Scott # 1625

Scott # 1626

Scott # 1627

Scott # 1628

•  1995.  Pioneers of Communications.  SG 1887-1890.  The stamps show from left to right:

  • Sir Rowland Hill and Uniform Penny Postage Petition.  Birth bicentenary of Sir Rowland Hill (1795 - 1879)
    An educationist, administrator, and inventor, Hill was initially a teacher who introduced a system of self-government at his school in Birmingham and wrote on the challenges of mass education. In the 1830s he invented a rotary printing-press. In 1837 Hill wrote "Postal Reform; its Importance and Practibility". At the time postage fees were based on weight and the distance involved. Postage was calculated for each letter, which had to be paid by the addressee and often receivers refused to pay. Hill's plan called for the use of pre-printed envelopes and adhesive postage stamps with a uniform low rate of one penny per half-ounce letter. 

  • Rowland Hill and Penny Black.  Queen Victoria's portrait for the Penny Black was taken from a medal designed by William Wyon. Henry Corbould made the drawings for the engraver Charles Heath, though Heath's son Frederick may actually have done the work.  The intricate background was a guard against forgeries as were the letters found on the lower corners of each stamp.  The printers were Perkins, Bacon & Co. Printing started on 11 April 1840 and they went on sale on 1 May, though they didn't become valid for postage until the sixth.  The Penny Black paid postage for letter up to a half ounce. Doubleweight letters carried the Twopenny Blue, and these went on sale 8 May 1840. 

  • Giuglielmo Marconi (1874-1937) and Early Wireless.  Centenary of the first radio transmissions.
    In 1894 Marconi began to experiment with techniques for wireless communication after reading about the experiment on electric waves carried out by Hertz. Within a year, he had transmitted and received signals over a distance of more than 2 km (1.2 miles). Unable to gain support in Italy, he came to London, and in 1896 took out a UK patent and demonstrated his invention to the British Post Office. By 1899 he had sent messages to France, and in 1901 he bridged the Atlantic. From 1916 Marconi devoted his attention to exploring the possibilities of short-wave radio transmission and to the considerable business interests that had grown up around his invention. He shared the Nobel Prize for physics in 1909 with Braun, who invented a coupled wireless transmitter and receiver.  

  • Marconi and Sinking of "Titanic".  The Titanic was a British passenger liner, the largest ship in the world when she was built. On her maiden voyage in April 1912, she struck an iceberg in the North Atlantic near Newfoundland and sank with the loss of 1513 lives. Thought to be unsinkable, the Titanic carried enough lifeboats for only half the passengers. As a result of the disaster safety rules for ships at sea were drawn up by the International Convention for Safety of Life at Sea (1913) and the International Ice Patrol was established.
    According to The Daily Herald, 21 July 1937, Marconi's most cherished possession was a gold tablet presented to him by 600 survivors of the Titanic who had been saved by the fact that the ship's wireless transmitter had been able to call ships from hundreds of miles away to pick up survivors. 

Designed by The Four Hundred. Engraved by C. Slania. 
Printed in intaglio & offset lithography by Harrison & Sons.
Date of issue 5 September 1995. SG 1887 - 1890. 

Scott # MH 310	Scott # MH 280	Scott # MH 281
	Scott # MH 282	Scott # MH 283

• 1999.  The above stamps bearing what has become known as the Machin head were engraved by Slania and printed by the recess, intaglio, method.   £1.50, £2, £3, £5 are small size definitives; 1ST NVI (no value indicated) is large format.  SG 2077 and SG 2078.

The small size stamps were first issued on 9 March 1999 printed by Enschedé of Netherlands.  They were re-issued on 11 April 2000 printed by De La Rue and are still on sale. The Slania die was exhibited at the Stamp Show 2000 held in London last May.  The space where the value appears was a blank rectangle.  This was filled in with the appropriate figures by Inge Madel at Enschedé.   The De La Rue stamps were finished by an unknown engraver at their factory, possibly John Matthews.  

It is difficult to really tell single stamps from the two printers, apart by the way this space was filled. The point is that all four values from both printers used the same Slania die.

The large format NVI stamp was separately engraved by Slania for a pane of four stamps issued as part of the Profile on Print prestige book issued 16 February 1999 as part of the pre-publicity for Stamp Show 2000.  

Because the image on all these stamps was from an engraving, it does not owe its origin to any Machin sculpture.  However, it is believed that a photograph of the Machin head was supplied to Slania for the purpose.

The above information is kindly provided for this site by Mr. Douglas Myall, Great Britain.  

See also:

• Rowland Hill Award