USPS Bruce Lee stamp kicks off Feb. 18 in Seattle

By Scott Tiffney

On Feb. 18 the United States Postal Service will honor Chinese-American actor and martial artist Bruce Lee with a nondenominated (78¢) forever commemorative stamp.

“Chinese American martial artist, actor, and filmmaker Bruce Lee (1940–73) was the first Asian leading man in American film,” the USPS said in announcing the stamp, “captivating audiences with his skill, charisma, and screen presence and inspiring a generation of young fans.”

The first-day ceremony for the stamp will take place at the Nippon Kan Theater, 628 S. Washington St. in Seattle, Wash. at 2 p.m. Pacific Time. Speakers for the event include Benjamin Kuo, USPS senior vice president of Facilities and Infrastructure, who will serve as the dedicating official and Shannon Lee, chief executive officer for Bruce Lee Enterprises. Those wishing to attend the ceremony are encouraged to register at usps.com/bruceleestamp.

The stamp, available in panes of 20, features a black-and-white painting of Lee by artist Kam Mak showing Lee executing a flying kick with the vertical inscriptions “BRUCE LEE” and “FOREVER USA” being the targets on the right side of the design. On the stamp, designed by USPS art director Antonio Alcala, Lee is pictured against a yellow brushstroke backdrop from Mak’s egg tempera painting on traditional gesso.

Mak has worked on previous stamps for the Postal Service, most notably the second series of Lunar New Year stamps, and he was a natural choice for Alcala to be the artist for the project. “It didn’t hurt that he’s been a big Bruce Lee fan for most of his life!” Alcala said. …

Ashton Potter, one of two contract printers for the USPS, printed the new Bruce Lee forever stamp in a quantity of 20 million stamps in 1 million panes of 20.

A plate number consisting of a “P” followed by five single digits is printed in the bottom two corners of the pane. Each digit represents one of the colors used to print the stamp: cyan, magenta, yellow, black and Pantone Matching System 109 C yellow. Further technical information for the Bruce Lee stamp can be found in the box on page 6.

Post offices wishing to hold an event for the Bruce Lee stamp are required to use a pictorial dedication postmark consisting of a circular datestamp to the left of “Bruce Lee” in an uppercase bold shadowed font with two lightning bolts in the upper right corner. “The word ‘Station’ or the abbreviation ‘STA’ is required somewhere in the design because it will be a temporary station,” the USPS said. “Use of any image other than the … special pictorial image is prohibited.”

Two pictorial first-day cancels for the Bruce Lee stamp are being offered by the Postal Service, one in black and the other in color. The black postmark is applied free, up to a quantity of 50, to most collector-submitted covers. There is a 5¢ charge for each additional postmark over 50.

The black postmark features “Bruce Lee” in an uppercase bold shadowed font with additional first-day details above and below.

The color postmark features the front-facing outline of a clenched fist in yellow with first-day details vertically in black in each of the four fingers of the fist. On either side of the fist are two black lightning bolts.

The color postmark can be obtained by collectors on envelopes made from laser-safe paper. There is an order minimum of 10 envelopes with a fee of 50¢ per postmark.

The Jan. 8 issue of the Postal Bulletin provides additional ordering and technical information.

Both postmarks are also applied to first-day covers manufactured and sold by the Postal Service. All requests for Bruce Lee first-day cancels must be postmarked by June 18.

Further Bruce Lee stamp products are available from the online USPS postal store at https://store.usps.com/store/home.

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