Special Delivery

What, exactly, makes "Special Delivery" so darn special?

Take a look at the first stamp. There's a motorcycle and the words "AT ANY UNITED STATES POST OFFICE." This can only mean that at every United States Post Office, there was a special Special Delivery delivery rider on duty, his motorcycle anxiously idling as he waited, waited, waited for a letter with a Special Delivery stamp to show up. When such a letter arrived, the rider tucked the Special Delivery correspondence securely in his leather satchel and sped off to the letter's final destination. At ten cents, this level of service would have to be considered a terrific bargain, even in nineteen-ought-whatsit dollars.

Sometime later, the cost of Special Delivery doubled and trebled. With this increase in cost, it is reasonable to assume that an increased level of service was introduced. Note that a Special Delivery letter is no longer simply brought directly to the addressee's door; extra care is now given to ensure that the letter is transferred directly from the hand of Uncle Sam to the recipient. We don't know if the motorcyle is still employed, but it would seem not. That is not the hand—or coat—of a motorcyle rider. The suit and shirt cuffs, along with the immaculately manicured thumb (see thumb below), lead us to believe that this is no mere mail carrier delivering the letter. No, this is a Postal Executive, who has taken time out of his busy day to make sure this Special Delivery letter gets Special Treatment.

The question we are left with, then, regards the difference between the blue 20¢ and red 30¢ Special Delivery service. Is the red Special Delivery service the really Special Delivery service? Is it a "Code Red" letter? When a red Special Delivery stamp shows up, does everything else down at the post office immediately stop while every attention is given to ensuring that this most special of Special Letters is dispatched with the greatest of haste?

It must be this: the red Special Delivery letter is delivered by an Executive Vice President, while the blue Special Delivery letter is carried by someone in middle management.

The feature of these last two examples that is really worth noting is the stamp on the letter on the stamp. It is the same stamp as the stamp itself. And if you could examine the stamp in an electron microscope, you would find that the stamp on the letter on the stamp of the letter of the stamp is, in fact, the same stamp as the stamp of the letter of the stamp of the letter of the stamp. This Escheresque phenomenon continues down to the cellular level, meaning that every Special Delivery stamp is actually its own infinite supply of Special Delivery stamps...

I think I'll stop now.