The 2012 Olympics take place in London, England, from 27 July to 12 August 2012. London will become the first city to officially host the modern Olympic Games three times, having previously done so in 1908 and in 1948. The majority of venues will be divided across London and use will be made of some partially new and temporary venues and structures. The stated goal is not to leave “white elephants”, i.e. large structures that no one will be using after the Games.

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published May 27th, 2012

They usually arrived in the early hours of the morning and, impressively, approached the skylines of the cities. Land was initially a vague, distant outline.

A soft watercolour printed on the rounded line of the horizon, framed by the shades of blue of the sky and the sea. Amidst the strong ocean smell and dispersed aromatic notes emanating from the landscape, the ships headed towards the port. Little by little, the city grew, looming. Tones and reliefs were defined. Finally, the typical bustle of a quay, the mythical meeting place between those who have left and those who have remained. A mixture of people, a thousand stories to tell, a blend of feelings. It was in the third quarter of the twentieth century that the Portuguese merchant navy experienced a period of splendour.

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published May 27th, 2012

Charles Dickens is undoubtedly one of the most celebrated authors of all time.  His appeal shows no signs of fading more than 140 years after his death, with his books remaining in print all around the world.

Alderney have chosen to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Dickens with stamps depicting original illustrations from Oliver Twist by George Cruikshank (1792-1878), one of the artists with whom Dickens personally collaborated.

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published May 26th, 2012

Rare stamp and prestige collectibles dealer, Stanley Gibbons, are pleased to offer for sale the Master Die Proof for the world’s first postage stamp, the Penny Black.

Stanley Gibbons have acquired a rare Master Die Proof of the world’s first stamp, the Penny Black; one of only two complete examples in private hands from a total of five known examples in the world.

Printed in March 1840, two months prior to the release of the Penny Black, the die proof was produced to check that all the details in the design would print correctly before the stamp went into production ready for its release on 6th May 1840.

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published May 26th, 2012

The U.S. Postal Service issued the second of an annual series of Forever stamps that pay tribute to one of the most searing, traumatic and consequential events in our nation’s history: the American Civil War.

The dedicated stamps, The Civil War: 1862, remember the Battle of New Orleans, the first significant achievement of the U.S. Navy in the war, and the Battle of Antietam, which marked the bloodiest day of the war.

The American Civil War engulfed the nation from 1861 to 1865 and profoundly changed the country, bringing an end to slavery and transforming the social life of the South and the economic life of the nation.

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published May 25th, 2012

The Austrian writer, actor, singer, playwright and satirist Johann Nepomuk Nestroy (1801 – 1862) was beyond doubt one of the most significant representatives of the old Viennese popular comedy. The motif for the commemorative released on the occasion of the 150th anniversary of his death is a lithograph by Melchior Fritsch dating from 1857, showing Nestroy as Willibald in his burlesque “Die schlimmen Buben in der Schule”.

In addition, the stamp also reproduces the quotation “The world is the true school, since it is there that you learn everything yourself”, from the same work in Nestroy’s transcribed original handwriting Johann Nepomuk Eduard Ambrosius Nestroy, to give him his full name, was born the son of a court and judicial advocate on 7 December 1801 in Vienna.

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published May 23rd, 2012

The 60th anniversary of a monarch’s accession is known as a ‘Diamond Jubilee’, and it is certainly an occasion worth celebrating. Queen Elizabeth II’s Diamond Jubilee is only the second in the past 1,000 years of New Zealand and British history.

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published May 21st, 2012

Statue honours seafarers Raised in 1936 as a memorial to those seafarers who perished at sea, the statue ‘The man at the wheel’ is the oldest outdoor piece of art in Mariehamn. Åland Post now issues an engraved stamp featuring the well-known statue.

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published May 21st, 2012

John Rasmussen and Ivars Silis are the photographers, who created the images for the two Greenlandic contributions to this year’s EUROPA series. The theme for both stamps is “Visit Greenland”.

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published May 20th, 2012

To celebrate a remarkable 60 years of Queen Elizabeth II as Monarch of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and of Her other Realms and Territories we are delighted to confirm the issue a special set of new stamps and a souvenir sheet from the Falkland Islands.

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published May 20th, 2012

This stamp issue, produced in association with World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), recognizes some of the lesser-known species of seabird breeding on South Georgia. The species depicted are part of the rich biodiversity found in South Georgia’s unique environment. WWF is one of the world’s leading conservation organisations who work towards conservation and sustainability.

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published May 19th, 2012