1942 30c Canal Zone Official Airmail, Gaillard Cut, Rose Lake, Panama Canal Overprint Type I

Most stamps are made for the public, but some were made for the government alone. Beginning in 1941, the Canal Zone overprinted its regular airmail stamps for official use by federal offices in the zone, and the program ran through 1951. Government agencies needed a separate stamp for official mail, so they would not have to use stamps meant for sale to the general public. This 30 cent value was one of the denominations produced for that purpose.

The stamp shows the Gaillard Cut, the stretch of the canal dug through the Continental Divide. It was first called the Culebra Cut, and work on it went on for years, with landslides making it harder than engineers had expected. Major David du Bose Gaillard led the central district that included the cut. He was promoted to colonel in 1913 and died that December, before the canal opened in 1914. In 1915 the cut was renamed Gaillard Cut in his honor.

Collectors tell the two overprint types apart by small differences in the lettering, and this is Type I. Official stamps like this one were used only within the Canal Zone’s federal offices, so they tell a small story about how the territory ran its own government mail. The Canal Zone ended in 1979, when the land was returned to Panama.