The Space Science set, issued on October 16, celebrates the United Kingdom’s contribution to studying the solar system with six eye-catching images captured by satellites.
The issue is claimed to mark the 50th anniversary of Ariel 1, the first British satellite, which was launched on April 26, 1962.
However, all the chosen imageswere captured by later satellites and probes operated wholly or partly by the European Space Agency, in which the UK is a major player.
Royal Mail issued its final stamps commemorating the Olympic and Paralympic Games on September 27 in the shape of a four-stamp miniature sheet entitled Memories of London 2012.
In the same format as the Welcome to the Olympics and Welcome to the Paralympics sheets of July and August, it features photographs from both events, with the logos of Team GB and ParalympicsGB and a quote from Lord Coe, the Chairman of the Organising Committee, in the border.
The sheet was designed by The Chase and printed by Walsall in lithography.
Royal Mail issued a Gold Medal Winner miniature sheet to celebrate each British success in the Paralympic Games in London.
Each sheet comprised two self-adhesive 1st class stamps of the same design, showing the medallists either in action during their event or on the podium.
As with the Olympic Games six-stamp sheets (October issue, page 20), base sheets designed by True North and pre-printed by Cartor were overprinted with images and inscriptions by six different regional printers, whose identities had not been released as we went to press.
Royal Mail issued a total of 29 next-day miniature sheets from August 1-12, to celebrate every gold medal won by British competitors at the London 2012 Olympics.
Each sheet comprised six 1st class stamps of the same design, featuring a photograph of the athlete or team in the process of winning their event, celebrating immediately afterwards or receivingtheir medals.
The images and inscriptions were overprinted onto pre-printed base sheets by six different printers, based in London, Swindon, Attleborough, Solihull, Preston and Edinburgh, and were available from 500 main post offices by noon the following day.
Royal Mail is issuing a miniature sheet of four stamps to coincide with the opening of the Paralympic Games on August 29.
The Welcome to the London 2012 Paralympic Games miniature sheet is similar in style to the Welcome to the Olympic Games sheet issued in July (August issue, page 22), featuring aquartet of sports merged with images of the city’s landmarks.
It will make Royal Mail the first postal administration of a host country to issue stamps to celebrate the start of the Paralympics.
Royal Mail is celebrating the bicentenary of the birth of Britain’s greatest novelist, Charles Dickens, with a set of six stamps and a miniature sheet to be issued on June 19.
They feature popular characters from 10 of his most famous novels, as drawn during the 19th century.
In the case of the sheet stamps, the illustrations are adapted from Character Sketches from Charles Dickens by Joseph Clayton Clarke (known as ‘Kyd’); in the case of the miniature sheet, they are from book illustrations by Hablot Knight Brown (known as ‘Phiz’).