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featuring an Air Force X-7 research missile. Retail merchants also staged special sales.On the streets were stands, information booths, and Boy Scouts who sold red-andwhite felt pennants celebrating Operation Jupiter. Music was provided by a 30-piece Purdue Marching Band and Congressman Charles Halleck, the Minority Leader in the House of Representatives, came to town to make a speech and to dedicate a plaque at the Post Office honoring the 1859 flight. Other politicians showed up as well, including U.S. Senator Homer E. Capehart and Governor Harold W. Handley.For its Saturday, August 15 edition, The Lafayette Journal and Courier featured a banner headline%u2014%u201c%u2018JUPITER DAY%u2019 HERE MONDAY.%u201d That issue also contained a meaty 38-page supplement which covered all aspects of Operation Jupiter. It included extensive articles on the 1859 flight, the new stamp, the 1959 celebration, and numerous ads by local businesses, several of which were full-page in size.The release of the new 7-cent Jupiter commemorative Air Mail stamp was the centerpiece of Operation Jupiter. And, it was Austin Briggs, a Connecticut cartoonist and illustrator, who was its designer. His credentials included studying at the Wicker Art School in Detroit, advertising work, drawing the Flash Gordon daily comic strips after its creator (Alex Raymond) retired, and creating illustrations for Readers Digest and The Saturday Evening Post. He was also on the faculty of the Famous Artists School and was inducted into the Society of Illustrators%u2019 Hall of Fame in 1969.While Briggs was responsible for the design concept of the new stamp, William K. Shrag of the Bureau of Printing and Engraving simplified it somewhat. Schrage then submitted two options for final approval on May 19, 1959. One retained Briggs%u2019 vertical words on the left side of the stamp%u2014FIRST FLIGHT%u2014while the other used the words LAFAYETTE, IND instead. The second version was approved that very day.The new red-and-blue stamp measured 0.84 inches by 1.44 inches with Perf. 11 (11 perforations per every 2 centimeters). When all the specifications were finalized, a printing order was issued on December 18, 1958 for an initial run of 90-million stamps. The stamps were processed in June, and the first delivery to Lafayette was made on July 8th. Unfortunately, nearly 16 million stamps were imperfectly printed and had to be destroyed. Once released, the stamp was assigned number C54 in the Scott Standard Postage Stamp Catalog.On August 17, the very first day the Jupiterstamp was offered for sale to the public, tenyear-old Tom Sterner of West Lafayette was the first customer to purchase some from Lafayette postal clerk Herbert Anderson. Tom had been patiently waiting in line since the Post Office opened at 6:30 that morning. By the end of that day, 383,556 First Day Covers had been cancelled, and 590,137 stamps sold. At 10 a.m., and again at 3:45 p.m., Jupiter covers were dispatched by truck from the local Post Office to a Chicago Helicopter Airways%u2019 chopper, which carried them to a Lake Central Airlines%u2019 plane at Operation Jupiter felt pennant sold by Lafayette%u2019s Boy Scouts.