COVER N.88 - USA

Postmark: NORTH POLE AK 06MAR22
Posted on the 22nd March; received on the 28th March
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Wow! what a nicely and carefully laid out cover, hailing from a quite curious origin - North Pole, Alaska, and devoted to my theme of choice. Thank you so much, A.M. not only for the cover but also for the immensely appreciated goodies inside.

North Pole is a small town of some 2.200 inhabitants in the greater area of Fairbanks, with a relevant philatelic connection as it is home to one of the traditional Santa Claus offices that are yearly flooded on that particular time of the year with letters from children (big and small, alike) from across the globe, hoping to get an answer from the old man in red. (Note to self: Can't forget to nag Santa at North Pole, later this year...)

Stamps:

On the right top corner in blue ... no, wrong sport....

On the right top corner the two stamps issued to celebrate the centenary of the establishment of regular Airmail Service in USA, the blue issue coming to light on 01MAY2018 and the red-brown on 11AUG2018. 

The stamps echo, but do not mirror, the design of the infamous " 24 cents Jenny" issue (on this "Forever" self-adhesive stamps the aircraft is pictured from head-on as opposed to a side view on the former) that was the first ever air mail stamp produced and which originated the most famous stamp printing error of history: The Inverted Jenny.  

History has it that the blue Curtiss jenny image on the centre of the stamp was printed upside down on at least four of the 100 stamp sheets, three of them being immediately discarded, but one having inadvertently survived, of which the whereabouts of 94 stamps are still known.

Alfred "Chief" Anderson did not learn to fly in a Jenny, as so many pilots before him. In fact he only learned to fly because he would not let himself be discouraged  by bigotry and prejudice. In times of racial discrimination he, like Martin Luther King later would say, had a dream, and he would do everything to fulfill it. So, he took the advice I once saw on a photo in old National Geographic magazine of a picture hanging on a wall of a house in some remote area of the USA: "Do you need a helping hand? look at the end of your arm!"

Alfred Anderson bought his own aircraft, a Velie Monocoupe, and self thought himself to fly.

To cut along history short, in spite of all the racial discrimination he had to go through he would become the first black american to hold a Civil Aeronautics Administration licence, which he got in 1932.

The second world war saw him rise to fame as the Chief instructor for the famed Tuskgee Airmen, a term identifying the first all-black air force units that would become famous for  their role in WW2, as part of the "red tails" group, flying P-51 Mustangs. their score at the end of the war was nothing short of significant. According to wikipedia "the 450 Tuskegee Airmen who saw combat flew 1,378 combat missions, destroyed 260 enemy planes, and earned over 150 Distinguished Flying Crosses, among numerous other awards."

The 70 cent self-adhesive stamp honouring the memory of Charles Alfred "Chief" Anderson, was issued on 13MAR2014, as part of the emission "Distinguished Americans" that ran from 2000 to 2017.