Announced by the USPS on July 28th:
This Christmas stamp (Our Lady of Guápulo) features a detail of the painting “Our Lady of Guápulo.” Painted in the 18th century by an unknown artist in Cuzco, Peru, “Our Lady of Guápulo” is from the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Enrobed in a pyramidal gown speckled with jewels and holding a scepter woven with roses and leaves, a crowned Virgin Mary looks down at a similarly adorned Christ Child in her left arm. Art director Greg Breeding designed the stamp.
New information will appear below the line, with the latest at the top.
Updated December 5th:
The Scott catalogue number for this issue is 5525.
Updated September 16th:
Here are the first-day postmarks for this issue: 
The Digital Color Postmark for this issue measures 2.91″ x 1.26″ 
The pictorial postmark measures 2.58″ x 1.07″
Updated September 10th from the Postal Bulletin:
On October 20, 2020, in New York, NY, the United States Postal Service® will issue the Our Lady of Guápulo stamp (Forever® priced at the First-Class Mail® rate) in one design, in a pressure-sensitive adhesive (PSA) double-sided booklet of 20 stamps (Item 682900). The stamp will go on sale nationwide October 20, 2020, and must not be sold or canceled before the first-day-of-issue.
This Christmas stamp features a detail of the painting Our Lady of Guápulo. Painted in the 18th century by an unknown artist in Cuzco, Peru, Our Lady of Guápulo is from the collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Enrobed in a pyramidal gown speckled with jewels and holding a scepter woven with roses and leaves, a crowned Virgin Mary looks down at a similarly adorned Christ Child in her left arm. Art director Greg Breeding designed the stamp.
No automatic distribution.
How to Order the First-Day-of-Issue Postmark:
Customers have 120 days to obtain the first-day-of-issue postmark by mail. They may purchase new stamps at their local Post Office™ or at The Postal Store® website at usps.com/shop. They must affix the stamps to envelopes of their choice, address the envelopes (to themselves or others), and place them in a larger envelope addressed to:
FDOI – Our Lady of Guápulo Stamp
USPS Stamp Fulfillment Services
8300 NE Underground Drive, Suite 300
Kansas City, MO 64144-9900
After applying the first-day-of-issue postmark, the Postal Service™ will return the envelopes through the mail. There is no charge for the postmark up to a quantity of 50. There is a 5-cent charge for each additional postmark over 50. All orders must be postmarked by February 20, 2021.
Technical Specificiatons:
Issue: Our Lady of Guápulo Stamp
Item Number: 682900
Denomination & Type of Issue: First-Class Mail Forever
Format: Double-Sided Booklet of 20 (1 design)
Series: N/A
Issue Date & City: October 20, 2020, New York, NY 10199
Art Director: Greg Breeding, Charlottesville, VA
Designer: Greg Breeding, Charlotesville, VA
Existing Art: Unknown, 18th c, Cuzco, Peru
Modeler: Sandra Lane/Michelle Finn
Manufacturing Process: Offset, Microprint
Printer: Banknote Corporation of America
Press Type: Alprinta 74
Stamps per Booklet: 20
Print Quantity: 200,000,000 stamps
Paper Type: Phosphor Tagged Paper, Block Tag
Adhesive Type: Pressure-sensitive
Stamp Orientation: Vertical
Image Area (w x h): 0.77 x 1.05 in./19.558 x 26.67 mm
Stamp Size (w x h): 0.91 x 1.19 in./23.114 x 30.226 mm
Full Booklet Size (w x h): 5.743 x 2.375 in./145.872 x 60.325 mm
Colors: Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black, Pantone 8003
Plate Size: 800 stamps per revolution
Plate Number: “B” followed by five (5) single digits
Marginal Markings: Header: CHRISTMAS Our Lady of Guápulo • Twenty First-Class Forever Stamps • USPS logo • Barcode • Plate number in peel strip area • ©2020 USPS in peel strip area • Promotional text in peel strip area
Winter Scenes celebrates the beauty and serenity of seasonal sights amid snowy landscapes. The 10 different photographs featured in this booklet of 20 stamps showcase the special allure of winter, with iconic scenes from the northern United States. Art director Derry Noyes designed the stamps with existing images taken by various photographers.
