Millennium Collection 2 : Pier 21

[This post is another in a series  profiling each of the 68 stamps issued by Canada Post Corporation on September 15, 1999 on the occasion of the new Millennium. Links to previously published posts are listed at the bottom of this page]

 

 The photograph of Pier 21 featured on the Millennium stamp.

From 1928 to 1971, the facility known as Pier 21 of the Halifax Ocean Terminals was the arrival centre for hundreds of thousands of immigrants to Canada.  During World War II, Pier 21 was transformed into the major departure point for nearly 500,000 military personnel sailing on troopships to Europe. As well,  Pier 21 was the welcoming centre for nearly 50,000 war brides and their 22,000 children.

 Troopship arrival at Pier 21, 1945

After the war, nearly 500,000 immigrants passed through Pier 21 including 100,000 displaced persons.

 Processing immigrants at Pier 21, 1952

T.s.s. Queen Anna Maria : May 5, 1968

The Queen Anna Maria arrived at Pier 21, Halifax, on May 4, 1968

Post card mailed by passenger on board the Queen Anna Maria

Halifax to Athens, May 4, 1968

 With the advent of cheap air travel from Europe, passenger liner service eventually ceased and Pier 21 was closed in 1971.

Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21

The historical significance of Pier 21 was recognized by J.P. LeBlanc, Ruth Goldbloom and many other interested parties, and the Pier 21 Society was formed in the 1980s. The mandate of the Pier 21 Society was to transform the shed into a facility of international importance, acknowledging the significance of immigration to the building of Canada and our country’s role in the Second World War. In 1995, Prime Minister Jean Chretien pledged $4.5 million in federal funding toward the museum project. The Pier 21 Society launched national fundraising campaign and with matching donations from the private sector, Pier 21 was renovated and the Canadian Museum of Immigration was opened on July 1, 1999.

References

• Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21

• Pier 21 : The first 75 years

• The Pier 21 Story

• Pier 21's Opening Day 1991

• Pier 21 : National Historic Place

Millennium Stamp Formats

1.  Millennium Collection Album

The 68 Millennium stamps were first issued in a hardbound book, Canada Post The Millennium Collection : Expressions of a People, on September 15, 1999. The stamps were printed perforated with two stamps per page. 

 

The L'Anse aux Meadows and Pier 21 stamps were printed on the same page.

2. Millennium Collection Souvenir Sheet

Canada Post Corporation re-issued the Millennium stamps in panes of 4 stamps (recognized by stamp catalogues) issued over a three month period from December 17, 1999 to March 17, 2000.  The souvenir sheet with the Pier 21 stamp was released on  February 17, 2000.

Millennium Stamp Collection

1. Wikipedia :  Canada Post Millennium Stamps
(This site describes the stamps and provides links to article dealing with each subject.)

2. Postal History Corner articles:

 
1. L'Anse aux Meadows

2. Pier 21

3. Pontiac

4. Tom Longboat

5. Inuit Shaman

6. Healing From Within

1995 : Canada Day - Group of Seven

On June 29, 1995, Canada Post Corporation (CPC) issued a set of 10 stamps honouring the 75th anniversary of the first "Group of Seven" exhibition at the Art Gallery of Ontario. According to CPC, the artists developed a style of landscape painting with bright, bold images, simplified forms and raw surface patterns and "helped create a national identity based on our rugged land while establishing a permanent place in the history of Canadian art and the hearts of Canadians."

The stamps were issued in souvenir sheet format featuring works of the seven original members and that of three new members. I have provided links to the McMichael Canadian Art Collection web site for a profile of each artist.

Original Members

Franklin Carmichael

 

 October Gold, 1922

Lawren Harris

 From the North Shore, 1923

A.Y. Jackson

Evening, Les Eboulements, 1932-33

Frank H. Johnston

Serenity, Lake of the Woods, 1922

Arthur Lismer

A September Gale, Georgian Bay, 1921

J.E.H. Macdonald

 Falls, Montreal River, 1920

Frederick Varley

 

Open Window, c. 1933

New Members

 Alfred J. Casson

Mill Houses, 1928

Lionel Fitzgerald

 Pembina Valley, 1923

 Edwin Holgate

 The Lumberjack, 1924

Canada Millennium 1 : L'Anse aux Meadows National Historic Site

[This is the first in a series of posts profiling each of the 68 stamps issued by Canada Post Corporation on September 15, 1999 on the occasion of the new Millennium.]

L'Anse aux Meadows at the tip of the Great Northern Peninsula of Newfoundland was the site of the first European settlement in North America.

Vikings, led by Leif Eriksson, wintered at a settlement called Straumfiord near present-day l'Anse aux Meadows about one thousand years ago. Eriksson's family and other colonists visited the camp and explored the region as far as southwest of New Brunswick but returned to Greenland after ten years due to conflicts with Aboriginal people.

