Association of Canadian Post Directors

As a collector of Canadian stamps, the 48-cent stamp issued on July 5, 2002, made me curious about the reason for this issuance. The old stamp, a postmark from a small town in Canada dating back to 1902. Furthermore, I was curious whether the rest of the postmark was continued 'somewhere'. My second question soon became clear when I got a corner piece from the sheet in my hands: the stamp still needed a 'tab' to show the complete impression. And when I received a vertical pair, it became perfectly clear. The tab appeared throughout the entire sheet. Only the bottom tabs, the sheet margin, differed, because the small piece of the 2-cent stamp was not reproduced there. But why this issue? That was a matter of looking it up. Perhaps the question of why an impression of the Stonewall postmark, the 2-cent stamp, and the little old post office were depicted on the stamp could also be answered. The town of Stonewall is located in the province of Manitoba, approximately 25 kilometers north of Winnipeg. The town owes its name to the limestone quarries that were exploited here. The Quarry Days, a festival that takes place on the main street, are still held here every year. Stonewall was founded in 1878 by Samuel Jacob Jackson. The town, with a few hundred inhabitants, was connected to the railway line between Winnipeg and Victoria Junction in June 1880. The town consisted mainly of wooden houses, and the small post office was also constructed of wood.Ira Stratton was the postmaster of the post office. Stratton was born in August 1865 in Tretton, a small town in the province of Ontario. In 1889, he moved to Stonewall, where he began teaching at the local school and publishing his own newspaper, the 'Stonewall News'. A few years later, in 1897, he was appointed postmaster and a small counter was opened for customers.Because he considered the working conditions far too meager, on July 5, 1902, together with his colleague from the nearby post office in Enerson, he founded an association, the Canadian Postmasters Association, to pressure the management of the Canadian Post to improve working conditions. In 1903, he became secretary of the Manitoba Postmasters' Association, and his initiative was soon followed in several other Canadian provinces. During a meeting, a petition for improved salaries and working conditions was signed by more than 100 postmasters, and it was successful. By 1910, all provinces were affiliated with the Association. Meetings of the Association took place regularly, and sometimes these were commemorated by means of special envelopes. For example, in Windsor in 1934, an envelope was issued featuring a vignette dedicated to the three-day meeting.A special stamp was also sometimes used, such as in 1965 at a meeting in Kingston that lasted from May 16 to 20.In 2002, the time finally came for a special stamp to be issued on the occasion of the Association's 100th anniversary. Included is a first-day cover with the stamp affixed, though without a tab! But why the 2-dollar-cent stamp? The stamp's designer, Chris Candish from Cambridge, Ontario, approached his design from a historical perspective. Alongside the photo of the post office, taken in 1910, he also depicted a 2-cent stamp, which at the time was the domestic rate for a single-weight letter. Thus, every stamp has its own story!