Mirabeau Lamar Postmark

In 1840, the legislature of the Republic of Texas created a new county and named it in honor of Georgia-native Mirabeau Lamar, who was a hero of the Battle of San Jacinto in 1836. On Dec. 17, 1990, Lamar County, Texas celebrated its 150th birthday. To mark the event, the U.S. Postal Service issued a pictorial postmark for use in canceling mail at a special postal station set up for the day-long celebration. The postmark shows Mirabeau Lamar and the outline of the county named in his honor. At the time, the first-class rate for postage was 25 cents. To meet this rate, two Texas-related stamps were used: a 1986 22-cent stamp commemorating the 150th anniversary of the Battle of San Jacinto and a 1936 3- cent stamp commemorating the centennial of the Battle of the Alamo (with vignettes of Sam Houston and Stephen F. Austin). In the example shown above, the pictorial cancel was only applied to the 3-cent stamp, leaving the 22-cent stamp uncanceled. The Postal Service then ran the envelope through a machine cancel to make sure both stamps were canceled. Interestingly, the machine cancel resulted in a halo effect around Lamar's head.

Photo by Ed Jackson (c) Carl Vinson Institute of Government, The University of Georgia

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