The cardiologist who told America to get up and move, from the Great Americans definitive series.

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

• Catalog Number: Scott #2170

• Denomination: 3 cents (3¢)

• Date of Issue: September 15, 1986

• Printing Method: Engraved (Intaglio)

• Perforation: 11.2

• Color: Bright Blue

• Subject: Portrait of Dr. Paul Dudley White, physician and cardiologist

• Format: Definitive single, Great Americans series

CONDITION ANALYSIS (Seller-Assessed)

• Status: Used

• Grading: Fine

• Postmark: Faint machine postmark of wavy lines across the upper design. The White portrait and  inscriptions remain clearly readable.

• Obverse: The engraved portrait, the vertical name inscription, and the denomination are all sharp and identifiable.

• Reverse: No original gum present, as expected for a used stamp. The paper shows light toning, with no tears or thinning visible.

• Centering / Margins: The design sits comfortably within the frame, with clear margins present.

• Perforations: Intact on all four sides.

HISTORY

Paul Dudley White was the physician who helped turn cardiology into a modern medical field and who taught ordinary Americans to think about their hearts before something went wrong. Based in Boston, he was a founder of the American Heart Association and wrote a landmark textbook that trained a generation of heart specialists. He was an early champion of the electrocardiogram as a diagnostic tool, at a time when the technology was new and unproven.

White reached his widest fame in 1955, when President Dwight Eisenhower suffered a heart attack while in office. White was called in as the consulting cardiologist, and his calm, plainspoken public briefings reassured a nervous nation and, along the way, taught it a great deal about heart disease. He used the moment to push a message ahead of its time: that regular physical activity, sensible diet, and not smoking were the keys to a healthy heart. An avid cyclist himself, he became a visible advocate for exercise decades before it was fashionable.

This small definitive, issued September 15, 1986, in bright blue, belongs to the Great Americans series and served as make-up postage. It is a fitting, low-key tribute to a doctor whose real monument is the now-familiar advice to keep moving.

STEVEN SAYS

White was Eisenhower's heart doctor after the president's 1955 heart attack, and he used that spotlight to preach something people were not used to hearing: exercise, eat sensibly, do not smoke. He rode his bike everywhere. Basic advice now, but he was decades early. Small stamp, big idea.