Playing To Win: American Sports & Athletes on Stamps

Contents

- Introduction: Playing To Win
- Youth Sports: Where It All Begins
- America's Baseball Heroes
- Baseball's Home Run Record
- "Take Me Out To The Ball Game"
- American Football
- The Super Bowl: America's Most Popular Sports Event
- Basketball's Origins & Creator
- American Golf
- American Tennis
- American Boxing: From Dempsey To Marciano
- Cycling
- Thoroughbred Horse Racing
- The Olympics: All Americans On The Same Team
- 1896-1908 Olympic Games
- 1912 Olympic Games
- 1920 & 1932 Olympic Games
- 1932 Summer Olympic Games
- Jesse Owens At The 1936 Summer Olympics
- 1960 Summer Olympic Games
- 1972 Olympic Summer and Winter Games
- 1980 Olympic Summer Games
- Miracle On Ice At The 1980 Winter Olympics
- 1980, 1992, & 1994 Olympic Winter Games
- Special Olympics
- Physical Fitness
- Extreme Sports
- World Cup Soccer
- Credits

Youth Sports: Where It All Begins

Greatly outnumbering professional athletes, millions of non-professional youth athletes participate in thousands of different sports leagues and teams around the nation. The passion and dedication demonstrated by young athletes every day while practicing and playing their chosen sports illustrates the true origins of America’s fascination with professional sports. Fittingly, the first American postage stamp to depict a team oriented athletic event in action featured kids playing a sandlot game of baseball. This stamp, the 3-cent Baseball Centennial Issue, commemorated the 100th anniversary of the creation of baseball by Abner Doubleday in Cooperstown, New York.

“The one constant through all the years, Ray, has been baseball. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It has been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt and erased again. But baseball has marked the time. This field, this game: it's a part of our past, Ray. It reminds us of all that once was good and it could be again. Oh... people will come Ray. People will most definitely come.” ~Actor James Earl Jones, as Terrence Mann in the 1989 film Field of Dreams

America's Baseball Heroes

America’s long lasting connection to the game of baseball is demonstrated through the range and scope of United States postage stamps dedicated to this great sport. Since the first U.S. postage stamp highlighting baseball was released in 1939, forty-eight different U.S. postage stamps featuring famous players, stadiums and important moments in professional baseball have been issued.

The first four professional players to be honored with their own postage stamp are undoubtedly among the most monumental players to have ever stepped onto a baseball field. Cumulatively George Herman “Babe” Ruth, Jack Roosevelt “Jackie” Robinson, Henry Louis “Lou” Gehrig and Roberto Clemente Walker have played on thirteen winning World Series teams, slammed 1,584 homeruns, achieved over 10,000 hits and maintained a .328 batting average. The conduct and accomplishments of these legendary players cemented baseball in the American consciousness unlike any sport before it.

The 33-cent Roberto Clemente stamp was issued July 6, 2006 as part of the Legends of Baseball issue.

"Take Me Out To The Ball Game"

"Take me out to the ball game,
Take me out with the crowd;
Buy me some peanuts and Cracker Jack,
I don't care if I never get back.
Let me root, root, root for the home team,
If they don't win, it's a shame.
For it's one, two, three strikes, you're out,
At the old ball game."

The home stadium or arena where a particular team plays in any professional sport becomes a part of the personality, experience and history of that team. Baseball stadiums were the first large athletic structures built in the United States for continuous use by a single professional sports team.

Legendary Playing Fields

The US Postal Service issued ten 34-cent commemorative stamps with images of Baseball's Legendary Playing Fields, on June 27, 2001, in the cities where these legendary fields once existed.

"Take Me Out To The Ballgame"

The 42-cent "Take Me Out To The Ballgame" stamp was issued July 16, 2008.

American Football

“We are inclined to think that if we watch a football game or baseball game, we have taken part in it.” ~President John F. Kennedy

The Super Bowl: America's Most Popular Sports Event

The championship game in professional football, the Super Bowl, has in recent years become the most watched event in American sports. Since the first Super Bowl matchup in 1967 between the American Football League's Kansas City Chiefs and the National Football League's Green Bay Packers (coached by Vince Lombardi), the Super Bowl games have forever since crowned season champions, crushed teams’ final hopes and affirmed team dynasties.

