Product Review

The U.S. Postal Service issued these Hawaiian Missionaries souvenir sheet on October 24, 2002, in New York, NY. This water-activated gummed souvenir sheet, designed by Richard Sheaff of Scottsdale, AZ, contains four 37-cent stamps that reproduce examples of Hawaii's first four postage stamps, which were issued in three denominations: 2-cents, 5-cents, and 13-cents. The stamps are called "Hawaiian Missionaries" by philatelists because most of them were used on correspondence mailed by Christian missionaries from Hawaii to their families, friends, and business associates. These rare stamps are now considered among the world's foremost philatelic items. Only twenty-eight covers bearing Missionary stamps are known to exist, and only one surviving cover bears the 2-cent stamp, the famous "Dawson cover" shown on this souvenir sheet.