# 2247 - 1987 22c Pan American Games

U.S. #2247
1987 22¢ Pan American Games

• Issued to commemorate the 10^th Pan American Games
• The games were held in Indianapolis, Indiana from August 7 to August 23, 1987
• Second US stamp to honor the Pan Am Games

Stamp Category:  Commemorative
Value:  22¢, first-class rate
First Day of Issue:  January 29, 1987
First Day City:  Indianapolis, Indiana
Quantity Issued:  166,555,000
Printed by:  Bureau of Engraving and Printing
Printing Method:  Photogravure
Format:  Panes of 50 in sheets of 200
Perforations:  11

Why the stamp was issued:  To commemorate the 10^th Pan American Games.  These were the second Pan American Games held in the US.  The first games were also honored with a stamp in 1959 (US #C56).

About the stamp design:  This was Lon Busch’s first stamp design.  His geometric design shows a runner in motion moving across the stamp.  The motion is expressed by the varying shades from one side to the other.  A special silver ink was used to make the denomination and lettering stand out.

First Day City:  The First Day ceremony for this stamp was held at the Indiana War Memorial for veterans of the Spanish-American War and World War I, in Indianapolis.  The games were held that August in Indianapolis.

Unusual fact about this stamp:  About 30 error stamps with the silver omitted have been discovered to date.

History the stamp represents: 

Indiana Hosts 10th Pan American Games

Pan American Games are a series of athletic competitions much like the Olympic Games.  They are sponsored by the Pan American Sports Organization, which is made up of 38 nations from the Western Hemisphere.  Like the Olympics, the games are held every four years, usually one year before the Olympics.  The Pan American Games were founded after World War II to foster good relations between the countries of the Americas.

From August 7 to August 23, 1987, Indianapolis, Indiana, held the X Pan American Games.  The event’s opening ceremony was held at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and hosted a crowd of around 80,000.  When the torch was finally lit, Vice President George H.W. Bush announced the opening of the games. 

More than 6,500 athletes and officials participated in the games.  Indianapolis had built $136 million worth of athletic facilities in the decade preceding the games.  These facilities included an indoor arena, a domed stadium, a velodrome (for bicycle racing), a natatorium (for swimming events), and a track-and-field stadium.  The 1987 Pan American games were larger than the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics – the Pan American games had 65 more events.

The United States earned the highest number of gold medals in the 30 sports offered.  The X Pan American Games had a positive impact on Indianapolis’s economy, bringing in millions of dollars and allowing it to become the first Pan American city to break even with the costs of the event.

History of the Pan American Games

The first step toward the Pan-American Games came at the 1924 Olympic Games in Paris, France. During the Olympic Congress there, members of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) from Cuba, Guatemala, and Mexico suggested the creation of regional games to increase sport activities in Central America. Working together, they succeeded in holding the first Central American Games two years later.

At the 1932 Olympic Games in Los Angeles, Latin American IOC members proposed an even larger competition, to include all countries in the Americas. The first attempt at these games was held in Dallas, Texas, in 1937 at the Greater Texas and Pan-American Exposition. The program included athletics, boxing and wrestling. Though the games attracted little attention, they were successful enough that Olympic officials from the Americas agreed to meet and discuss a larger competition.

In 1940 the representatives met Buenos Aires at the first Pan American Sports Congress. They agreed that the first games would be held two years later in Buenos Aires. However, the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941 drew most of the participating nations into World War II, and the games were postponed. Once the war was over, the congress reconvened in London during the 1948 Summer Olympics. There, they once again agreed on Buenos Aires as the host city and set the games for 1951.

The first Pan-American Games began on February 25, 1951. Over the following 13 days, 2,513 athletes from 21 nations competed in 18 sports (for a total of 140 events). Argentina won the most medals, the United States came in second, and Chile placed third.

The games proved to be a success and have been held every four years (in the year before the Summer Olympics) since 1951. The United States hosted the games for the first time in 1959, when they were held in Chicago, Illinois.

In 1990, the nations competed in the first and only Winter Pan-American Games. Since 1999, the games have been immediately followed by the Parapan American Games, in which athletes with physical disabilities compete. The most recent games were held in Toronto in 2015. Over 6,100 athletes participated in 36 sports (for a total of 364 events).

Since 1951, the games have been held 27 times. Currently, the United States has the most total medals, with 4,420 – 1,944 of those are gold. The next Pan-American Games are scheduled for 2019 in Lima, Peru.