Chris Calle (American, B. 1961) "Bi-Plane" Signed lower center. Mixed Media on Illustration Board. Provenance: Collection of James A. Helzer (1946-2008), Founder of Unicover Corporation. This painting was originally published on the Fleetwood First Day of Issue Proofcard for the U.S. 25c Bi-plane stamp in the UPU Congress Series issued November 16, 1989. Postal service and delivery have come a long way since ancient runners memorized messages or carried them by hand. Today, with the help of the airplane, correspondence is routinely flown across continents and wide oceans in a matter of hours. The first airplane mail flight took place only eight years after the Wright brothers flew their first frail plane at Kitty Hawk. This first airmail delivery was undertaken in Great Britain, between Hendor and Windsor, to help celebrate the coronation of King George V in 1911. After that, the development of airmail proceeded at a rapid pace. In 1918, the world's first regular airmail service commenced with a flight between New York City and Washington, D.C. The first leg of this historic flight was piloted by Torrey Webb, pictured with his biplane on this cachet. In 1939, regular service across the North Atlantic was instituted. Soon, daring mail pilots were blazing new routes to the remotest ends of the earth. One of the most famous, the French pilot Antoine-Marie-Roger de Saint-Exupery, helped map the first airmail routes over northwest Africa, the South Atlantic and South America. In his spare time, he shared his adventures and solitary meditations with the world in such lyrical and popular masterpieces of prose as Southern Mail (1933) and Wind, Sand and Stars (1939), using his flying expertise to not only deliver the mail safely but as a source for an appropriate literary theme -- linking all points of the world for the solidarity of all mankind. Image Size: 14.75 x 12.25 in. Overall Size: 23.25 x 19.25 in. Unframed. (B12067)