Mount Vernon, Virginia - Philatelic Photographs on Waymarking.com

In 1954, the US Post Office Dept. began to replace the longstanding “Presidential” series of regular postage stamps. These had been around since 1938 and I guess it was just time for a change. The new issue was called the “Liberty” series because the domestic and international letter rate stamps in the series featured the Statue of Liberty. In addition to these, the set was to honor six Presidents, six famous Americans and six historic national shrines. When all was said and done though, there were more Presidents and famous Americans than anticipated. One of the historic shrines chosen for the set was Mount Vernon, home of President George Washington.

In 1674, recent immigrant to northern Virginia, John Washington, great-grandfather of George Washington, was granted some land along the upper Potomac River. This land, which became known as the Hunting Creek Plantation, passed to John’s son, Lawrence and eventually to Lawrence’s daughter, Mildred. In 1735, Mildred’s brother Augustine Washington (George Washington’s father) purchased the plantation from his sister and lived on the estate for a few years before deeding it to his eldest son, Lawrence in 1740. Lawrence renamed the estate Mount Vernon after Admiral Edward Vernon, under whom he had served in the British Navy.

Lawrence Washington died in 1752. George Washington, Lawrence’s half-brother, leased the estate from his sister-in-law in 1754 and eventually acquired her interest in the estate, inheriting it completely in 1761. George Washington expanded the mansion to its current size in two separate episodes. The first expansion was completed just before his marriage to Martha Custis in 1759 and the second began just before Washington was named Commander of the Colonial Army in 1775. There is little evidence to suggest that anyone other than George Washington himself was involved in the architectural design of the house.

The estate remained in the Washington family for several more generations before being purchased by the Mount Vernon Ladies Association who operate the estate as a national shrine until this day. The view on the stamp is from the southeast showing the side of the mansion that faces the Potomac River. It is the same view that appeared on an earlier commemorative postage stamp honoring George Washington and Nathanael Greene, two Revolutionary War generals.

The stamp’s 1½c denomination paid the basic third-class rate for printed matter, what some might call “junk” mail. Though not a commemorative stamp, it was nevertheless issued on February 22, George Washington’s birthday. And, in an interesting twist, it replaced a stamp featuring Martha Washington, also a resident of Mount Vernon.

Stamp Issuing Country: United States Date of Issue: 22-Feb-1956 Denomination: 1½c Color: brown carmine Stamp Type: Single Stamp Relevant Web Site: [Web Link]

Visit Instructions:
To post a visit log for this category, you must visit the actual site of the waymark. Post at least one photo that you personally took of the site if at all possible. If you cannot provide a photo for some reason, your visit will still be welcome.

You do NOT need to be a stamp collector to visit the waymark site, nor do you have to provide a photo of the stamp. Just having a copy of the stamp in question, however, is not sufficient; you must personally visit the site.

Recent Visits/Logs:

Date Logged Log User Rating   01/29/2024 eilers1 visited it 07/27/2023 wildernessmama visited it 08/24/2022 Don.Morfe visited it 06/05/2022 m&m O visited it 09/10/2021 petendot visited it 03/01/2020 Go Boilers! visited it

View all visits/logs