June 3rd in stamps Jefferson Davis, Frederick VIII, George V

Here are some events that happened on June 3rd. It could be an event or a person that died or was born on that day


1808 Born: Jefferson Davis, American colonel and politician, President of the Confederate States of America (d. 1889)

Jefferson Finis Davis (June 3, 1808 – December 6, 1889) was an American politician who served as the president of the Confederate States from 1861 to 1865. As a member of the Democratic Party, he represented Mississippi in the United States Senate and the House of Representatives before the American Civil War. He previously served as the United States Secretary of War from 1853 to 1857 under President Franklin Pierce.

Davis was born in Fairview, Kentucky, to a moderately prosperous farmer, the youngest of ten children. He grew up in Wilkinson County, Mississippi, and also lived in Louisiana. His eldest brother Joseph Emory Davis secured the younger Davis's appointment to the United States Military Academy. After graduating, Jefferson Davis served six years as a lieutenant in the United States Army. He fought in the Mexican–American War (1846–1848), as the colonel of a volunteer regiment. Before the American Civil War, he operated a large cotton plantation in Mississippi, which his brother Joseph gave him, and owned as many as 113 slaves. Although Davis argued against secession in 1858, he believed that states had an unquestionable right to leave the Union.

Davis married Sarah Knox Taylor, daughter of general and future President Zachary Taylor, in 1835, when he was 27 years old. They were both stricken with malaria soon thereafter, and Sarah died after three months of marriage. Davis recovered slowly and suffered from recurring bouts of the disease throughout his life. At the age of 36, Davis married again, to 18-year-old Varina Howell, a native of Natchez, Mississippi, who had been educated in Philadelphia and had some family ties in the North. They had six children. Only two survived him, and only one married and had children.

Many historians attribute some of the Confederacy's weaknesses to the poor leadership of Davis. His preoccupation with detail, reluctance to delegate responsibility, lack of popular appeal, feuds with powerful state governors and generals, favoritism toward old friends, inability to get along with people who disagreed with him, neglect of civil matters in favor of military ones, and resistance to public opinion all worked against him. Historians agree he was a much less effective war leader than his Union counterpart, President Abraham Lincoln. After Davis was captured in 1865, he was accused of treason and imprisoned at Fort Monroe in Hampton, Virginia. He was never tried and was released after two years. While not disgraced, Davis had been displaced in ex-Confederate affection after the war by his leading general, Robert E. Lee. Davis wrote a memoir entitled The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, which he completed in 1881. By the late 1880s, he began to encourage reconciliation, telling Southerners to be loyal to the Union. Ex-Confederates came to appreciate his role in the war, seeing him as a Southern patriot. He became a hero of the Lost Cause of the Confederacy in the post-Reconstruction South.

US and Confederate States stamps depicting Jefferson Davis

1843 Born: Frederick VIII of Denmark (d. 1912)

Frederick VIII (Christian Frederik Vilhelm Carl) (3 June 1843 – 14 May 1912) was King of Denmark from 1906 to 1912. Before his accession to the throne at age 62, he served as crown prince for over 42 years. During the long reign of his father, King Christian IX, he was largely excluded from influence and political power.

Frederick became king of Denmark as Frederick VIII upon Christian IX's death on 29 January 1906. He was 62 years old at the time and had been Crown Prince for 43 years. In many ways Frederick VIII was a liberal ruler who was much more favorable to the new parliamentarian system than his father had been. He was reform-minded and democratically inclined. However, because of his very late accession to the throne he had only six years as regent and he was weakened by ill health.


On his return journey from a trip to Nice, King Frederick made a short stop in Hamburg, staying at the Hotel Hamburger Hof. The evening of his arrival on 14 May 1912, Frederick (incognito) took a walk on the Jungfernstieg. While walking he became faint and collapsed on a park bench and died. He was discovered by a police officer who took him to a Hafen hospital where he was pronounced dead. His cause of death was announced as a paralysis-attack. He was interred with other members of the Danish royal family in Roskilde Cathedral near Copenhagen.

