| Postal Items Issued When the Early Expos and Olympic Games Were Held Together |
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| Date:26/08/2006 |
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By Yang Bowei
The World Expo and Olympic Games have been
held together three times -Paris in 1900, Louisiana in 1904 and London in 1908.
At that time, the new Olympic Games were only a companion to the Expo. Audiences
were interested in the commercial exhibition of the Expo, not the Olympic Games.
Later, both the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and sportspeople realized
that holding the Expo and the Olympic Games together was by no means a good
idea, as the Olympic Games could not establish its own reputation, and would be
overwhelmed by the Expo and ultimately become its accessory by doing this. The
president of the IOC, Coubertin - the initiator of this plan, did not attend the
third Olympic Games in 1904 hosted by Louisiana, indicating his dissatisfaction
with his own creation. After the fourth Olympic Games held in 1908 in London,
this did not happen again.
Although the history of the Expo was nearly half
a century longer than the Olympic Games, Olympic postage stamps appeared 37
years earlier than those of the Expo. No commemorative stamps were issued in
1900, 1904 and 1908 when the Expo and the Olympic Games were held together,
however, the three host cities produced and issued some pictorial and
photographic postcards, sealing stamps, as well as other postal items, and the
postal authorities started using commemorative postmarks during the grand
gatherings. After more than a century, few of these postal items, especially
those entire postcard posted with precious postmarks, survive. Even fewer were
handed down to domestic stamp-collectors.
This author mainly focuses on
collecting Olympic postal items issued by host cities. With the help of foreign
friends, I acquired several stamps issued by the three host cities where the
Expo and Olympic Games were held together. Here, I present several pictures of
them for the readers to enjoy.
(Author affiliation: Shanghai Dictionary
Publishing House)
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