2. History of Philippine Postal Cards

In part 2 of the History of Philippine Postal Cards we take at looks at the issues from the United States of America.

Skip to:

U.S. Era Philippine Postal Cards

In the early 1900’s all Philippine postal cards issued under the U.S. administration were U.S. postal cards overprinted for use in the Philippines. Postal cards from the early 1900’s are the hardest and most valuable to collect of the U.S. era postal cards. Replied-paid postal cards were issued up until 1903 (liberty 2c) and would no be released again until 1944 when the Philippines was under Japanese occupation. Official use postal cards were introduced for the first time in the Philippines by the U.S. administration. 5 different postal cards were released between 1925 and 1941. All postal cards are simple by design, small and do not have any details or decoration on the reverse side.

Scott/ UPSS	Image	Year	Description
UX1/ S1		1900	Jefferson 1c in black
UX2/ S2		1900	Liberty 2c in black, contains a “.” after the “PHILIPPINES” overprint.
UX3/ S3	not acquired	1903	McKinley 1c in black, no a “.” after the word “PHILIPPINES” in the overprint.
UX4/ S4	not acquired	1906	Liberty 2c in black, very scarce. Similar to UX-2 but with larger, bolder font and no a “.” after the word “PHILIPPINES” in the overprint.
UX5/ S5		1905	McKinley 1c in black, has a “.” after the word “PHILIPPINES” in the overprint.
UX6/ S6	not acquired	1904	Liberty 2c in black, similar to UX2 but with larger font used for the “PHILIPPINES.” over print.
UX7/ S7	not acquired	1906	McKinley 1c in black. Similar to UX3 but with no “.” after “PHILIPPINES” and font is lighter.
UX8/ S8	not acquired	1906	Liberty 2c in black. Similar to UX6 but with no “.” after “PHILIPPINES” and font is lighter.
UX9/ S9		1907	Rizal 2c in black.
UX10/ S10		1910	McKinley 4c in black.
UX11/ S11		1911	Rizal 2c in blue.
UX12/ S12		1913	McKinley in blue.
UX13/ S13	not acquired	1917	Rizal 2c in green on buff card.
UX14/ S14		1932	Rizal 2c in green, a brighter shade of green than UX13 and issued on a card that is more orange in tone.
UX15/ S15		1916	McKinley 4c in green.
UX16/ S16	Long Dividing Line Short Dividing Line	1936	Rizal 2c in red. Exists as both the long and short vertical bar/dividing line varieties.
UX17/ S17		1938	Rizal 2c in red, “Commonwealth” overprint. Distinguishable by lower crossbar in the letter “A” of “Commonwealth”.
UX18/ S18		1939	Rizal 2c in red, “Commonwealth” overprint. Distinguishable by higher crossbar in the letter “A” of “Commonwealth”.
UX19/ S19		1941	Rizal 2c in red, “Commonwealth” overprint. Distinguishable by larger font for the word “Commonwealth”.

Distinguishing between UX17, UX18 and UX19

All 3 cards are overprinted with the word “COMMONWEALTH” in black on the 1936 UX16 postal card. There are subtle differences between each which are more clearly visible when the overprints are compared with each other. Here’s what to look for:

UX 17 – crossbar in the letter “A” is lower then the other 2 releases.
UX18 – crossbar in the letter “A” is higher and sits just under midpoint of the letter.
UX18 – clearly a larger font in both width and height.

Post WWII postal cards

Section 3. History of Philippine Postal Cards will cover the postal cards that were issued during WWII while the Japanese occupied the Philippine Islands. A single postal card was issued after WWII while the Philippines was still a territory of the United States. It exists in 2 varieties with the only difference being in the spacing of the letters “I” and “C” in word “VICTORY”. From 1946 the Philippines would gain independence from the United States, making this the last postal card issued under the U.S. Administration.

Scott/USPS	Image	Year	Description
UX23/??	Long Dividing Line Short Dividing Line	1945	2c brown Rizal with “VICTORY” centered between stamp and the seal of the Philippines. The overprint is in black and the “I” and “C” in “VICTORY” are evenly spaced. May have short or long dividing lines.
UX23a/??	not acquired		Same as UX23 above except the “I” and “C” in the “VICTORY” overprint are close to each other.

Official Business Postal Cards

1935 UZ2 "Rizal red, 2c" Official Business

1938 UZ3 "2c Rizal in Red" O.B. Commonwealth overprint Postcard

Scott/ UPSS	Image	Year	Description
UZ1/OS1	not acquired	1925	2c Rizal in green (on S13 or S13A). Contains “O.B.” printed in black and centered between the stamp and the seal of the Philippines.
UZ2/OS2		1935	2c Rizal in red (on S16). Contains “O.B.” printed in black and centered between the stamp and the seal of the Philippines. May have short or long dividing lines as per S16.
UZ3/OS3		1938	2c Rizal in red (on S16). Contains “O.B. COMMONWEALTH” printed over 2 lines at the left in black. May have short or long dividing lines as per S16. UZ3 has larger “O.B.” font.
UZ4/OS4	not acquired	1941	2c Rizal in green with “O.B.” printed beneath the stamp. Only produced with the O.B. overprint – many further overprinted to remove the “O.B.” and “United States of America” during the Japanese Occupation. Estimated that no more than 1,000 existed without the Japanese overprint.
UZ5/OS5	not acquired	1941	2c Rizal in red (on S19). Contains “O.B. COMMONWEALTH” printed over 2 lines centered between the seal of the Philippines and Rizal. May have short or long dividing lines as per S16. UZ5 has smaller “O.B.” font (about the same size as the word “COMMONWEALTH” in height.

Reply Paid Postal Cards

1900 - Liberty - 2+2c Philippine Reply Paid Postcard

Scott/ UPSS	Image	Year	Description
UY1/MR1		1900	Liberty 2c in blue with 2c reply paid portion.
UY2/MR2		1903	Ulysses Grant 1c in black with 1c reply paid portion. 20,000 copies only.
UY3/MR3	not acquired	1903	Liberty 2c in black with 2c replay paid portion scarce as many cards were destroyed as remainders. 20,000 copies only.