Stamps from the Danish West Indies depicting Frederick VIII of Denmark

1865 Born: George V of the United Kingdom (d. 1936)

George V (George Frederick Ernest Albert; 3 June 1865 – 20 January 1936) was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 6 May 1910 until his death in 1936.

Born during the reign of his grandmother Queen Victoria, George was third in the line of succession behind his father, Prince Albert Edward, and his own elder brother, Prince Albert Victor. From 1877 to 1891, George served in the Royal Navy, until the unexpected death of his elder brother in early 1892 put him directly in line for the throne. On the death of his grandmother in 1901, George's father ascended the throne as Edward VII, and George was created Prince of Wales. He became king-emperor on his father's death in 1910.

George V's reign saw the rise of socialism, communism, fascism, Irish republicanism, and the Indian independence movement, all of which radically changed the political landscape. The Parliament Act 1911 established the supremacy of the elected British House of Commons over the unelected House of Lords. As a result of the First World War (1914–1918), the empires of his first cousins Nicholas II of Russia and Wilhelm II of Germany fell, while the British Empire expanded to its greatest effective extent. In 1917, George became the first monarch of the House of Windsor, which he renamed from the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha as a result of anti-German public sentiment. In 1924 he appointed the first Labour ministry and in 1931 the Statute of Westminster recognised the dominions of the Empire as separate, independent states within the British Commonwealth of Nations. He had smoking-related health problems throughout much of his later reign and at his death was succeeded by his eldest son, Edward VIII.


Stamps from Great Britain, Hong Kong and India depicting George V

June 2nd in stamps Ogata Kōrin, Italian Republic, coronation of Queen Elizabeth II

Here are some events that happened on June 2nd. It could be an event or a person that died or was born on that day


1716 Died: Ogata Kōrin, Japanese painter and educator (b. 1658)

Ogata Kōrin (Japanese: 尾形光琳; 1658 – June 2, 1716) was a Japanese painter, lacquerer and designer of the Rinpa school.

Kōrin is best known for his byōbu folding screens, such as Irises and Red and White Plum Blossoms (both registered National Treasures), and his paintings on ceramics and lacquerware produced by his brother Kenzan (1663–1743). Also a prolific designer, he worked with a variety of decorative and practical objects, such as round fans, makie writing boxes or inrō medicine cases.

He is also credited with reviving and consolidating the Rinpa school of Japanese painting, fifty years after its foundation by Hon'ami Kōetsu (1558–1637) and Tawaraya Sōtatsu (c. 1570 – c. 1640). In fact the term "Rinpa", coined in the Meiji period, means "school of [Kō]rin". In particular he had a lasting influence on Sakai Hōitsu (1761–1828), who replicated many of his paintings and popularized his work, organizing the first exhibition of Kōrin's paintings at the hundredth anniversary of his death.

Stamps issued by Russia and Japan depicting Ogata Kōrin's work

1946 – Birth of the Italian Republic: In a referendum, Italians vote to turn Italy from a monarchy into a Republic. After the referendum, King Umberto II of Italy is exiled.

An institutional referendum (Italian: referendum istituzionale, or referendum sulla forma istituzionale dello Stato) was held in Italy on 2 June 1946, a key event of Italian contemporary history.

Until 1946, Italy had been a kingdom ruled by the House of Savoy, kings of Italy since the Risorgimento and previously rulers of Savoy. However, Benito Mussolini imposed fascism after the 28 October 1922 March on Rome, eventually engaging Italy in World War II alongside Nazi Germany. The popular referendum resulted in voters favoring the replacement of the monarchy with a republic. Monarchists had suspicions of fraud, but were never able to prove it. A Constituent Assembly was elected at the same time.

