Celebrate 20 x Forever US Postage Stamps

Good times call for good wishes, and the U.S. Postal Service gets in on the act with the Neon Celebrate! Forever stamp, first issued in 2011, and reissued in 2015. Bringing an extra wish for happiness to anyone celebrating a special time, this stamp features a brilliantly colored design crafted out of neon and glass that adds a spark to greeting cards, invitations, and gift-bearing envelopes and packages. No matter the occasion-birthday, anniversary, engagement, wedding, new job, retirement-this stamp will add another congratulatory wish to the good times being acknowledged. Since the early 20th century, designers have made use of the fact that neon, argon, and a few other gases, glow when an electrical charge passes through them. In 1910, French scientist Georges Claude (1870-1960) first presented the neon lamp to the public in Paris. During the 1920s, neon signs became a popular form of advertising in the United States after the Packard Motor Car dealership in Los Angeles displayed the first documented neon commercial sign in the country. Today, in addition to creating signage, artists work with neon as an expressive medium, filling and shaping glass tubes into an infinite variety of colorful images for exhibit.