Dear Amy, 

Deuteronomy 16:20
Justice, justice shalt thou follow, that thou mayest live, and inherit the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee.

{S} כ צֶדֶק צֶדֶק, תִּרְדֹּף--לְמַעַן תִּחְיֶה וְיָרַשְׁתָּ אֶת-הָאָרֶץ, אֲשֶׁר-יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ נֹתֵן לָךְ. {ס}

This portion of the Torah was the foundation of my bar mitzvah speech in August of 1965.

I know that you have not only lived by this edict, but have devoted your life of service to it.

We are very proud of you, and equally so to know that you have walked the corridors of the hallowed halls of our beloved Rhodes College.

As President Franklin D.Roosevelt was, I have been a stamp collector throughout my lifetime, beginning as a child, at the age of five, exploring the world illuminated by a tiny canvas known as a stamp.

When Justice Antonin Scalia visited the Rhodes Campus on September 22, 2015 he allowed me to visit with him. I was honored that he accorded the privilege of his signatures on two envelopes bearing stamps representing the history of our nation, that of John Jay, the first Supreme Court Justice of the United States,

& Freedom of the Press.

Judge Scalia noticed that the envelope bearing the Freedom of The Press stamp also had a cancellation of September 22, 1958, 57 years to the day of his visit to Rhodes College for his Constitution Day lecture.

Rhodes College also has both first day covers, signed by Justice Scalia, in the archives as I had two sets of each envelope with me that day, one for me and one for Rhodes.

This envelope bears the cancellation for the first day of issue of our nation's stamp honoring the Drafting of the Bill of Rights.

It is my hope that one day it will also bear your signature.

May God, in His infinite wisdom, guide you, always.

-David-

My girlfriend, Denise, me, and her best friend, Rose, in Tupelo, Mississippi some years ago. Rose had me strapped in tight with that big bear hug. Rose was a beautiful woman, brilliant artist, scholar and stamp collector, too. Denise is a very successful real estate broker and philanthropist. I loved them very much. For a brief moment in time, the three of us were inseparable, like the unforgettable song of the same name,
"Three Coins In The Fountain"

"I firmly believe that if the whole materia medica, as now used, could be sunk to the bottom of the sea, it would be better for mankind-and all the worse for the fishes, to wit, if all the medicine in the world were thrown into the sea, it would be bad for the fish and good for humanity."

-Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.- (29 August 1809 - October 8, 1894) American physician, writer, poet, and the father of US Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

This young piano player and philatelist was enjoying a lovely autumn day at the university when his girfriend snagged this pic of him in 1988.

What could he possibly have been thinking about ? A hayride, a walk in the park, kisses, stamp collecting, the Beatles and Elvis ?

It's a little bit thinner and a little bit lighter now, but I still have most of that signature rag top of mine.

Jenny Airmail Cover From the Collection of David Saks

Scott Catalog #C3, the carmine, rose and blue 24¢ airmail stamp, the Jenny, issued May 13, 1918, franks this rare cover along with Scott #C1, the 6¢ orange issued December 10, 1918 and Scott #C2, the 16¢ green issued July 11, 1918.

On close inspection it appears to have been mailed January 16, 1919, as shown in the New Britain Connecticut wavy machine cancellation.

U.S. postmarking machines were first developed in 1876 but few survived into the 1920’s. By then postmarks from these machines were usually circular and, while formats varied, all cancellations included bars or lines. Nearly all machine-cancellation devices applied both postmark and cancellation simultaneously. The circular postmark on a machine cancel is sometimes referred to as a dial. There is no circular postmark on this rare cover which leads me to believe it was produced by the Barnard or Universal cancellation machines produced in the late 19th and early 20th century. As a personal observation, without reverse cancellations, Mr. Prebis may have been a stamp collector. The cover appears to have been mailed from his home post office with a total of 46¢ postage far exceeding the postal rate for domestic mail required in 1918. The postal rate for the first ounce of a letter was 3¢ as of November 2, 1917. It was subsequently decreased to 2¢ on July 1, 1919 by an act of Congress following World War One.

All three Jenny's in mint condition are also in my collection.

On 1 March 1918 the Army placed an order with the Curtiss Aeroplane and Motor Company for 12 new airplanes to be used for airmail service. The order was divided equally between the Curtiss JN-4HM and R-4LM models. The “M” in each instance indicates the basic plane was modified to carry mail. An additional six JR-1B planes were ordered from the Standard Aircraft Corporation in July 1918 for use in the airmail service (the “B” model was a modified version of the Standard JR-1 training plane). The JR-1B’s were delivered on 6 August 1918.

Only the JN-4HM planes were used for the first airmail flights. The model that appears on the 24¢ stamp is an unmodified trainer with two seats. The photograph provided by the War Department to the Bureau of Engraving and Printing was made from one of the regular Jennys, not a modified mail plane.

In 1915 Curtiss began production of a new plane that combined features of the earlier “J” and “N” models used by the Army and Navy. The JN series' initials gave rise to the plane's popular nickname “Jenny.”

But this is the "Jenny" I want to fly with.

One great day she'll land on my stamp collection.