Image courtesy of the Smithsonian National Postal Museum.

"The Greatest American First Day Cover" by Ken Lawrence is the 2023 winner of the American First Day Cover Society’s annual Philip H. Ward, Jr., Memorial Award for Excellence in First Day Cover Literature. The article appeared in the February 2023 issue of The Chronicle of the US Classic Postal Issues. It is the story of a July 2, 1847, cover sent from New York City to Indianapolis, franked with the 10-cent George Washington (Scott 2), one of the first two U.S. stamps. It was first discovered in 1972 and is currently on display at the National Postal Museum.

All articles in First Days, the official journal of the AFDCS, automatically are considered for this award, but articles and works in other publications may be submitted for consideration. A complete list of past winners can be found here.

Lawrence's articles have won the Ward competition twice before and shared in a third. One of those articles also was awarded the U.S. Stamp Society's Barbara Mueller Award. He is a recipient of the Charles J. Peterson Philatelic Literature Life Achievement Award, and served as a vice president of the American Philatelic Society and trustee of the American Philatelic Research Library.

Although he has been writing about FDCs for 40 years, "this article is probably the most important one I have written," he says. Although the official first-day-of-issue for Scott 1 and 2 is July 1, there is no evidence they were placed on sale until the next day, when this cover was mailed.

Philip Henry Ward, Jr., began servicing first day covers in 1909. An electrical engineer by trade, he wrote on new issues for The American Philatelist, Mekeel’s Weekly Stamp News and The Weekly Philatelic Gazette in the early 20th century.