Celebrate the holidays with Holiday Delights. Inspired by folk art but with a modern graphic vibe, these charming stamps will add a touch of whimsy to your holiday mailings. With a traditional palette of red, green and white, illustrator Kirsten Ulve channeled her love of Christmas, vintage ornaments and Scandinavian folk art to create unique digital illustrations of four holiday icons: a prancing reindeer with antlers; an ornament tied with a bow and ready to hang; a tree topped with a star; and a stocking holding a teddy bear and a sprig of holly. Art director Antonio Alcalá designed the stamps.
This new stamp celebrates the joyous Jewish holiday of Hanukkah. The stamp art’s colorful digital illustration shows the lighting of the nine-branched Hanukkah menorah on the last evening of the holiday. All eight of the Hanukkah candles have been lit, and the child is reaching up to replace the shamash, the helper candle used to light the others in the menorah. Art director Ethel Kessler designed the stamp with original art by Jing Jing Tsong.
With this new stamp, the Postal Service continues its tradition of celebrating Kwanzaa. The annual Pan-African holiday, which takes place over seven days from Dec. 26 to Jan. 1, brings family, community and culture together for many African Americans. The stamp design features the face of a woman in profile with her eyes closed. Her contemplative demeanor signifies the ways in which observers of Kwanzaa reflect on the seven founding principles, the Nguzo Saba, and their role in everyday life. A kinara (candleholder) with the seven lit candles (mishumaa saba) sits in front of her. Cool tones evoke a sense of inner peace, and vibrant design elements give the artwork a celebratory feel. Art director Antonio Alcalá designed the stamp with original artwork by Andrea Pippins.
ailable for purchase while supplies last: [click on the issue to go to its page]
5462 (55¢) American Gardens – Stan Hywet Hall and Gardens
The Scott catalogue numbers for this issue are:
Each stamp design features a photograph of a subject representing Computing, Biomedicine, Genome Sequencing, Robotics and Solar Technology. The word INNOVATION overlays each image in a holographic foil.
The Digital Color Postmark measures 2.93″ x 1.48″ 
The Pictorial Postmark for this issue measures 2.66″ x 1.33″
The Philatelic Foundation will award John M. Hotchner [left] its 2020 Neinken Medal for distinguished service to philately. Originally scheduled to be held at a ceremony and reception at The Collectors Club in New York on October 27, 2020, it instead will be held in October 2021 because of COVID-19 which has shuttered much of New York. A collector since the age of fivc, he has been a devoted leader, writer and active participant in the advancement of organized philately at the international, national and local levels.
In the last three editions, this column looked at what it takes to get started as a stamp collector, choosing what to collect, and how to get stamps for your collection, and how a Scott Standard Postage Stamp Catalogue can help you identify your stamps and build your collection. This may also help if you don’t have a catalog, and are simply trying to find the correct box in a stamp album where your stamp should be placed.
The 23¢ purple stamp showing Mary Cassatt has a couple of helpful attributes in addition to Cassatt herself. It is an airy design with lots of white background, identifies the country of issue as “USA” and it has a value of 23¢.
If we did not have the subject index, the design itself would be a great pointer. American stamps into the mid-20th Century tended to have little white space, single color designs, and a lot of fancy elements that filled the design space. A good example is the 5¢ George Washington stamp. It says across the top “U.S. Postage,” has laurel leaves around the portrait of Washington, spells out the word “Cents,” and has ribbons under the portrait. This level of complexity marks this stamp as being from the first part of the 20th Century. Not only were the designs “heavy,” but they were repetitive. Almost every U.S. stamp issued into the 1920s pictured Washington, Ben Franklin, or a portrait from a very limited cast of characters emphasizing presidents, major political figures or military heroes. Another feature to notice between the 23¢ Cassatt and the 5¢ Washington is the method of showing the country name: “U.S.” or “USA” replaced the spelled-out version or “U.S. Postage” on most stamps starting in the mid-’60s. So, the heavy design and the “U.S. Postage” again mark the 5¢ stamp as something from early in the 20th Century. Here the Index is not a lot of help as there are dozens of stamps picturing or honoring George Washington. Leafing through the catalogue for the early part of the century will quickly identify the set of 1918-1922 Washington-Franklin stamps as being where the 5¢ Washington comes from. The problem is that there are no fewer than 14 different versions of this 5¢ design — sheet stamps, coils, different perforations, different watermarks, different papers. (And the 5¢ is easy compared to the 1¢, 2¢, and 3¢ stamps of the Washington-Franklin series!)
