the collogravure process was being adopted, all the stamps were being produced by the intaglio process. OUTSTANDING WORK The Minister said that designs for the stamps had been obtained from several well-known artists and stamp designers, and these had been adjudicated upon by a special committee consisting of Sir R. Heaton Rhodes (president of the Philatelic Society of New Zealand) and other representatives of the philatelic works, as well as representatives of the Post Office. In the opinion of the committee, Mr Berry's designs had been outstanding, and had portrayed in excellent fashion and in highly good tastes not only the many tributes that the people of the Dominion felt were due. but also the transitional stages from war to peace. "Die proofs of all the denominations have now been received in the Dominion,” concluded the Minister, "and I am convinced that most people will agree when they see them that the stamps rank with the best of New Zealand's outstanding issues. They will certainly be a credit to New Zealand and do full justice to the great occasion they are intended to corftmemorate.”