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Some members of the Virtual Stamp Club received these Greetings From America first day covers in the mail, unsolicited. In each case, the stamp used was the home state of the recipient. The cancellations are from all over the U.S. on the first day of issue, but are not cancels that were made available through the mail to collectors. The correlation between the stamps and states, and the variety of cancels seen, would seem to indicate a network of agents on April 4th, the first day of issue.
But who coordinated the effort? The return address label on the back of the envelopes doesn't indicate who the mystery cachetmaker is.
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This person also serviced United We Stand first day covers in Vermont on October 24, 2001, the first day of issue for that stamp -- but the stamp was not yet on sale in that state, just New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and the Washington, DC, area. A Vermont postmaster did take it upon himself to sell the stamp that day, but, again, who was the cachetmaker/servicer of these FDCs?
Stay tuned!
Lloyd A. de Vries
©2002 de Vries Philatelic Media