UNESCO World Heritage Site

In 1978, the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) added l'Anse aux Meadows National Historic Site to its World Heritage List. The list recognizes  natural and cultural places of outstanding universal importance. To date, over 900 properties have been identified as having outstanding universal value, including: 

• The Galapagos Islands, in Ecuador
• The Historic Sanctuary of Machu Picchu, in Peru
• Paris — the Banks of the Seine, in France
• The Acropolis, in Greece
• Stonehenge, in the United Kingdom
• The Great Barrier Reef, in Australia 

L'Anse aux Meadows is one of only 17 World Heritage sites located in Canada.

Discoverers of the Settlement : Helge and Anne Stine Ingstad (1960)

Norwegian explorer and writer Helge Instad and his wife, archeologist Anne Stine Ingstad discovered the site in 1960. Between 1961 and 1968, Anne Stine Ingstad led an excavation of the settlement with an international team of archaeologists from Sweden, Iceland, Canada, U.S. and Norway. Remains of the 11th century Viking settlement consisting of timber-framed turf buildings (houses, workshops, etc.) that were identical with those found in Norse Greenland and Iceland at the same period were found.

Bronze, ring-headed pin of the kind Norsemen used to fasten their cloaks found at L'Anse aux Meadows

Parks Canada :  L'Anse aux Meadows National Historic Site of Canada

Recreation of Viking Settlement

Visitors to l'Anse aux Meadows can learn about the Norse Settlement by touring the visitor centre and seeing the many artifacts excavated from the site. The actual site of the settlement can be viewed as well as recreations of the sod houses.  When walking the trails today, it is not difficult to imagine the isolation that the Vikings must have felt a millennium ago.

 The bay at l'Anse aux Meadows

References

• Parks Canada

• UNESCO

• The Canadian Encyclopedia 

• Wikipedia Canada Post Millennium Stamps

Millennium Stamp Formats

1.  Millennium Collection Album

The 68 Millennium stamps were first issued in a hardbound book, Canada Post The Millennium Collection : Expressions of a People, on September 15, 1999. The stamps were printed perforated with two stamps per page.

 

The L'Anse aux Meadows and Pier 21 stamps were printed on the same page.

2. Millennium Collection Souvenir Sheet

Canada Post Corporation re-issued the Millennium stamps in panes of 4 stamps (recognized by stamp catalogues) issued over a three month period from December 17, 1999 to March 17, 2000.  The souvenir sheet with the L'Anse aux Meadows stamp was released on  February 17, 2000.

Millennium Stamp Collection

1. Wikipedia :  Canada Post Millennium Stamps
(This site describes the stamps and provides links to article dealing with each subject.)

2. Postal History Corner articles:

 
1. L'Anse aux Meadows

2. Pier 21

3. Pontiac

4. Tom Longboat

5. Inuit Shaman

6. Healing From Within

2007 FIFA U-20 World Cup

In 1904, the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) , the world football governing body was founded. The first FIFA World Cup took place in Uruguay in 1930.  The FIFA U-20 World Cup, formerly known as the FIFA World Youth Championship, is the world championship of soccer for male players under the age of 20. The first FIFA U-20 World Cup was hosted by Tunisia in 1977.This post deals with the 2007 Under-20 World Cup competition held in various Canadian cities from June 30 to July 22. Over that period, 52 games were played  in six cities: Victoria, Burnaby, Edmonton, Toronto, Ottawa and Montréal. Several players who competed in the 2007 tournament will be representing their nations at the 2014 World Cup. 

 

Canadian Postal Archives Database

Commemorative Stamp

On June 26, Canada Post Corporation issued a domestic rate (52¢) stamp to mark  the FIFA U-20 World Cup Canada 2007.

 "I wanted to create a stamp that captured all the elements of the game," explains stamp designer Debbie Adams of Adams and Associates, in Toronto. "And that also communicated the speed, action and excitement of soccer at its best. The Canadian players featured on the stamp give an incredible sense of movement to the design, while the ball is the epicentre of the game.

 Canada Post Corporation. Canada's Stamp Details, Vol. 16, No. 2, 2007, p. 18-19.

 First Day Covers

I prepared a few non-commercial first day covers for this issue.

Usage to Germany

2007 U-20 World Cup Results

The FIFA website provides an exciting summary of the competition HERE. 

Competitors

Congo, Nigeria, Gambia, Zambia, Japan, Korea DPR, Jordan, Korea Republic, Austria, Czech Republic, Poland, Portugal, Scotland, Spain, Canada, Costa Rica, Mexico, Panama, USA, New Zealand, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Uruguay .

Finishers

1. Argentina
2. Czech Republic
3. Chile
4. Austria 

Attendance

The tournament broke an attendance record that stood since Mexico 1983. Almost 1.2 million fans turned up  to make Canada 2007 the largest single-sport event in the country's history.