The republic was formally proclaimed on 6 June 1946 days later, ending King Umberto II's brief 34-day reign as king. Umberto at first refused to accept what he called "the outrageous illegality" of the referendum, and took his deposition badly. In his last statement as king, Umberto refused to accept the republic, saying he was the victim of a coup d'état by his ministers and the referendum had been rigged against him. In response, Alcide De Gasperi who became acting president replied in a press statement:

"We must strive to understand the tragedy of someone who, after inheriting a military defeat and a disastrous complicity with dictatorship, tried hard in recent months to work with patience and good will towards a better future. But this final act of the thousand-year old House of Savoy must be seen as part of our national catastrophe; it is an expiation, an expiation forced upon all of us, even those who have not shared directly in the guilt of the dynasty".

Some monarchists advocated using force to prevent a republic from being proclaimed, even at the risk of a civil war, but Mack Smith wrote that: "Common sense and patriotism saved Umberto from accepting such counsel". Umberto rejected the advice that he should go to Naples, proclaim a rival government with the intention of starting a civil war in which the Army would presumably side with the House of Savoy under the grounds that "My house united Italy. It will not divide it". The monarchy of the House of Savoy formally ended on 12 June 1946, and Umberto left the country. Prime Minister Alcide de Gasperi assumed office as Italy's interim Head of State. At about 15:00 on 13 June, Umberto left the Quirinal Palace for the last time with the servants all assembled in the courtyard to see him off; many were in tears. At the Ciampino Airport in Rome, as Umberto boarded the airplane that was to take him to Lisbon, a Carabiniere grabbed him by the hand and shaking it in tears said "Your Majesty, we will never forget you!"

Italian stamps issued right after the referendum

1953 – The coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, who is crowned Queen of the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Her Other Realms and Territories & Head of the Commonwealth, the first major international event to be televised.

The coronation of Elizabeth II took place on 2 June 1953 at Westminster Abbey, London. She acceded to the throne at the age of 25 upon the death of her father, George VI, on 6 February 1952, being proclaimed queen by her privy and executive councils shortly afterwards. The coronation was held more than one year later because of the tradition of allowing an appropriate length of time to pass after a monarch dies before holding such festivals. It also gave the planning committees adequate time to make preparations for the ceremony. During the service, Elizabeth took an oath, was anointed with holy oil, invested with robes and regalia, and crowned Queen of the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Pakistan, and Ceylon (now Sri Lanka).

Celebrations took place across the Commonwealth realms and a commemorative medal was issued. It was the first British coronation to be fully televised; television cameras had not been allowed inside the abbey during her father's coronation in 1937. Elizabeth's was the fourth and last British coronation of the 20th century. It was estimated to have cost £1.57 million (c. £43,427,400 in 2019).

Stamps issued to commemorate the coronation of Elizabeth II by Great Britain and territories

June 1st in stamps James Clark Ross, Baudelaire, Emanuel Vidović

Here are some events that happened on June 1st. It could be an event or a person that died or was born on that day


1831 – James Clark Ross becomes the first European at the North Magnetic Pole.

Sir James Clark Ross (15 April 1800 – 3 April 1862) was a British Royal Navy officer and polar explorer known for his explorations of the Arctic, participating in two expeditions led by his uncle Sir John Ross, and four led by Sir William Parry, and, in particular, for his own Antarctic expedition from 1839 to 1843.

Ross was born in London, the nephew of Sir John Ross, under whom he entered the Royal Navy in 1812, accompanying him on Sir John's first Arctic voyage in search of a Northwest Passage in 1818. Between 1819 and 1827, Ross took part in four Arctic expeditions under Sir William Parry, and in 1829 to 1833, again served under his uncle on Sir John's second Arctic voyage. It was during this trip that a small party led by James Ross (including Thomas Abernethy) located the position of the North Magnetic Pole on 1 June 1831, on the Boothia Peninsula in the far north of Canada. It was on this trip, too, that Ross charted the Beaufort Islands, later renamed Clarence Islands by his uncle.

Stamps from Great Britain and French Southern & Antarctic Territories depicting James Clark Ross

1857 – Charles Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du mal is published.

