1973 8c Boston Tea Party: British Merchantman

U.S. #1480

8¢ British Merchantman
Boston Tea Party

Issue Date: July 4, 1973

City: Boston, MA

Quantity: 49,068,750,000

Printed By: Bureau of Engraving and Printing

Printing Method: Lithographed, engraved

Perforations: 11

Color: Black and multicolored

This set of four stamps was the second time the post office used four separate designs to create one larger scene. These stamps depict the drama of the night in 1773 when enraged colonists, dressed as Mohawk Indians, dumped chests of tea into Boston Harbor in protest of an English-levied tax.

The Bicentennial Series

The U.S. Bicentennial was a series of celebrations during the mid-1970s that commemorated the historic events leading to America’s independence from Great Britain. 

The official events began on April 1, 1975, when the American Freedom Train departed Delaware to begin a 21-month, 25,338-mile tour of the 48 contiguous states. For more than a year, a wave of patriotism swept the nation as elaborate firework displays lit up skies across the U.S., an international fleet of tall-mast sailing ships gathered in New York City and Boston, and Queen Elizabeth made a state visit. The celebration culminated on July 4, 1976, with the 200th anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence. 

The U.S.P.S. issued 113 commemorative stamps over a six-year period in honor of the U.S. bicentennial, beginning with the American Revolution Bicentennial Commission Emblem stamp (U.S. #1432). As a group, the Bicentennial Series chronicles one of our nation’s most important chapters, and remembers the events and patriots who made the U.S. a world model for liberty.