#Owney the #postal #dog #stamps

      Being a dog lover, I bought Owney the Postal Dog commemorative stamps without knowing the story of this dog.  According to the back of the page of stamps, in the late 1880s, a terrier mix began hanging around the post office in Albany, NY, where the clerks enjoyed his company.
     Owney enjoyed riding on the postal wagons and on trains, where the postal emkployees considered him their good-luck charm.  Owney travelled the country, gatyhering medals and tags from the clerks he met.  Eventually, he had too many medals for his collar, so the postmaster gene34ral gave him a dog-sized jacket to display his medals.  He then travelled the world as an American postal icon and representative of the Railway Mail Service.  Today, he "enjoys" a place of honor in the Smithsonian's Postal Museum, which I doubt.  It probably means he is stuffed and standing there, but it is an inspiring story nonetheless.

     “Children and dogs are as necessary to the welfare of the country as Wall Street and the railroads.”  Harry S. Truman