Charles Pierre Baudelaire (9 April 1821 – 31 August 1867) was a French poet who also produced notable work as an essayist, art critic, and pioneering translator of Edgar Allan Poe.

His most famous work, a book of lyric poetry titled Les Fleurs du mal (The Flowers of Evil), expresses the changing nature of beauty in the rapidly industrializing Paris during the mid-19th century. Baudelaire's highly original style of prose-poetry influenced a whole generation of poets including Paul Verlaine, Arthur Rimbaud and Stéphane Mallarmé, among many others. He is credited with coining the term "modernity" (modernité) to designate the fleeting, ephemeral experience of life in an urban metropolis, and the responsibility of artistic expression to capture that experience.

Stamps from France and Monaco depicting Charles Baudelaire

1953 Died: Emanuel Vidović, Croatian painter and illustrator (b. 1870)

Emanuel Božidar Vidović (24 December 1870 – 1 June 1953) was a Croatian painter and graphic artist from Split.

Emanuel Vidović was instrumental in bringing the modern art ideas to Split. From 1900 he was an active member of the Literary-Art Club, and in 1907, together with Ivan Meštrović, he founded the Medulić Society. Though he had trained at the Academy of Arts in Venice, he never completed his formal studies, preferring instead to paint scenes of Venice – interiors, views of canals, lagoons and motifs from around the town of Chioggia. In 1898, he returned to his home city of Split, bringing new ideas of post-impressionist style light and intense colour. He painted plein air landscapes, and more stylized, larger canvases back in his studio. His early work contained literary allusions to South Slavic history and legends, in an art nouveau style. Later work would become darker, with brighter accents, and expressionist style black outlines around forms. His landscapes, and especially his later interiors of churches around Split and Trogir were well received by critics and the public.

Vidović was elected a corresponding member of the Yugoslav Academy of Sciences and Arts in 1949. He exhibited his work at solo and group shows within Croatia and abroad. For many years he was Professor of Drawing at the High School, and at the School of Crafts in Split.

In 1986, the Emanuel Vidović Gallery was opened in Split, featuring the life and works of the artist.

Croatian and Yugoslavian stamps issued depicting the works of Emanuel Vidović

Stamp swap sets

I did a couple of stamp swaps recently and enjoyed the stamps I received, the people that received the stamps from me were also very happy.

I decided to put together a bunch of lots with about 100 stamps each.  You can see the descriptions and pictures for these below

Just direct message me on twitter: https://twitter.com/stampioo with the lot that you are interested in

I am interested in the following

• Netherlands 1990 and later
• Great Britain any period
• Germany 2001 and later
• France 1980 and later
• Greece 1970 and later
• Europa CEPT any period
• Japan any period
• Stamps on Stamps.. any period from Europe, Japan, America (North and South)

All the stamps I offer are in good condition, I ask that the stamps you offer are the same, the lots I have are all 100 stamps or so, I ask that your lot is the same.

Here are the lots I have available for now, more will be coming soon



YUG01

A collection with some mint blocks and stamps, all stamps are shown in the picture below

DDR01  Gone

Small collection of East German stamps

DDR02   Gone

Another small collection of East German stamps

NL01

Small collection of dutch stamps These are shown on 2 images

NL02

Small collection of dutch stamps

AUS01

Small collection of Austrian stamps

AUS02

Another small collection of Austrian stamps

ROM01

Small collection of Romanian stamps

BULCZE01 Gone

Small collection of Bulgarian and Czechoslovakian stamps, some older stamps in this lot

May 15th in stamps de Keyser, third law of planetary motion, Pierre Curie

Here are some events that happened on May 15th. It could be an event or a person that died or was born on that day


1565 Born: Hendrick de Keyser, Dutch sculptor and architect born in Utrecht (d. 1621)

Hendrick de Keyser (15 May 1565 – 15 May 1621) was a Dutch sculptor and architect born in Utrecht, Netherlands, who was instrumental in establishing a late Renaissance form of Mannerism in Amsterdam. He was the father of Thomas de Keyser who was an architect and portrait painter.

