By PETER BOSCH

Hey, everybody! You have the super power to bring back a favorite DC Comics postal stamp! The U.S. Postal Service is sponsoring Stamp Encore, tied to its 250th anniversary — it was founded July 26, 1775 — and has chosen an array of stamps that you can pick to return to circulation.

The USPS has chosen 25 categories from the past, including Batman, Wonder Woman, and DC Comics Super Heroes. The Batman series features eight stamps, consisting of four Batman images through the eras and four different Bat symbols. Wonder Woman has four images, tracking her from the past to the present. The DC Comics Super Heroes is a series of 20 stamps (!), with 10 heroes and 10 classic covers. You can vote as often as you want and the winning stamp will be revealed next year. Voting ends September 30. (Vote here!)

Personally, I can’t think of a better time to remember one of the greatest projects to come from the post office — Celebrate the Century, which not only entertained and educated, it paid a special tribute to the greatest comic-book hero of them all, Superman! Heck, it not only paid tribute to him, he became a main focal point in selling it!

Front page of 1998 advertising pamphlet

It all started with a government press release on December 11, 1997: “WASHINGTON — The U.S. Postal Service today announced the first 30 postage stamps to be unveiled as part of the Celebrate the Century program — an unprecedented commemorative stamp and education program that will honor the most memorable and significant people, places, events and trends of the 20th century. The 30 stamps commemorating the years 1900-1909 and 1910-1919 will be unveiled one per day over 30 consecutive days — Jan. 5 through Feb. 3, 1998 — in cities across the U.S.”

The announcement went on to say: “The first stamp, ‘Immigrants Arrive,’ honoring Ellis Island, will be unveiled on Jan. 5 in the Great Hall on Ellis Island — in the shadow of the Statue of Liberty. As part of the unveiling event, 50 people will be officially sworn in as U.S. citizens by the U.S. Department of Immigration & Naturalization… All 30 stamps will be issued Feb. 3 at a special ceremony in Washington, D.C. The stamps will be available at all post offices on two collectible sheets of 15 commemorative stamps each — one honoring the 1900s and one honoring the 1910s… Spanning a two-year period, the Postal Service will issue sheets of commemorative stamps heralding the most significant occurrences of each decade of the 20th century.”

Inside the pamphlet

It was easy to see this was not going to be like a barely noticed new release of floral-design postage stamps. Among the other locations set for the 30 stamp unveilings in 30 days were the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York, for the “First World Series” stamp, and Mount Rushmore National Park for the “President Theodore Roosevelt” commemorative.

In total, between 1998 and 2000, there would be 150 stamps issued… 15 stamps for each decade from 1900 to 1999. The Post Office also made sure the endeavor was an eye-grabber by having a 76-inch-high standee of Superman in lobbies of postal offices across the country, promoting the event.

But why Superman, you ask?

The answer is two-fold. The first part is that in the 1930s decade of stamps, one of those was to be “Superman Arrives 1938.” (More about that below.) The other reason is that, as part of their merchandising efforts, the Postal Service teamed up with DC Comics to publish 10 comic books featuring their greatest superheroes aiding in the project. You didn’t find these comics in your local comic shop. They were available directly through a post office mailing address, with each decade’s stamps and comic book released approximately every three months. (The final release, for the 1990s, was issued on May 2, 2000.)

Comic book promotion from the pamphlet

Though the title of the comic book series was Celebrate the Century Super Heroes Stamp Album, they were far more than just a place to insert stamps. The first issue (written by Doug Moench) included Superman, Batman, Robin, Green Arrow, the Flash, Steel, Wonder Woman, and Green Lantern taking the readers on a time trip back to the years spanning 1900 to 1909 and providing short history lessons.

The subjects included President Theodore Roosevelt; Ellis Island immigrants; the creation of the Teddy Bear; the first World Series; preservationist John Muir; Crayola crayons; the Gibson Girl; the Wright Brothers at Kitty Hawk; the Model T Ford; the groundbreaking film The Great Train Robbery; the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair; the Pure Food and Drugs Act; the NAACP; Frank Lloyd Wright; and “Ash Can Painting” (a term used to describe a gritty realism movement of painting unsavory subjects).

