Vintage Circus Posters Stamp - Who Was Hillary Long?

I don't know why this detail has interested me so (other than the history buff in me) but one of the famous posters being used on the upcoming Vintage Circus Posters Stamp features the name "Hillary Long" and the fact that he was a notable acrobat famed for his being the greatest "head balancer" in the show world back in his day.

Here's the stamp (which is based almost identical to a famous circus poster featuring his stunts):



What is known is that Hillary Long died of Tuberculosis at a Tucson, Arizona Sanitorium at the very young age 45 on February 5, 1930.

About a decade ago, someone was doing some genealogical research on him but found very little about his family, not even his parents name or his exact location of burial -- as there is said to be two graves for him (one in North Carolina and another in Delaware). The known details are summarized in the link below:

http://boards.ancestrylibrary.com/l...96.1/mb.ashx

Interestingly, Hillary Long actually patented some of his acrobatic equipment as shown here:





He was noted not only with Ringling Bros., but with other circus performances as well, both in the US and Australia, as described in these period newspaper excerpts:







An interesting, yet rather mysterious character, to say the least.

Very interesting.

Very neat. Here is the USPS link to preorder the no die cut special press sheet. I expect this will be a sell out and popular item in the secondary market.

https://store.usps.com/store/browse...tPressSheets

Some details on this stamp was posted here:

http://www.stampnews.com/stamps/sta...lectors.html

An image of the sheet can be found here:



Now, do I collect the sheet, or just the se-tenant?

collect the sheet. I'm not sure but the USPS has been putting the history of the stamp subject on the back of the sheets lately. If the issue is attractive I get 2. One for the album the other to use and save the backing sheet to insert into the album (reversed) to show the USPS history. (or I could just take a photocopy of the reverse and insert into the album.. nah! I'll buy the extra and use the stamps for postage on these, they are great nostalgic history of the traveling wagons of the old days)

Wow those old circus posters bring back a flood of memories. I'll probably buy a pane just because.

I noted as of yesterday, or earlier, the no die cut press sheets were no longer available at USPS SFS.

Also, the sheets seem to be preselling on eBay as individual panes for about double the face value.

It could be an interesting issue. The individual stamps are quite scarce at 30,000 of each. 2 stamps per pane, 6 panes per press sheet, 2500 press sheets.
......
Correction, the sheets are now available at USPS. They were temporarily unavailable while the photo of the item was being added.

An interesting non-philatelic news article on the Vintage Circus Poster Stamps:

https://www.authintmail.com/article...tas-ringling

How many picked up the Vintage Circus Posters Stamps today at your local post office? I did!

In response to this previous comment:




Here's the reverse side text from the pane of stamps:



And since I typically buy my stamps from a very small one person post office, he gave me the deck card and I was surprised to see that their entire shrink wrapped package consisted of only 10 panes (160 stamps in total):

He must have had a neck of steel.

Apparently the USPS has been getting some flack from animal rights groups (most notably PETA) about issuing the Vintage Circus Posters Stamps because of the poor treatment of animals in circus acts.

The protest was vocal enough that it prompted the US Postal Service to issue this statement:

http://about.usps.com/news/electron...r-stamps.htm

Linn's Stamp News has announced that as of July 29th the Vintage Circus Posters Press Sheet (without die cuts) has been sold out. It may prove interesting to monitor whether or not these "Without Die Cut" Press Sheets (or stamps cut from them) will find a premium value with buyers since they are no longer available at face value from the USPS.

http://linns.com/news/breaking-stam...uts-sold-out

Well as of today they continue to sell at the same moderate premium. On eBay we are seeing $12-16 per intact single pane. Typically there are only 5-6 sold per eBay report period. The original cost per pane was $7.84. Considering that Scott value for the normal pane is around $16, these special no die cut sheets may still be underpriced. There can be no more than 15,000 panes but as so many are cut up for gutters and blocks the true number of intact panes could be closer to 10,000 quite low.

So maybe the appeal of the circus sheet will put in the same category as the Made in America set of 5 no die cut panes? I will update the thread in a year to see where we are at market. I wish I had bought a pane!

I have no idea why this is making news now (August 25, 2014) when the stamps in question (Vintage Circus Posters) were issued months ago. It seems to be kind of a moot point to raise the issue presently, but apparently animal rights activists did get 60,000 signatures on a petition:

http://thehill.com/policy/finance/2...ircus-stamps

Perhaps the Animal's Rights activists will succeed in scuttling the special circus pane slated for inclusion with the yearbook. I might even sign a petition for that!