Co-Authors Win
2021 La Posta Helbock Prize
La Posta Publications News Release 21-5
June 15, 2021 For Immediate Release
For additional information contact: Peter Martin (540) 899-7683, pmartin2525@yahoo.com
For the first time, co-authors have won the La Posta Richard W. Helbock Prize awarded to the best postal history article appearing in the previous year’s La Posta: The Journal of American Postal History.
James W. Milgram, M.D., Lake Forest, Illinois, and Tony Wawrukiewicz, Portland, Oregon, won the 2021 Helbock Prize for “Postal Markings on Registered Covers Showing Registered Package Envelope Numbering,” which appeared in the Second Quarter 2020 La Posta.
The article was an exceptional review of the special types of envelopes used by the U.S. Post Office Department in the latter half of the 19th century to transport registered letters.
Milgram previously won the 2019 Helbock Prize for “Portfolio and Package Envelopes of the American Civil War.”
Four-time Helbock Prize winner Charles Neyhart Jr. of Portland, Oregon, finished second with “U.S. Navy Postmarks at the Panama California Exposition 1915-16 (3Q). Neyhart’s article was an in-depth look at the Navy ships that attended the exposition and the postmarks used by the ships while they were there. Neyhart won the 2020 Helbock Prize for, “A Case Study of the Demise of the West Portland Oregon, Fourth Class Post Office”.
Finishing third was La Posta columnist John M. Hotchner, Falls Church, Virginia, with “The Story of ‘Called Out’ and Related Markings,” (4Q). Hochner’s groundbreaking article examined the purpose and history of “Called Out” auxiliary markings and provided examples to show how they were used at post offices.
“The Medical Postal History of Buffalo, New York,” (3Q) by Peter Jablonski, Akron, New York, took fourth, and “Directory Assistance in Readdressing Misdirected Items,” by Wawrukiewicz, Thomas C. Breske, and Scott Steward (1Q) was fifth.
Receiving honorable mentions were: “The Postal History of Warsaw, North Carolina,” (1Q) by Tony Crumbley; “Research Complications: The Family of Bolling Hall,” (3Q) by Patricia A. Kaufmann; “Comic Valentines Depicting Civil Was Subjects,” (1Q) by Milgram; and “Postage Due Collection Rulings for Unpaid and Shortpaid Domestic Mail from 1855 to 1958,” (4Q) by Wawrukiewicz.
The top three finishers receive cash prizes. The selections were based on voting by the La Posta editorial staff and the subscribers of La Posta.
The Richard W. Helbock Prize is named in honor of the founding editor of La Posta who died in 2011. Helbock founded La Posta in 1969 and continued to edit the journal for more than 42 years until his death.
La Posta: The Journal of American Postal History is published four times per year. It is the leading journal devoted to American postal history and is in its 53rd year of publication. Subscriptions are $35 per year. For more information contact: La Posta Publications, POB 6074 Fredericksburg, VA 22403, e-mail laposta.joan@yahoo.com or visit the La Posta website at: www.lapostapub.com.