Stamp Museum >> World Space Stamps >> US Space Stamps >> Viking to Mars Commemorative Stamp, 1978
The U.S. Viking to Mars Commemorative Stamp: 1978
Viking, 15 cents, Scott Catalog No. 1759, Issued in 1978
This mult-color engraved stamp was first issued on July 20, 1978, the ninth anniversary of the Apollo 11 lunar landing.
For further reading, see NASA's Viking: Mission to Mars.
The design of this space stamp is highly symbolic, not realistic. It does realistically show the Viking lander, but instead of a realistic Mars landscape, we see a portion of Mars as a globe. As symbols go, nice, but imagine a stamp with a realistic illustration of the surface of Mars...