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Steve Gribben

New “Pluto — Explored!” postage stamps feature an image of NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft, based on artwork created by APL graphic artist Steve Gribben.

Credit: JHUAPL

Press Release

APL Space Missions Commemorated on Postage Stamps

U.S. postage stamps featuring a pair of prominent Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory space missions debuted recently. The “Pluto — Explored!” set commemorates the July 2015 flyby of Pluto by the New Horizons spacecraft; “Views of Our Planets” features iconic images of the planets in our solar system, including an image of Mercury from the MESSENGER mission.

The first-day-of-issue dedication ceremony for both sets of Forever stamps was held May 31 at the World Stamp Show in New York City. In dedicating the stamps, U.S. Postal Service Chief Operating Officer and Executive Vice President David Williams noted, “In 2006, NASA placed a 29-cent ‘Pluto: Not Yet Explored’ stamp on board the New Horizons spacecraft, which — it is safe to say — makes it the most widely traveled stamp in the universe.”

The 45-minute ceremony was followed by an autograph session, in which speakers and VIPs (including APL’s Alice Bowman, the New Horizons mission operations manager) signed first-day-of-issue programs for hundreds of stamp enthusiasts.