De Keyser is famous for a number of important buildings which belong to the core of Dutch historic sites. Today the Zuiderkerk (1603-1611) and accompanying tower (1614), the Delft Town Hall (1618-1620), the Westerkerk (1620-1631) and Westertoren (built in 1638 but in a modified version) are among the historic buildings which provide important insights into De Keyser's work. His Commodity Exchange of 1608-1613 was pulled down in the 19th century.

Hendrick de Keyser's projects in Amsterdam during the early decades of the 17th century helped establish a late Mannerist style referred to as "Amsterdam Renaissance". The Amsterdam Renaissance style deviates in many respects from sixteenth-century Italian Renaissance architecture. Classical elements such as pilasters, cornices and frontons were used on a large scale, but mainly as decorative elements. De Keyser never slavishly followed the tenets of classical architecture as laid down in the Italian treatises. His version came to full bloom at the end of the second decade of the 17th century, and set the stage for the later Dutch classical phase of Jacob van Campen and Pieter Post. The East India House in Amsterdam was most likely also designed by him.


Stamps Issued by Sint Maarten commemorating Hendrick de Keyser

1618 – Johannes Kepler confirms his previously rejected discovery of the third law of planetary motion

Kepler's laws of planetary motion are three scientific laws describing the motion of planets around the Sun, published by Johannes Kepler between 1609 and 1619. These improved the heliocentric theory of Nicolaus Copernicus, replacing its circular orbits and epicycles with elliptical trajectories, and explaining how planetary velocities vary. The laws state that:

1. The orbit of a planet is an ellipse with the Sun at one of the two foci.
2. A line segment joining a planet and the Sun sweeps out equal areas during equal intervals of time.
3. The square of the orbital period of a planet is directly proportional to the cube of the semi-major axis of its orbit.

The elliptical orbits of planets were indicated by calculations of the orbit of Mars. From this, Kepler inferred that other bodies in the Solar System, including those farther away from the Sun, also have elliptical orbits. The second law helps to establish that when a planet is closer to the Sun, it travels faster. The third law expresses that the farther a planet is from the Sun, the longer its orbit, and vice versa.

Johannes Kepler (December 27, 1571 – November 15, 1630) was a German astronomer, mathematician, and astrologer. He is a key figure in the 17th-century scientific revolution, best known for his laws of planetary motion, and his books Astronomia nova, Harmonices Mundi, and Epitome Astronomiae Copernicanae. These works also provided one of the foundations for Newton's theory of universal gravitation.

Kepler was a mathematics teacher at a seminary school in Graz, where he became an associate of Prince Hans Ulrich von Eggenberg. Later he became an assistant to the astronomer Tycho Brahe in Prague, and eventually the imperial mathematician to Emperor Rudolf II and his two successors Matthias and Ferdinand II. He also taught mathematics in Linz, and was an adviser to General Wallenstein. Additionally, he did fundamental work in the field of optics, invented an improved version of the refracting (or Keplerian) telescope, and was mentioned in the telescopic discoveries of his contemporary Galileo Galilei. He was a corresponding member of the Accademia dei Lincei in Rome. 

Kepler lived in an era when there was no clear distinction between astronomy and astrology, but there was a strong division between astronomy (a branch of mathematics within the liberal arts) and physics (a branch of natural philosophy). Kepler also incorporated religious arguments and reasoning into his work, motivated by the religious conviction and belief that God had created the world according to an intelligible plan that is accessible through the natural light of reason. Kepler described his new astronomy as "celestial physics", as "an excursion into Aristotle's Metaphysics", and as "a supplement to Aristotle's On the Heavens", transforming the ancient tradition of physical cosmology by treating astronomy as part of a universal mathematical physics

Stamps from Austria, Germany and Hungary featuring Johannes Kepler

1859 Born: Pierre Curie, French physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1906)

Pierre Curie (15 May 1859 – 19 April 1906) was a French physicist, a pioneer in crystallography, magnetism, piezoelectricity, and radioactivity. In 1903, he received the Nobel Prize in Physics with his wife, Marie Skłodowska-Curie, and Henri Becquerel, "in recognition of the extraordinary services they have rendered by their joint researches on the radiation phenomena discovered by Professor Henri Becquerel".

