June 4, 1992: Public Selects Elvis Presley Stamp

For the first time ever, the United States Postal Service (USPS) asked Americans to choose the art for a stamp. To commemorate the late rock icon Elvis Presley, should the image be the young rockabilly singer or the older Vegas entertainer in a jumpsuit?

Ballots were distributed to post offices and in the April 13, 1992 issue of People magazine. On this day, June 4, 1992, Presley’s ex-wife Priscilla announced the results. More than 75 percent of the 1.2 million ballots returned favored the painting of the youthful Elvis by Howard Stutzman. Among those publicly voicing support for it during the polling was then-presidential aspirant Bill Clinton.

On January 8 the following year – Presley’s 58th birthday – the 29-cent stamp was issued. It went on to become the best-selling collectible U.S. stamp with a reported 124 million sold but never used to mail a letter.

Related: The story of Presley’s ’68 Comeback Special

In 1992, the public wanted to see this Elvis commemorated on a stamp…

On August 12, 2015, Elvis got a second stamp: a “Forever” stamp as part of the USPS’s music icon series.

Related: Our coverage of the 2018 USPS ceremony honoring John Lennon

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Rob Patterson

Rob Patterson began writing about music in 1976. Since his first published record review in Crawdaddy he has contributed to numerous national popular music magazines such as Creem, Musician, Circus, Spin, Request, Tower Pulse!, CD Review, Acoustic Guitar, Harp and many others along with major country music, consumer audio, musical instrument and studio recording magazines plus international publications New Musical Express and Country Music People in the U.K. From 1977 to '84 he wrote a nationally syndicated music column as well as stories for Newspaper Enterprises Association/United Feature Syndicate that ran in more than 400 daily newspapers across the nation. His work has also appeared in many weekly newspapers, onlinepublications like Salon.com and The Huffington Post, such books as the Rolling Stone Record Guide & Revised Record Guide, The Greenwood Encyclopedia of Rock History and The Year In Rock, 1980-81, plus liner notes for 20 album releases.

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