Washington, D.C., aquatic park joins National Parks list

By Michael Baadke

The 11th stamp revealed by the United States Postal Service in its planned set of 16 National Parks stamps will commemorate Kenilworth Park and Aquatic Gardens in Washington, D.C.

The stamp will be part of the set honoring the 100th anniversary of the National Park Service in the United States. The Postal Service has been revealing one stamp in the set each day, beginning April 4.

The set will be issued June 2 during World Stamp Show-NY 2016, which is taking place from May 28 to June 4 at the Javits Center in New York City.

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The 700-acre Kenilworth Park and Aquatic Gardens were first developed by Walter Shaw on land he purchased in the 1880s, in an effort to recreate some of the familiar surroundings of his native Maine. Congress purchased the land in 1938 to add it to Anacostia Park.

Kenilworth Park and Aquatic Gardens offers a boardwalk through the aquatic gardens and fields of water lilies. The park includes birds and other wildlife, recreation areas and more.

The stamp photograph features an aquatic plant known as the sacred lotus from the park. The photograph is by Cindy Dyer, whose photos of water lilies previously appeared on four forever stamps issued March 20, 2015 (Scott 4964-4967). Those water lily images were also photographed at Kenilworth Park.

Dyer also created the five photographs that appeared on the 49¢ Ferns coil stamps issued Jan. 27, 2014 (Scott 4848-4852). The same designs were used to create forever coil stamps issued March 6, 2014 (Scott 4874-4878), and Ferns coil stamps issued March 27, 2015 (4973-77).

The 10 stamps previously revealed in the National Parks set honor Acadia National Park, Arches National Park, Assateague Island National Seashore, Bandelier National Monument, Carlsbad Caverns National Park, Everglades National Park, Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve, Grand Canyon National Park, Gulf Islands National Seashore, and Haleakala National Park.