Product Description
14 June 2011 Thomas The Tank Engine booklet single
From the self-adhesive retail booklet of 6 stamps (including 4 x 1st class definitives) available left or right, please state a preference if you have one.
1st Class – ‘Thomas and Bertie the Bus’
In this original illustration from the story ‘Thomas and Bertie’ (from Tank Engine Thomas Again), Thomas challenges Bertie the bus to a race. Here he is speeding past Bertie at a level crossing in this original illustration by C Reginald Dalby.
This issue marks the centenary of the birth of the Reverend Wilbert Awdry creator of Thomas the Tank Engine. The six stamps show Thomas and some of his friends from the TV series.
Reverend Awdry’s passion for railways had been instilled in him by his clergyman father, Vere, and when Wilbert himself had a family, he shared his railway enthusiasm with his own son, Christopher. It was while two-year-old Christopher was suffering with measles that Wilbert tried to enliven his son’s bed-bound quarantine by telling stories and drawing pictures about a group of little engines.
He wrote down the stories and in May 1945 ‘The Three Railway Engines’ was published. Between 1945 and 1972, Reverend Awdry wrote 26 volumes in ‘The Railway Series’.
