Lustrum year mentions children's stamp attributes

On the eve of the announcement of the images for the new 2024 children's stamps on September 25th by the 100-year-old children's stamp organization, it is fitting to devote some space, in words and images, to notable issues from the organization. Eye-catching reference points are those items on which a 'so-many-year' existence is prominently displayed. Thus, a reasonably nostalgic view emerges over the years of the progress, adaptations, and changes to the children's stamp campaigns in memorable commemorative years.

1924

The first series of children's stamps was issued at the initiative of the Dutch Association for the Protection of Children. The Central Propaganda Committee, acting as the Association's executor, received and distributed the funds. After 1945, the Dutch Committee for Children's Stamps Foundation continued this task, which has subsequently been carried out by the Dutch Children's Stamps Foundation (SKN) up to the present day. The first children's stamp issue was released in 1924. Graphic designer Georg Rueter (1875 – 1966) drew and designed a winged portrait of his eldest daughter Maria (1902 – 1999, Maria Hofker-Rueter) as the first 'sealed child'. Rueter depicted the protective function of the child by having the daughter's portrait carried by two guardian angels. “We hereby provide an enlarged image of the charity stamp, which will be available at post offices from December 15th to January 15th, 1925. The design is by Georg Rueter. The stamp is being issued in three denominations: 2 cents, 7½ cents, and 10 cents. The stamp with a face value of 2 cents will cost 4 cents, the one with a face value of 7½ cents will cost 11 cents, and the one with a face value of 10 cents will cost 12½ cents. The price difference benefits the institutions that care for children under guardianship and government care. The design for these three differs only in the indication of the face value and the color. The stamps can also be used for mail to foreign countries. Their validity is unlimited. Do not purchase any other stamps from December 15th to January 15th,” according to a poster text.

1938

15 years of Charity Stamps. The commemorative sheet begins with the Toorop surcharge stamps [1923] as the starting point of the children's stamp issues. It is most likely a private publication. Postmark December 1, 1938, Charlotte de Bourbonpstraat, The Hague. From 1924 onwards, the Local Children's Stamp Committees were accompanied by the Journal for Poverty Relief, Social Assistance and Child Protection.

1948

“I was allowed to wear my beautiful jacket,” says 59-year-old Fie de Stigter, “I remember it as if it were yesterday. I rang the doorbell practically house by house. I thought it was wonderful,” she says. She was among the first children to participate in the first school campaign in 1948. “It was a rainy autumn day and I was wearing my beautiful tweed jacket. I came home soaking wet. Once home, it turned out a button had also come off the jacket. Together with my mother, I then walked the entire route in reverse to find that button. *) And successfully. I could still point out the exact spot where the button lay.” *) This event took place three years after the war. Back then, you still had to be particularly careful with your clothes. People still knitted socks, mended clothes with rags, and darned stockings and socks. People did not live in a throwaway society like we do today.

1953

The handwritten text below by a graphic designer Theo Kurpershoek is taken from the 1953 children's stamps introductory brochure 'It 'sa serious business for one-year-old manuel', which the Philatelic Service of the PTT sent to foreign subscribers.   “. . . an apple, a little boat, a flower. My own children posed for the little heads, not because I consider them particularly typical examples of underprivileged children, but because they were the models closest at hand and also because it seems like a nice idea to me to frank a letter with my own offspring (Marguerite, Manuel, Koosje, René, and Ingeborg). I chose the colors in such a way that , , , “ Designer Kurpershoek, with his 'nice idea' in 1953, was exactly 50 years earlier the initiator of ordering Personal Frame Stamps, which could only be ordered for the first time in 2003!

1956

The commemorative book '30 x Kinderzegels' (32 pages), which was presented to guests at the commemorative exhibition from November 12–17, 1956, in Fodor (Amsterdam), was published in an edition of 2500 copies by the Dutch Committee for Children's Stamps. The special exhibition stamp '30 Years of Children's Stamps' was not applied to the first page of the jubilee book sent to business relations. Through the cutouts in the cover of the jubilee book, a red and a yellow children's stamp are visible within the number '30'. As early as 1935, schoolmaster/teacher G. Verheul introduced the first campaign at his school in Waarder, where pupils took orders. In 1946, an improved follow-up school campaign was carried out by Verheul at the ULO in Ede. In 1948, the first school campaigns were organized as a trial in three locations (Amsterdam, Rotterdam, and Groningen). In 1949, the school campaign was implemented nationwide. Extensive and interesting information on 'Teacher Had an Idea', along with historical background information on children's stamps, can be found in the commemorative book (pp. 29/30).

1966

In 1966, the 40th series of children's stamps was issued. Graphic designer Frans Mettes designed the red poster and the yellow door seal. The execution of both images does not entirely match. To mark the 40th anniversary of the 1966 children's stamp issue, the book '40 x toeslag' was compiled by graphic designer/writer Christiaan de Moor. This richly illustrated, 72-page overview of children's stamps contains a great deal of interesting and readable background information. On one children's stamp in 1967 it says, among other things, Stekelvarkentjes lullaby (nvph 894) that was once written by Trijntje Fop (pseudonym of Kees Stip [1913 – 2001]). A hedgehog in a leap year was extremely irritable. With every spine, he wrote something to everyone he disliked. Those were a hundred angry letters, but this was actually the sweet one. That every letter from this hedgehog was covered with a children's stamp.

Continuation

Part 2 follows on August 4.