Category: Great Britain

Our cat and companion Beck (left) was put to sleep last week. He shared our home for 16 years. Beck would sit next to you and lay next to you and was a great comfort. Often he would meow and turn his head to look at me as he was heading into the bedroom. I knew he wanted me to lay down on the bed. He would then jump up on the bed, circle about three times at my side and lay down next to me. We often dozed off together—comforting for us both. I miss him.

I’ve been thinking of other cats who have shared my life, Wolsey being the first. He could leap vertically six feet and grab a shaking stick. And then there was Lance, found on the street on a snowy New Year’s Eve. And Fluffy, our kids’ favorite. Oddly, I never wanted for a cat. The children had wanted cats, and my wife too. Other cats simply found me and agreed to share a life. I’ve been enriched by each one.

There have been hundreds of cats featured on stamps. I don’t collect cat stamps, but with Beck’s passing I began to look at some of those stamps. Here are a few I was drawn to: The gray Burmese shown on the 22-cent U.S. stamp of 1988 (along with the Maine Coon) looks just like Beck: gray fur, piercing yellow eyes. That stamp was one of a set of four, each featuring a pair of cats of different breeds. A Maine Coon lived next door and would wander our neighbors’ back yard (and ours), but would always return home when called. Beck, on the other hand, shot out our door a few times. I chased after him and couldn’t find him, but he lay outside our door the next morning. We became more vigilant when he was nearing an open door, and when we moved to an apartment he showed little interest in leaving.

The 1930 airmail stamp from Spain shown here, one of a set of eight airmail stamps honoring pioneering aviators, is the first instance of a cat appearing on a postage stamp. and his cat Patsy is shown at the bottom right of the stamp. This stamp honored Charles Lindbergh. The eight stamps promoted the Ibero-American Exhibition (Exposição Ibero-Americana de 1929) which took place in the Spanish city of Seville. It opened on 9 May 1929 and closed on 21 June 1930. The purpose of the exposition was to improve relations between Spain and the countries in attendance, all of which have historical ties with Spain. The exposition was smaller in scale than the International Exposition held concurrently in Barcelona from May 1929 to January 1930. Patsy was a frequent passenger on Lindbergh’s flights and could often be found curled up on his plane’s tail in the hangar (right). When asked why Patsy didn’t join him for the famed trans-Atlantic flight. Lindbergh said, “It’s too dangerous a journey to risk the cat’s life.”

In 2022 Great Britain issued a sheet of 20 stamps featuring cats. 18 of the stamps show different cat images. Two of the stamps are duplicated on the sheet—why, I don’t know. I think those of you with cats can identify with many of the poses. It was that s-t-r-e-t-c-h-i-n-g cat on the £2.55 stamp that initially drew my attention. Beck liked a good stretch.
To learn more about cats on stamps check out the “Cats On Stamps” Study Unit of the American Topical Association.