Sir Rowland Hill's Postal Reform
Introduction
The year 2020 is the 180th Birthday of the world's first postage stamp – the Penny Black. The exhibitor would like to use these two frames to describe the greatest British Postal Reformer – Sir Rowland Hill (1795-l879) and his inventions (Uniform Penny Postage and Penny Black).In 1835, Hill took real action to start his postal reform with the help of Mr.Robert Wallace MP, another long-standing postal reformer. In January l837 he published his famous pamphlet entitled Post Office Reform,Its Importance and Practicability. His reform was not only supported by some MPs, businessmen and officials, but also by ordinary people and media. Finally he succeeded by the Uniform Postage Act enacted by Parliament which received Queen Victoria's Royal Assent on 17th August 1839, and the 1d post system came into operation on 10th January l840.
That same year, the first world postage stamp – the Penny Black – was invented, which was sold from lst May 1840 and officially issued and used for postage on 6th May 1840. Uniform Penny Post and the Penny Black stamps meant a milestone in World Postal history and represented the beginning of the modem postal system of the world. Sir Rowland Hill is known as the "Stamp Father" by future generations.
Written up in both Mandarin and English. Originally prepared for the "Gems of Asian Philately" exhibition at the Royal Philatelic Society on 29th February 2020.