Scott No: 374-376
Serial number: C56
Values in set: 3
Date of issue: October 1, 1958
Denomination: 24 fen
Designer: Liu Shuoren, Wu Jiankun
Engraver: Sun Jingyong, Sun Hongnian, Gao Pinzhang
Size of stamps: 31*26mm
Perforation: 14
Sheet composition: 110(10*10)
Printing process: Engraving
Printing House: Beijing People's Printing Works

C55 "National Industrial and Transport Exhibition" commemorative stamps were issued on October 1, 1958. The set consists of 3 stamps, printed by engraving, designed by Liu Shuoren, engraved by Sun Jingyong, Sun Hongnian, and Gao Pinzhang, and printed by the Beijing People's Printing Factory. Stamp size 31 mm × 26 mm, perforation gauge 14, 100 stamps per sheet (10 × 10), with a total face value of 0.24 yuan for the set; General Line for Socialist Construction 8 fen, circulation 10 million copies; Strive to Be First 8 fen, circulation 10 million copies; Great Leap in Production 8 fen, circulation 8 million copies, without gum throughout the set.

Theme of the Set

The National Industrial and Transport Exhibition was held in October 1958 at the Soviet Exhibition Center in Beijing (today's Beijing Exhibition Center), with fifteen exhibition halls covering metallurgy, machinery, atomic energy, geology, petroleum, coal, electric power, chemicals, forestry, light industry, textiles, construction engineering, as well as railway, transport, and posts and telecommunications, systematically displaying through objects and pictures the achievements made in industrial and transport construction in the nine years since the founding of the People's Republic of China. The Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications chose National Day, the ninth anniversary, to issue this set in conjunction with the opening of the exhibition, displaying the vigorous appearance of the industrial and transport front and echoing the call of the general line of the time to "go all out, aim high, and build socialism with greater, faster, better, and more economical results." This set carries a distinct imprint of the Great Leap Forward era, and the first stamp is New China's first stamp with text as its main design.

Stamp Designs and Historical Background

General Line for Socialist Construction

The main subject of the design is Zhou Enlai's own calligraphy of the nineteen large characters "Go all out, aim high, and build socialism with greater, faster, better, and more economical results," vigorous and powerful, arranged in the center. Above is printed the emblem of the National Industrial and Transport Exhibition, with a gear surrounding the characters "1958"; below are decorative industrial and scientific research patterns such as factory buildings and a microscope. The overall tone is green, taking the text of the general line as the absolute main subject of the picture; it is the first stamp in the history of New China's stamps to take text as its core design, pioneering the text stamp.

Strive to Be First

The design uses dragon boat racing as a metaphor: a dragon boat with its dragon head held high cleaves through the waves, several athletes on board row with all their strength, one person stands at the bow holding high a red flag, the water surges, and auspicious clouds swirl around. The red tone is passionate and high-spirited, borrowing the traditional imagery of folk dragon boat racing to symbolize the soaring drive of the industrial and transport front to vie for the lead and strive to be first, echoing the four characters "strive to be first" in the general line.

Great Leap in Production

The design uses ten thousand galloping horses as a metaphor: several steeds gallop with all four hooves off the ground and heads held high, riders on horseback wave flags, with magnificent momentum; the background is set off by factory chimneys and building silhouettes, and auspicious clouds spread across the sky. The brown tone is steady and powerful, using the galloping horses to symbolize the advancing-by-leaps-and-bounds momentum of production and construction at a thousand li a day, integrating figurative expression with the background of industrial construction.

Artistic Design Features

The set uniformly adopts a horizontal format and engraving; all three stamps have a face value of 8 fen and use green, red, and brown respectively, with distinctive colors of the era. The first stamp takes the inscribed text as its main design, and the latter two use the two traditional auspicious images of dragon boat racing and galloping horses as metaphors, combining pictures and text and blending solid and void, with a conception full of the characteristics of the times. The engraved lines are vigorous and rough, with powerful depiction of the dragon boat's waves, the horses' manes, and the factory outlines, combining decorative quality with stirring appeal. The third stamp, with a circulation of 8 million copies, is slightly fewer and is the bottleneck of the set. This set is a representative work on the theme of industry and transport during the Great Leap Forward period and an important physical object for studying the postal design language of that special era.