 Best Player : Sergio "Kun"  Aguero

Argentinian Sergio Aguero won both official player awards, picking up the Adidas Golden Ball for best player and Golden shoe for top scorer with six goals.

Argentina's number 10 was very much the star of the tournament in Canada. The captain of the Albiceleste impressed not only with his goals and his overall technique but also with his work rate, catching the eye of both the fans and the media representatives who traditionally elect the tournament's best player. Though relatively small at a mere 1.70m, Agüero stood tall for the South Americans, with his impressive performances and above all his goals setting him apart from the rest.

FIFA news release

Aguero who now plays spectacular football for Manchester City in the English Premier League was on the Argentine 2010 World Cup squad, and will be on the 2014 World Cup team. Perhaps Argentina can go beyond the quarter-final stage this year in Brazil.

Historic Land Vehicles : The Labatt's Streamliner

 1947 White Model WA 122 tractor-trailer

On June 8, 1996, Canada Post Corporation issued a 90 cent stamp featuring the Labatt's Brewery 1947 White Model WA tractor-trailer (the "Streamliner"). The Strreamliner was one of 25 different "Historic Land Vehicles" shown on stamps from 1993 to 1996. The 90 cents Streamliner stamp, created by Tiit Telmet, Cameron Wykes and Joseph Gault , captured Streamliner's curved corners and horizontal lines.

Commercial usage

Vancouver LPP to Petersfield, England, July 19, 1996

90 cents international letter rate

 

The Historic Land Vehicle stamps were issued in souvenir sheet format:

Historic Land Vehicles Souvenir Sheet 4

Streamliner History

The Labatt Streamliner history was provided in the June 11, 1949 issue of the London Free Press :

In 1936 the first of four streamliners designed by internationally famous Count Alexis de Sakhnoffsky made its appearance. Four of these sleek giants were built. In 1938 the second series, a more advanced design, appeared and 12 streamliners were built along this pattern. The 1939 streamliner with forward-sloping lines appeared but only two were built before the war began. Last year ten new streamliners were built at a cost of $16,500 each – unpainted. All paint and gold-leaf lettering is applied in LaBatt's own garage paint shop.

It is interesting to note that all four streamline designs were drawn at the same time 12 years ago by Count Sakhnoffsky. In spite of the intervening years the streamliners are the most modern design of transport to be seen anywhere on the highways. Another interesting fact is that Labatt streamlined trucks had fenders sweeping back to the rear wheels and full windows in the back of the cab before these modern designs were ever used on passenger cars!

 

In 1955,  Labatt's sold off its Streamliner fleet. It was the end of an era, but in 1977, Joe Scott of London with the financial support ot Labatt's began the challenging task of restoring a 1947 Streamliner. In 1983, a restored Streamliner finally hit the road.

The restored 1947 Streamliner

Usage to Pakistan

 Stoney Creek LPP to Pakistan, August 22, 1996

90 cents international letter rate

 

 Video Endoding System (VES) identification code : AU23O

 Pakistan receiver, August 28, 1996

Gaylord Products First Day Covers

You never know what you will learn when you come across a first day cover, even those that are seemingly uninteresting. The two covers shown in today's post are historical artifacts that really bring the past to life.

The  Rosecraft first day cover of the 1967 Royal Visit stamp was addressed to Mr. David Miller, Ottawa, and marked "Personal". There was no return address, but the enclosure reveals that it was an advertizing first day cover from Gaylord Products of Canada, St. Hyacinthe, Quebec. Gaylord was one of several businesses which used first day covers to promote their companies. What is unusual about the Gaylord letter is the reproduction of the stamp and the fact that there is no mention of the products or services provided by Gaylord, just a briefing on the Royal Visit stamp.

 Gaylord Products of Canada Limited first day cover

June 27, 1967

Gaylord Products and Gayla

An easy internet search reveals that Gaylord sold hair pins under its "Gayla" mark.

For those who are not users of bobby pins, this Wikepedia description explains the device nicely:

A bobbing pin  is a type of hairpin usually of metal or plastic, used in coiffure to hold hair in place. It is a small double-pronged hair pin or clip that slides into hair with the prongs open and then the flexible prongs close over the hair to hold it in place. They are typically plain and unobtrusively colored, but some are elaborately decorated or jeweled. Bobbing pins became popular in the 1920s to hold the new bobbed hairstyles.

Wikepedia

1966 Christmas Issue

The next Gaylord first day cover  is a knock-out. The enclosed letter, again addressed to Mr. Miller, conveyed the company's early Christmas message.

 Canada Post Office Replacement First Day Cover

Gaylord's first day cover envelope was damaged by the Ottawa Post Office in servicing, and the Gaylord letter was sent in a Canada Post Office (CPO) replacement first day cover.  CPO replacement covers are not common and a commercial usage is particularly unusual.

 CPO replacement first day cover

October 12, 1966

Postmaster, Ottawa memorandum

I always marvel at the interesting discoveries one can make collecting first day covers.