French stamp depicting Pierre and Marie Curie

Bulgarian stamp depicting Pierre Curie

May 14th in stamps Louis XIV, Otto Klemperer, Frederick VIII of Denmark, Henri La Fontaine

Here are some events that happened on May 14th. It could be an event or a person that died or was born on that day


1643 – Four-year-old Louis XIV becomes King of France upon the death of his father, Louis XIII.

Louis XIV (Louis Dieudonné; 5 September 1638 – 1 September 1715), known as Louis the Great (Louis le Grand) or the Sun King (le Roi Soleil), was King of France from 14 May 1643 until his death in 1715. His reign of 72 years and 110 days is the longest recorded of any monarch of a sovereign country in European history. In the age of absolutism in Europe, Louis XIV's France was a leader in the growing centralization of power.

Louis began his personal rule of France in 1661, after the death of his chief minister, the Italian Cardinal Mazarin. An adherent of the concept of the divine right of kings, Louis continued his predecessors' work of creating a centralized state governed from the capital. He sought to eliminate the remnants of feudalism persisting in parts of France and, by compelling many members of the nobility to inhabit his lavish Palace of Versailles, succeeded in pacifying the aristocracy, many members of which had participated in the Fronde rebellion during Louis' minority. By these means he became one of the most powerful French monarchs and consolidated a system of absolute monarchical rule in France that endured until the French Revolution.

Some France stamps and a maximum card depicting Louis XIV

1885 Born: Otto Klemperer, German composer and conductor (d. 1973)

Otto Nossan Klemperer (14 May 1885 – 6 July 1973) was a Jewish German-born conductor and composer, described as "the last of the few really great conductors of his generation."

Klemperer studied music first at the Hoch Conservatory in Frankfurt, and later at the Stern Conservatory in Berlin under James Kwast and Hans Pfitzner. He followed Kwast to three institutions and credited him with the whole basis of his musical development. In 1905, he met Gustav Mahler while conducting the off-stage brass at a performance of Mahler's Symphony No. 2, Resurrection. He also made a piano reduction of the second symphony. The two men became friends, and Klemperer became conductor at the German Opera in Prague in 1907 on Mahler's recommendation. Mahler wrote a short testimonial, recommending Klemperer, on a small card which Klemperer kept for the rest of his life. Later, in 1910, Klemperer assisted Mahler in the premiere of his Symphony No. 8, Symphony of a Thousand.

Klemperer went on to hold a number of positions, in Hamburg (1910–1912); in Barmen (1912–1913); the Strasbourg Opera (1914–1917); the Cologne Opera (1917–1924); and the Wiesbaden Opera House (1924–1927). From 1927 to 1931, he was conductor at the Kroll Opera in Berlin. In this post he enhanced his reputation as a champion of new music, playing a number of new works, including Janáček's From the House of the Dead, Schoenberg's Erwartung, Stravinsky's Oedipus rex, and Hindemith's Cardillac.

Klemperer is less well known as a composer, but like other famous conductors such as Furtwängler, Walter and Markevitch, he wrote a number of pieces, including six symphonies (only the first two were published), a Mass, nine string quartets, many lieder and the opera Das Ziel. He tried periodically to have his music performed, as he had hopes of being remembered as a composer as well as a conductor, but found little success. His works have generally fallen into neglect since his death, although commercial recordings of a few of his symphonic pieces have been issued. Four of his string quartets and a selection of piano pieces and songs have been recorded in two limited edition CDs.

Berlin stamps depicting Otto Klemperer

1912 Died: Frederick VIII of Denmark (b. 1843)

Frederick VIII (Christian Frederik Vilhelm Carl) (3 June 1843 – 14 May 1912) was King of Denmark from 1906 to 1912. Before his accession to the throne at age 62, he served as crown prince for over 42 years. During the long reign of his father, King Christian IX, he was largely excluded from influence and political power.

