I1501

America The Beautiful

The Desert

Collins Cover Announcement 

DESERT WILDLIFE 

This is a superb wildlife hand-painted cachet on the "America the Beautiful" postcard. It is a fore-runner of an absolutely beautiful series of wildlife cards that will be offered soon including wetlands, mountains, seashore and woodlands. Each of them will feature a marvelous hand-painted wildlife cachet.

The living desert is shown at sunset. The sky is ablaze with color as the sun sinks below the horizon. Twin mesa peaks rise from the desert floor in the distance. A cactus wren perches on a mighty arm of a giant saguaro. A movement in the sand below has caught its eye -- the menacing but colorful gila monster. The reptile has also caught the eye of a mule deer buck with full rack of antlers standing a short distance away. I am very pleased with this "America the Beautiful" card and those still up-coming.

I traveled to Tucson to obtain these postcards on the Day of Issue. After securing them at the main Tucson Post Office, I headed north on Route 10. As I drove toward Phoenix, giant saguaro cactus dotted the landscape on both sides of the road. These silent sentinels are truly magnificent plants and they are in prominence on this COLLINS FDC. Upon reaching Phoenix, I located the "Cactus Branch" of the Post Office and it was here that the cards received their wonderfully fitting and appropriate First Day cancel.

The relatively new pictorial postcards have become an important part of the Postal Service's new issue proaram. They portray attractive and interesting topics and I will do them on a selected basis. In my opinion you should not miss adding them to your collection. Hand-painted cards are very scarce. Unofficial (real) First Day cancels on cards are very scarce. Hand-painted cachets with unofficial cancels are probably non-existent except for COLLINS.

I am proud to offer for your collection an item that I traveled to Arizona to obtain. An item with a beautiful desert wildlife hand-painted cachet. An item with the "Cactus Station" First Day cancel obtained exclusively for COLLINS collectors. A unique and scarce item that present and future collectors of COLLINS, postcards, and wildlife will covet for their collections. An Arizona sunset. Item #11501 - $8.00.