Watch as Linn’s Stamp News associate editor Michael Baadke reports on the annual Linn’s Stamp News United States Popularity Poll for 2015 and also takes a look at the history of the poll, which is in its 78th year.

Full video transcript:

Welcome to the Monday Morning Brief for December 14, 2015.

With the end of the year closing in on us, it’s time to open the annual Linn’s Stamp News United States Stamp Popularity Poll for 2015.

The stamp poll gives collectors an opportunity to vote on the different United States stamps that were issued during the past year. You can choose the stamps that you think had the best and worst designs, and those that were the most important and the least necessary. You’ll vote in three different categories: commemoratives, definitives and special stamps, and postal stationery.

With one final vote you can also pick your overall favorite stamp of 2015.

Voting is open now to everyone on the Linn’s website at Linns.com. You can also fill out the ballot published each week in the pages of Linn’s print edition and mail it in before March 4.

The Linn’s U.S. Stamp Popularity Poll is not a scientific poll, but it is a fun way to see what collectors think about the year in stamps.

Photocopied ballots are welcome, so collectors can get family members and friends involved, and stamp clubs can make voting in the annual poll a fun activity for the next membership meeting.

When the votes are all in, the results will be announced in an upcoming issue of Linn’s Stamp News.

This is the 78th year for the annual stamp poll, which began with voting for the issues of 1948. In the early years of the poll, collectors simply voted for their favorite and least favorite stamps.

The least favorite stamp in that first poll was the 3¢ commemorative for American Turners Society, and the favorite stamp of 1948 was a stamp issued one day earlier, the 3¢ Gettysburg Address issue with a design featuring President Abraham Lincoln.

Last year collectors picked the Vintage Circus Posters stamps as the overall favorite for 2014.

It will be fun to see which stamps are the big winners in this year’s voting.

You can keep up with the latest stamp news and features on Linns.com, and be sure to check out Linn’s pages on Facebook and Instagram.

For Linn’s Stamp News and the Scott catalogs, I’m Michael Baadke.