Frederick became king of Denmark as Frederick VIII upon Christian IX's death on 29 January 1906. He was 62 years old at the time and had been Crown Prince for 43 years. In many ways Frederick VIII was a liberal ruler who was much more favorable to the new parliamentarian system than his father had been. He was reform-minded and democratically inclined. However, because of his very late accession to the throne he had only six years as regent and he was weakened by ill health.


On his return journey from a trip to Nice, King Frederick made a short stop in Hamburg, staying at the Hotel Hamburger Hof. The evening of his arrival on 14 May 1912, Frederick (incognito) took a walk on the Jungfernstieg. While walking he became faint and collapsed on a park bench and died. He was discovered by a police officer who took him to a Hafen hospital where he was pronounced dead. His cause of death was announced as a paralysis-attack. He was interred with other members of the Danish royal family in Roskilde Cathedral near Copenhagen.

Stamps from the Danish West Indies depicting Frederick VIII of Denmark

1943 Died: Henri La Fontaine, Belgian lawyer and author, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1854)

Henri La Fontaine (22 April 1854 – 14 May 1943), was a Belgian international lawyer and president of the International Peace Bureau. He received the Nobel Prize for Peace in 1913 because " he was the effective leader of the peace movement in Europe".

La Fontaine was born in Brussels on 22 April 1854 and studied law at the Free University of Brussels (now split into the Université libre de Bruxelles and the Vrije Universiteit Brussel). He was admitted to the bar in 1877 and established a reputation as an authority on international law. He and his sister Léonie La Fontaine were early advocates for women's rights and suffrage, founding in 1890 the Belgian League for the Rights of Women. In 1893, he became professor of international law at the Free University of Brussels and two years later was elected to the Belgian Senate as a member of the Socialist Party. He served as vice chairman of the Senate from 1919 to 1932.

La Fontaine took an early interest in the International Peace Bureau, founded in 1882, and was influential in the Bureau's efforts to bring about The Hague Peace Conferences of 1899 and 1907. He served as president of the Bureau from 1907 until his death in 1943. World War I convinced La Fontaine that the world would establish an international court when peace returned. He proposed a number of possible members, including Joseph Hodges Choate, Elihu Root, Charles William Eliot, and Andrew Dickson White. La Fontaine also promoted the idea of unification of the world's pacifist organizations.

He was a member of the Belgian delegation to the Paris Peace Conference in 1919 and to the League of Nations Assembly (1920–21). In other efforts to foster world peace, he founded the Centre Intellectuel Mondial (later merged into the League of Nations Institute for Intellectual Co-operation) and proposed such organizations as a world school and university, and a world parliament. In 1907, with Paul Otlet, he founded the Union of International Associations. He also is the co-founder of Institut International de Bibliographie (which later became the International Federation for Information and Documentation, FID) along with Paul Otlet. It was in this role that he and Otlet attended the World Congress of Universal Documentation in 1937.

Henri La Fontaine was a freemason, and a member of the lodge Les Amis Philanthropes in Brussels. He died on 14 May 1943 in Brussels.

Stamp from Belgium depicting Henri La Fontaine

May 13th in stamps Georges Cuvier, Ronald Ross, Giro d'Italia

Here are some events that happened on May 13th. It could be an event or a person that died or was born on that day


1832 Died: Georges Cuvier, French zoologist and academic (b. 1769)

Jean Léopold Nicolas Frédéric, Baron Cuvier (23 August 1769 – 13 May 1832), known as Georges Cuvier, was a French naturalist and zoologist, sometimes referred to as the "founding father of paleontology". Cuvier was a major figure in natural sciences research in the early 19th century and was instrumental in establishing the fields of comparative anatomy and paleontology through his work in comparing living animals with fossils.