Each section in the 32-page comic books was either a single- or double-page illustrated history lesson, with a space left open for inserting the actual stamp (if you wanted to, but there was no reason to do so as the comics stood very well on their own, thank you). And, oh, the talent that drew and/or inked those sections in that first issue included Dan Jurgens, Josef Rubinstein, Joe Orlando, Paul Ryan, Doug Hazlewood, Angelo Torres, Norm Breyfogle, Joe Staton, Mike DeCarlo, Jim Aparo, Bill Sienkiewicz, Tom Palmer, Dick Giordano, George Pratt, M.D. Bright, and Bob Smith.

Celebrate the Century Super Heroes Stamp Album – Book I: 1900 to 1909 (published 1998). Cover art by Paul Ryan (pencils) and Doug Hazlewood (inks).

Intro splash page to the series. Ryan (pencils) and Hazlewood (inks).

Food and Drugs Act. Norm Breyfogle (pencils) and Mike DeCarlo (inks).

The Gibson Girl. Art by Dick Giordano.

The issues that followed included a number of the same artists, with others joining in on the project (including Ernie Colon, Gene Ha, Joe Orlando, Gil Kane, Trevor Von Eeden, Sal Buscema, Ed Hannigan, Terry Beatty, Graham Nolan, and Steve Lightle). Altogether, over those 10 issues, there were 53 pencillers and inkers, half a dozen colorists, and four letterers. On the writing side, Doug Moench carried on with the 1910s and the 1920s issues, Marv Wolfman handled the 1930s, and Bronwyn Carlton took the 1940s and 1950s. Bob Rozakis wrote the bulk of the project, the issues covering the 1960s through the 1990s.

During those issues, DC added Supergirl, Aquaman, Plastic Man, Superboy, the Atom, Martian Manhunter, Black Lightning, Impulse, Oracle, Lobo, Catwoman, Doctor Light, and Gangbuster as historians.

The subjects beyond the initial 15 in the first issue covered some of the most important parts of American history, while also remembering to include several light entertainment events. Among the stamps’ remaining 135 topics were World War I, votes for women, child labor reform, the stock market crash of 1929, surviving the Great Depression, the opening of the Empire State Building, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, FDR’s New Deal plan, Jesse Owens, Monopoly, the first appearance of Superman, World War II, President Harry Truman, Jackie Robinson, television, 3-D movies, desegregating public schools, rock ’n’ roll, Martin Luther King Jr., the Vietnam War, man walking on the Moon, America’s bicentennial, the Vietnam Veterans War Memorial, the World Wide Web, and the Special Olympics. And that was just 25 of the 135.

Below are covers for Books II through X, plus a lot more sample interior pages.

Cover art by Ryan (pencils) and Hazlewood (inks).

Superman. Art by Dan Jurgens (pencils) and Rubinstein (inks).

Note that the following Celebrate the Century sheet for the 1930s decade includes the “Superman Arrives 1938” stamp and that the cancellation marks on the stamps are from the Cleveland, Ohio post office…Cleveland, of course, being where Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster created the greatest superhero of them all.

Cover art by Rick Burchett.

WW II. Jackson Guice (pencils) and Larry Mahlstedt (inks).

Cover art by Burchett.

Desegregation. Trevor Von Eeden (pencils) and Rubinstein (inks).

Cover art by Steve Lightle.

Cats. Adam DeKraker (pencils) and DeCarlo (inks).

Cover art by Tom Grummett (pencils) and Giordano (inks).

The wrap-up page for the Celebrate the Century comic book series. Giordano art.

Naturally, there was merchandising. In addition to the 10-issue comic book series, the Postal Service produced 10 hardcover volumes, one for each decade, with excellent photos and histories about each event. There were also collector albums for stamp sheets and first day envelopes.

The USPS went all out in other ways to promote the event, Including an Amtrak train – the “Celebrate the Century Express” – making stops across the country in order for people to come down and see interactive exhibits and displays about the stamp program.

This was not the last time that Superman and other DC heroes were involved with postage stamps. Several characters were featured on U.S. stamps in 2006. (Marvel followed suit in 2007.)

Also, Superman turned out to be not just an American icon. In 1995, tying in to Superman co-creator Joe Shuster’s birthplace of Toronto, he could be found with other comics heroes on Canadian stamps.