Basketball's Origins & Creator

James A. Naismith, a native of Ontario, left Canada in 1890 for a position as a physical education teacher at the YMCA training school in Springfield, Massachusetts. While there, Naismith was asked to invent a new sport for young men that could be played in the winter off-season between the end of football and the beginning of baseball in the spring. The game that Naismith invented in 1891 was basketball.

Naismith's basketball was based on aspects of a favorite childhood game known as “Duck on a Rock,” as well as elements of soccer, lacrosse, and football. The result was a skillful, less aggressive game suitable for play indoors. In explaining the process of inventing the game, he said, “We simply recombined the factors of the old and made the new.”

Basketball soon exploded in popularity and Naismith received great acclaim for his work.

American Golf

"It took me seventeen years to get 3,000 hits. I did it in one afternoon on the golf course." ~Hank Aaron, 1971

Baseball player Hank Aaron who in the Summer of 1974 broke Babe Ruth’s record of 714 career homeruns, expressed frustration (illustrated in the quote above) about the game of Golf. This deceivingly difficult game has mystified many and at the same time captured the attention of millions around the world in the modern era of sports.

American audiences’ widespread fascination with Golf began in 1913, when a twenty-year old American named Francis Ouimet ably assisted by his ten-year old caddie, Eddie Lowery, won the 1913 U.S. Open Golf Championship in Brookline, Massachusetts. Ouimet’s incredible victory came after beating legendary British golfer and five-time British Open Champion Harry Vardon and British golfer Ted Ray, winner of the 1912 British Open Championship, in a three-way playoff. Francis Ouimet’s lifelong role as a great player and ambassador for the game made him one of the most important American golfers of all time.

American Tennis

The game of tennis, similar to golf, has its origins in the United Kingdom. Tennis is played by millions around the world. Professional tennis has four major championships held on three continents, the U.S. Open, Wimbledon (held in Britain), the French Open and the Australian Open.

Though specifically honored on a 1990 25-cent postage stamp for her status as a gold medal winning Olympic athlete, tennis player Hazel Wightman was most famous for her dominance of women’s tennis between 1909 and 1929. During that period, Wightman won numerous U.S. Championships in the singles, doubles and mixed doubles categories. Her influential presence in the tennis world continued as a competitor until the mid-1950s and an ambassador for the sport until her death in 1974.

American Boxing

Cleverness, speed, defensive skills, and the ability to score points on one's opponent all outweigh the measure of how much physical punishment an athlete can absorb in the sport of boxing.

The 1992 Olympics Boxing stamp was issued June 11, 1992, in Baltimore, Maryland.

Cycling

Everyday millions of Americans use a bicycle to commute to work, exercise or have fun. Designed by McRay Magleby of Provo, Utah, the 50-cent Cycling stamps souvenir sheet features two cyclists in action, giving the feeling of speed and excitement in an actual high performance road race.

Thoroughbred Horse Racing

In 1973, a two-year-old, twelve hundred pound Caroline County, Virginia born Thoroughbred racehorse named Secretariat cemented his place in sports history after winning the Triple Crown. This achievement is composed of three important races, the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness Stakes and the Belmont Stakes. At the Kentucky Derby, Secretariat set a new track record with a sub-two minute first place finish. At the Preakness Stakes, Secreatriat moved during the race from last to first place and finished first with a new track record time. At the Belmont Stakes, Secreatriat completed his Triple Crown victory with a thirty-one length margin of victory setting a new world record for that distance. The 1973 Triple Crown victory along with his other career achievements firmly cemented Secretariat's place in sports history as the most important non-human athlete of the twentieth century.

The Olympics: All Americans On The Same Team

Since the first modern Olympic Games were held in Athens, Greece in 1896, the United States has hosted eight Olympic Games, four Winter Games (1932, 1960, 1980 & 2002) and four Summer Games (1904, 1932, 1984 & 1996). A plethora of monumental moments in the history of American sports have occurred during Olympic events. Many of these Olympic moments, competing athletes and events have been highlighted on American postage stamps.

