HISTORY OF THE POSTAGE STAMP
Postage fees go back 2500 years or as early as 550 BC. Persian, Babylonians, Phoenicians and Chinese used mail couriers mostly for military communications. Commercially postage services were implemented as early as 255 BC when letters were made of papyrus.
At that time sending letters was very expensive; postage had to be calculated for each letter. In Britain postage fees were based on weight and the distance involved. Furthermore both sender and addressee were responsible for the cost of the postage.
Often the receiving party refused to pay with consequent loss to the post office. The postal system was badly in need of a reform.
In 1837, Rowland Hill, a bright school master interested in science and mechanics wrote the book “Postal Reforms” in which he suggested a much more practical approach to the post office operation: an adhesive postage stamp.
On August 1839 Rowland Hill was appointed advisor to the Treasury. Encouraged to work on his project he soon invented the postage stamp. Hill’s reform also called for uniform low rate of one penny for a half-ounce letter.
The first two postage stamps were issued in England in 1840. Both were printed with the head of Queen Victoria. One stamp printed in black ink for letters up to 1/2 ounce, cost 1 penny, the other one in blue ink for letters over 1/2 once, cost 2 pennies.
In Tuscany and in the Kingdom of Sardinia the postage stamp was adopted in 1851, printed with the head of Victor Emmanuel II.
Another improvement in the postal system derived from Hill’s recommendation that only the sender pay for the stamp. Two years later Rowland Hill was promoted to Postmaster General.
In 1854 he was made Secretary to the Post Office and in 1860 Queen Victoria knighted him for his service to the Empire. Hill died at his home in Hampstead and was buried in Westminster Abbey.
Tony Ghezzo
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