Cuvier's work is considered the foundation of vertebrate paleontology, and he expanded Linnaean taxonomy by grouping classes into phyla and incorporating both fossils and living species into the classification. Cuvier is also known for establishing extinction as a fact—at the time, extinction was considered by many of Cuvier's contemporaries to be merely controversial speculation. In his Essay on the Theory of the Earth (1813) Cuvier proposed that now-extinct species had been wiped out by periodic catastrophic flooding events. In this way, Cuvier became the most influential proponent of catastrophism in geology in the early 19th century. His study of the strata of the Paris basin with Alexandre Brongniart established the basic principles of biostratigraphy.

Among his other accomplishments, Cuvier established that elephant-like bones found in the USA belonged to an extinct animal he later would name as a mastodon, and that a large skeleton dug up in Paraguay was of Megatherium, a giant, prehistoric ground sloth. He named the pterosaur Pterodactylus, described (but did not discover or name) the aquatic reptile Mosasaurus, and was one of the first people to suggest the earth had been dominated by reptiles, rather than mammals, in prehistoric times.

His most famous work is Le Règne Animal (1817; English: The Animal Kingdom). In 1819, he was created a peer for life in honor of his scientific contributions. Thereafter, he was known as Baron Cuvier. He died in Paris during an epidemic of cholera. Some of Cuvier's most influential followers were Louis Agassiz on the continent and in the United States, and Richard Owen in Britain. His name is one of the 72 names inscribed on the Eiffel Tower.

French stamp and FDC depicting  Georges Cuvier

1857 Born: Ronald Ross, Indian-English physician and mathematician, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1932)

Sir Ronald Ross (13 May 1857 – 16 September 1932) was a British medical doctor who received the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 1902 for his work on the transmission of malaria, becoming the first British Nobel laureate, and the first born outside Europe. His discovery of the malarial parasite in the gastrointestinal tract of a mosquito in 1897 proved that malaria was transmitted by mosquitoes, and laid the foundation for the method of combating the disease. He was a polymath, writing a number of poems, published several novels, and composed songs. He was also an amateur artist and natural mathematician. He worked in the Indian Medical Service for 25 years. It was during his service that he made the groundbreaking medical discovery. After resigning from his service in India, he joined the faculty of Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, and continued as Professor and Chairman of Tropical Medicine of the institute for 10 years. In 1926 he became Director-in-Chief of the Ross Institute and Hospital for Tropical Diseases, which was established in honour of his works. He remained there until his death.

Indian stamp and FDC depicting Ronald Ross

1909 – The first Giro d'Italia starts from Milan. Italian cyclist Luigi Ganna will be the winner.

The Giro d'Italia (English: Tour of Italy; also known as the Giro) is an annual multiple-stage bicycle race primarily held in Italy, while also starting in, or passing through, other countries. The first race was organized in 1909 to increase sales of the newspaper La Gazzetta dello Sport; and is still run by a subsidiary of that paper's owner. The race has been held annually since its first edition in 1909, except during the two world wars and the 2020 coronavirus pandemic. As the Giro gained prominence and popularity the race was lengthened, and the peloton expanded from primarily Italian participation to riders from all over the world. The Giro is a UCI World Tour event, which means that the teams that compete in the race are mostly UCI WorldTeams, with some additional teams invited as 'wild cards'.

Along with the Tour de France and Vuelta a España, the Giro is one of cycling's prestigious three-week-long Grand Tours. The Giro is usually held during May, sometimes continuing into early June. While the route changes each year, the format of the race stays the same, with at least two time trials, and a passage through the mountains of the Alps, including the Dolomites. Like the other Grand Tours, the modern editions of the Giro d'Italia normally consist of 21 stages over a 23 or 24 day period that includes two or three rest days.

The rider with the lowest aggregate time is the leader of the general classification and wears the pink jersey. While the general classification gathers the most attention, stages wins are prestigious of themselves, and there are other contests held within the Giro: the points classification, the mountains classification for the climbers, young rider classification for the riders under the age of 25, and the team classification.

Italian and San Marino stamps issued to commemorate the Giro d'Italia