1980 Olympic Summer Games

This stamp, which commemorates the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow, was released prior to the US-led boycott of the games due to the Soviet's invasion of Afghanistan. The United States did not participate in the 1980 Summer Olympics.

Miracle On Ice At The 1980 Winter Olympics

Going into the 1980 Winter Olympic Games, the Soviet Union’s hockey team was favored to win the gold medal. This outcome would not have been surprising since the Soviet team had won the gold at five of the past six Olympic Winter Games. In comparison to the U.S. team, the Soviet team was seemingly unstoppable as it included numerous former Olympic champions and individual players considered by all to be the best in the world.

The 1980 the U.S. hockey team, lead by coach Herb Brooks, was composed entirely of amateur players whose toughest level of competition took place at the inter-collegiate level. Doubts about the American team’s chances to beat the Soviets at the Olympics or even to win a medal were intensified following a ten to three victory by the Soviets over the Americans in a pre-Olympics exhibition game at Madison Square Garden.

Thirteen days later, the American team’s hard work and determination paid off on February 22, 1980, when the Soviet players looked on in disbelief (after winning every game leading into the medal round), as the game-ending buzzer sounded and the American team celebrated their incredible “miracle-like” four to three victory.

At the beginning of 1980, the Soviet Union’s power appeared on the rise and American hostages were still being held in Iran. The U.S. hockey team’s underdog triumph over the Soviets ignited the hope and optimism of an American public desperate for a sign of strength and better things to come. The “Miracle On Ice” victory of the U.S. Hockey Team over the Soviets is considered one of the most remarkable moments in the history of Olympic and American sports.

Olympic Winter Games

The 29-cent Figure Skating stamp was issued January 11, 1992.

Olympic Winter Games

The 29-cent Ice Hockey stamp was issued January 6, 1994.

Special Olympics

In 1968, the Chicago Park District and the Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr., Foundation sponsored the First International Special Olympics Games for one thousand participants. Since then, it has grown into the largest program for sports training and athletic competition in the world for mentally challenged persons. Today, with the assistance of hundreds of thousands of volunteers worldwide, more than 3,000,000 children and adults participate in year-round athletic programs.

Physical Fitness

Since the first U.S. postage stamps with a sports theme were issued in 1932 to commemorate the U.S. hosted Olympic Winter and Summer Games, the United States has issued hundreds of stamps depicting athletic activities enjoyed by Americans. The following images feature a small sample of the stamps related to American sports and athletics that have not already been included in this online exhibit.

The 1983 Physical Fitness stamp recognized the increasing enthusiasm of Americans for attaining and maintaining good physical health. The stamp draws attention to all forms of exercise, sport, and physical fitness activities. Since runners are a recognizable symbol of the modern fitness movement, the designer, Donald Moss of Ridgefield, Connecticut, chose to depict one female and two male joggers dressed in appropriate running attire. Behind the runners appears a white wavy line representing an electrocardiograph tracing. It graphically depicts the changes in electric potential of the currents that traverse the heart and initiate its contractions.

Extreme Sports

Beginning in the 1990s, Extreme Sports, a new form of adreneline-flowing high risk, yet physically demanding set of athletic activities took off in popularity among young Americans. Extreme sports include snowboarding, inline skating, skateboarding, BMX biking. The widespread participation and interest in these types of athletic activities has its roots in the organization and promotion of the X Games by the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network (ESPN).

World Cup Soccer

In 1994, the World Cup Soccer competition came to the United States for the first time. The tournament brought together twenty-four national teams for fifty-two games over a one-month period to determine a world champion. The games began on June 17 in Chicago's Soldier Field and concluded July 17 at the Pasadena Rose Bowl.

The souvenir sheet includes the three stamps set on a background image of a United States map. Identified on the map are the nine US cities where the games were played. Listed across the top and bottom of the sheet are the twenty-four countries that compete in the games.

World Cup Soccer

The 1994 World Cup Soccer Championships commemorative panel.