Chris West > Quotes

“It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly, who errs and comes short again and again; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, and spends himself in a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows in the end the triumph of high achievement; and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.”
― Chris West, A History of America in Thirty-Six Postage Stamps

“The Iwo Jima stamp shows us the many-sided truth of war: its teamwork and courage, its moments of glory, but behind that, its amoral destructiveness and its long, painful after-effects—something General William Tecumseh Sherman understood so well.”
― Chris West, A History of America in Thirty-Six Postage Stamps

“Too disparately settled and demoralized to fight back physically, the Native Americans found a kind of inner resistance through the Ghost Dance movement. In 1889, Wovoka, a Paiute shaman, had a vision. It was an essentially peaceful one: The tribes should cooperate with each other and the white man. A ritual was to be followed, which would bring back dead Indians and make the white man head back east of his own accord. The buffalo would return to the plains. Wovoka taught the ritual, a five-day dance, to members of various tribes (including a representative of the Mormons), who interpreted it in light of their own culture and experience. The warlike Lakota added the idea of the Ghost Shirt, a ceremonial garment that made the wearer immune to bullets. Lakota began to perform the dance. The authorities took this as a sign that they were planning an uprising; in 1890, the army was dispatched to arrest tribal leaders, including Sitting Bull.”
― Chris West, A History of America in Thirty-Six Postage Stamps

“ON FEBRUARY 18, 1861, the man featured on this stamp stood on the steps of the statehouse in Montgomery, Alabama, and took the oath of office as president of the Confederate States of America. Less than two months later he was at war with his own former countrymen. The war was to be one of horrific brutality, with a death toll fifteen times greater than that of all America’s previous conflicts, including the War of Independence, added together.”
― Chris West, A History of America in Thirty-Six Postage Stamps

“though the depiction of him on the stamp is not exactly flattering. A number of Washington portraits share this quality. Energetic and impatient, especially when young, he hated sitting around posing to be painted, and it usually shows. He also had bad teeth, some of which had been replaced with ivory replicas, which explains the puffiness around his mouth.”
― Chris West, A History of America in Thirty-Six Postage Stamps

“I owe my life to my hobbies—especially stamp collecting,”
― Chris West, A History of America in Thirty-Six Postage Stamps

“The stamp soon became known as the “Black Jack.” (The Confederates also issued a Jackson 2¢, the “Red Jack.” Both sides were eager to co-opt this formidable character.)”
― Chris West, A History of America in Thirty-Six Postage Stamps

“The $1 Airlift, another of Stevan Dohanos’s designs, was specially issued in April 1968 for families sending parcels to U.S. servicemen in Vietnam, a conflict that by that time had become hopelessly out of control and was dividing the nation as profoundly as the issue of race.”
― Chris West, A History of America in Thirty-Six Postage Stamps