The multi-color 5¢ “poster art” stamp labeled “Magna Carta, 1215” is a commemorative, so will most likely be found in the 5¢ rate era. “United States Postage” is spelled out. The label is also listed in the Index, where we learn it is Scott No. 1265.
Transportation coil series, which began in 1981. It is in the Index, as Scott #2464.
Finally, the 10¢ Red Pears is a design with lots of white space. The Index does not list Red Pears, but does list several stamps under “Pears”. Looking at the candidates we see that the design was first used for a coil in 2016, but our stamp is not a coil, and it has the date “2017” in the lower left corner. So it is the sheet issue (with perforations around all four sides) identified as Scott #5178.
Eight stamps will feature images of some of their most popular and iconic album covers: Queen II, 1974; Sheer Heart Attack, 1974; A Night at the Opera, 1975; News of the World, 1977; The Game, 1980; Greatest Hits, 1981; The Works, 1984; and Innuendo, 1991
UK’s most influential rock groups of all time, Queen. With more than 300 million record sales across five decades, they are one of the most successful music artists of all time.
Roger Taylor said of the stamps: “”Wow…….stamps featuring our albums! What an honour. We must be really part of the furniture now! Thanks Royal Mail for stamping on us ! In gratitude.”
Queen were in their formative stages when they were hired to play their first gig: a charity event at Truro City Hall, in June 1970, while still performing under the name Smile. By the time John Deacon joined the following year, the group had changed their name; the four-piece line-up that would remain together for the next two decades made their first live appearance at Surrey College on 2 July 1971.
The band’s list of musical achievements is rivalled by few: countless platinum, multi-platinum and gold albums; numerous Ivor Novello and BRITS awards; induction into the Grammy Hall of Fame and a recipient of the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, Queen also hold the record for the biggest selling album of all time on the Official UK charts with sales of over six million copies of their Greatest Hits album. With their 2018 feature film “Bohemian Rhapsody” they reinvigorated their core fan base and generated a whole new audience the world over. The film became the biggest music biopic in history and swept the Golden Globes and Oscars with the soundtrack topping the charts the world over.
Few bands can match the breadth of creativity on display in Queen’s discography. Dominating over four decades with their cutting-edge music, the band’s legacy continues to inspire.
loved bands of all time with these stunning stamps.”
Sheer Heart Attack, 1974, featured the single ‘Killer Queen’ which was their first global hit and they made their first Top of the Pops appearance.
The Game, 1980, included their hit ‘Another One Bites the Dust’ which drew in new audiences.
What’s up, doc? Maybe putting an end to that wascally “only anniversaries in multiples of 50” excuse for why significant historical events are commemorated.
5495 (55¢) Bugs Bunny, 80th Anniv. – Basketball player
Here are the first-day postmarks: There will also be a “special” postmark that may be used by local post offices: 
The Digital Color Postmark measures 2.43″ x 1.49″ 
The pictorial postmark measures 3.0″ x 1.36″ 
The “special” postmark that other post offices may use measures 2.73″ x 1.23″
We are delighted to announce that a new agent has just joined the David Feldman’s team covering the United States and the Canada.
From left, Thomas R Loebig will head Membership, Ken Martin, Expertizing, and Gary Loew, Editorial.
The American Philatelic Society today announced a reorganization in three areas: Editorial, Membership, and Expertizing. The changes result from new and expanded services instituted during the COVID-19 pandemic to help members and collectors sheltered in place.
