America's Pastime And Stamps

Baseball On U.S. Postage

Jun 21, 2009 David Chiu

Baseball is often regarded as America's favorite pastime. So it's no surprise that it is the most popular and common subject on U.S. postage stamps.

Throughout philately there have been more stamps featuring baseball compared to football, basketball and most certainly hockey—unless you live in Canada. In honor of the upcoming All-Star Game to be held on July 14 in St. Louis’s Busch Stadium, here is a guide to collecting baseball stamps.

Early Baseball Stamps

The first-ever baseball stamp issued in the United States was in 1939 (Scott #855), which was the 100th anniversary of the sport at the time. Thirty years later the Postal Service released a multi-colored stamp (#1381) featuring a batter hitting a ball, to honor 100 years of professional baseball.

Legends of the Game

Of course baseball is made up of the great players who not only popularized the sport but also changed it for the better of society. That honor certainly belongs to Jackie Robinson, the first man to break the color barrier in 1947. Robinson was featured on several stamps, first in 1982 (#2016) as part of the Black Heritage stamp series; then in 1999 as part of the Celebrate the Century stamp sheet (#3186c); and in 2000 for the Legends of Baseball sheet (#3408a).

Considered the most popular baseball player of all time, George Herman "Babe" Ruth has been the subject of stamps three times along with Robinson. The first Babe Ruth stamp (#2046)was issued in 1983, thirty-five years after his death. Then in 1998 he was depicted on the Celebrate the Century stamp pane honoring the 1920s (#3184a). Two years later, like Robinson, he was also honored on the Legends of Baseball issue (#3408h).

Ruth’s fellow Yankee teammate, Lou Gehrig, was known as the Iron Horse, who played in 2,130 consecutive games until Cal Ripken broke the record in 1995. Gehrig was honored twice on stamps with a commemorative issue in 1989, 50 years after he made that memorable farewell speech (#2417) and then in 2000 (#3408t).

This year would have been the 75th birthday of Roberto Clemente, the great Pittsburgh Pirate outfielder and one of the earliest Latino ball players. Not only a Hall of Fame baseball player, Clemente was also a humanitarian who died in a plane crash in 1972 delivering aid to earthquake victims in Nicaragua. The legend was honored with a stamp in 1984 (#2097) followed by another one in 2000 (#3408j).

In addition to memorializing the aforementioned greats, the Postal Service devoted a whole sheet to other outstanding baseball players in 2000 with its Legends of Baseball sheet. Not only including Robinson, Ruth, Gehrig and Clemente, the sheet also honored Eddie Collins, Christy Mathewson, Ty Cobb, George Sisler, Rogers Hornsby, Mickey Cochrane, Walter Johnson, Lefty Grove, Tris Speaker, Cy Young, Jimmie Foxx, Pie Traynor, Satchel Paige, Honus Wagner, Josh Gibson and Dizzy Dean. And in 2006, the Postal Service came out with its Baseball Sluggers issue (#4080-4083) that commemorated the great hitters Roy Campanella, Hank Greenberg, Mel Ott, and of course Number 7, Mickey Mantle.

Baseball Memories

Other aspects of baseball have appeared in stamps: the first ever World Series in 1903 (#3182n), Bobby Thompson’s dramatic home run for the New York Giants (#3187c) and the great New York baseball dynasty of the ‘50s (#3187j) , Roger Maris’ 61st home run (#3188n) breaking Babe Ruth’s single season record, and the baseball records set in the ‘90s (#3191a) have been spotlighted in the Postal Services Celebrate the Century series. had its own stamp in 1992 (#2619).

In 2001, 10 famous old ballparks were depicted in stamps (#3510-3519), among them Ebbets Field, Tigers Stadium, Crosley Field, Yankee Stadium, the Polo Grounds, Forbes Field, Comiskey Park, Shibe Park and Wrigley Field. The Postal Service last year also issued a commemorative stamp to honor the 100th anniversary of the famous song about baseball “Take Me Out To the Ball Game.”

Olympic Baseball

The possibilities of collecting your favorite sport on stamps is numerous. And with more future superstars and accomplishments to come, you can be sure there will be more stamps about them as well.

Scott catalog numbers are from the Scott 2008 Standard Postage Stamp Catalogue, published by Scott Publishing Company 2007.

The copyright of the article America's Pastime And Stamps in Antiques & Collectibles is owned by David Chiu. Permission to republish America's Pastime And Stamps in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.