posted 08-20-2008 08:38 AM               

There is, in fact, an ''official'' cover for the Mercury stamp: the post office canceled more than three million plain stamped envelopes with the slogan First Day of Issue and dated ''Cape Canaveral, Fla., Feb. 20, 3:30 P.M., 1962.'' Many were bought by dealers, who added cachets. That leaves only 304 first-day cancels to track down. One collector, Henry B. Scheuer of New York City, has led the search. By 1986, when he wrote an article on Mercury covers for The American Philatelist, 49 cities where the stamp had been released still had not yielded Feb. 20, 1962, cancellations.

Since then, he said in an interview this month, some progress has been made. But given the intensity of the devotees' search over the past 28 years, it seems unlikely that any more will turn up. Mr. Scheuer has only found one new city in the past year, he said.

Mr. Scheuer is convinced that the stamps did not even go on sale in four of the 305 cities: Mansfield and Marion, Ohio, where a snowstorm apparently disrupted business, and Lawton, Okla., and Warren, Pa., for reasons that are obscure.

posted 08-24-2008 01:29 PM               

It gives an interesting and informative account of the search for and collecting of the unofficial Mercury FDCs from the 305 official post offices.

Space and FDC collecting interest was high back at the time of Glenn's Mercury flight and this article gives a good account of the collecting frenzy surrounding the unofficial Mercury FDCs.