Scott No: 907-916
Serial number: S75
Values in set: 10
Date of issue: May 10, 1966
Denomination: 80 fen
Designer: Lu Tianjiao, Yang Baizi, Shen Xiaocun, Pan Keming
Size of stamps: 36.5*26mm
Perforation: 11*11.5
Sheet composition: 50(5*10)
Printing process: Photogravure
Printing House: Beijing Postage Stamp Printing Works

S75 "Women in the Service Trades" special stamps were issued on May 10, 1966. The set consists of 10 stamps, printed by photogravure, jointly designed by Lu Tianjiao, Yang Baizi, Chen Xiaocong, and Pan Keming, and printed by the Beijing Stamp Factory. Stamp size 40 mm × 30 mm, perforation gauge 11 × 11.5, 50 stamps per sheet (5 × 10), each stamp with a face value of 8 fen, with a total face value of 0.80 yuan for the set, and a circulation of 6 million copies for each stamp.

Theme of the Set

In the era's conception in New China, all trades and professions differed only in division of labor, not in high or low status, and service posts were likewise an indispensable component of socialist construction. At the time, large numbers of women devoted themselves to various service posts in town and country, quietly serving the people's daily life. The Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications issued this set, selecting ten highly representative service posts, displaying the appearance of women laborers rooted in ordinary posts and serving the people wholeheartedly, and praising the dedication of women in the service trades who love their work and are devoted to their duties. This set is also the concluding work of the entire old special stamps series; after its issuance, the special stamp series came to an end, and soon the postal service entered the stage of Wen-prefix stamp issuance, giving it a special place in the history of New China's stamps.

Stamp Designs and Historical Background

All Work Is for the Revolution

The picture shows a woman worker in the service trades holding a work in her arms with a high-spirited posture, with a banner slogan "All Work Is for the Revolution" in the background. As the general opening of the whole set, it makes clear the thematic keynote of the entire set, linking ordinary service work with the grand goal of revolutionary construction.

Train Attendant

The woman train attendant in the design wears a uniform and stands at the door of the train car, smiling and warmly welcoming and seeing off passengers, displaying the meticulous and thoughtful service on the railway passenger line; it is the service post most familiar to the masses on long journeys.

Rural Health Worker

A woman health worker, with a medical kit on her back, walks through the countryside, traveling over mountains and rivers into villages, bringing basic medical services to peasants' doorsteps. It corresponds to the rural grassroots cooperative medical care vigorously promoted at the time, safeguarding the health of the rural masses.

Childcare Worker

In the picture a childcare worker accompanies several young children and carefully tends to their daily activities, embodying the childcare work of nurseries and kindergartens, shouldering the responsibility of raising the next generation, and relieving workers of worries about their children.

Cleaner

A woman cleaner holds a broom and sweeps the city streets, quietly maintaining the tidiness of the city's appearance; it is an indispensable post for ensuring the normal operation of the city, praising ordinary laborers who fear neither dirt nor fatigue.

Barber

The barber operates tools in the barbershop, seriously cutting hair for the masses, providing daily convenience services to urban and rural residents, close to ordinary people's daily needs.

Bus Attendant

That is, the bus conductor: the woman conductor in the design stands on the bus holding a ticket clip, serving citizens riding the bus; it is a classic image of a women's post in urban public transportation.

Back-Basket Shop Salesperson

This is a post with a strong mountain-area character: the salesperson carries a back-basket, crosses mountains and ridges, and delivers daily necessities to mountain villages with inconvenient transportation, opening up the circulation of materials in mountain areas and serving the masses in remote villages.

Canteen Attendant

The canteen attendant is busy in the canteen, providing dining services for workers and residents, safeguarding collective life and serving the broad masses of laborers on the production frontline.

Rural Postwoman

A woman postal worker walks along country paths, delivering letters, newspapers, and periodicals, opening up the channel for information transmission in the countryside, delivering letters and newspapers to peasant households, and maintaining information exchange between town and country. It serves as the conclusion of the whole set.

Artistic Design Features

The set uniformly adopts a horizontal stamp format, with consistent specifications and a neat, uniform layout, convenient for displaying as a complete set. The four designers worked in division of labor, and the style is coordinated and unified, belonging to the typical realistic poster style of the 1960s: plain and soft modeling, bright and clean colors, without intense or exaggerated rendering, focusing on restoring the daily routine of each post. The subjects balance town and country, covering different categories such as transportation, medical care, preschool education, sanitation, commerce, and postal service, including both urban service trades and distinctive posts specifically serving mountain villages and rural areas, with a balanced perspective.

All stamps in the set have a face value of 8 fen, suitable for the domestic ordinary mail postage at the time; communication consumption was very large, and complete, well-preserved sets of new stamps are not easy to collect. When distinguishing forgeries, focus on the printing texture of photogravure: genuine stamps have transparent, soft colors and natural layer transitions; forgeries are mostly offset-printed, with coarse dot patterns, dull colors, and easily blurred facial and clothing details.