CONCORD REBEL / The Only Place We Live: August Derleth Pages

The Henry David Thoreau Postage Stamp 

In 1967 the United States Post Office issued a postage stamp to commemorate the centenary of Thoreau's birth.

This was designed by the distinguished artist Leonard Baskin (1922-2000). Baskin, although well-known as a painter and sculptor, was also particularly interested in various printing methods and their uses. Postage stamps were superb and exacting examples of the use of the printer's art in miniature. Baskin was also a keen collector of postage stamps and US postal history.

August Derleth also collected stamps, and was never short of an opinion on the quality of the US Postal Service. Replying to correspondent Ben Indick, Derleth said that he thought Baskin had "done violence" to his idol.

Personally I value Baskin's design and portrait of Thoreau -- I think it captures his difficult personality, with its outspokenness, its streak of realist melancholia, and natural artistic vision.

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