James Aloysius Farley

According to Wikipedia, "James Aloysius Farley (May 30, 1888–June 9, 1976) was the first Irish Catholic politician in American history to achieve success on a national level, serving as Chairman of the New York State Democratic Committee, Chairman of the Democratic National Committee and as Postmaster General simultaneously under the first two administrations of President Franklin D. Roosevelt."

 It goes on to say, "Farley is remembered among stamp collectors for two things. One is a series of souvenir sheets that were issued at commemorative events and which bore his name as the authorizer. The other are twenty stamps known as "Farley's Follies." These were reprints, mostly imperforated, of stamps of the period, that were given to President Roosevelt and Interior Secretary Harold Ickes, both collectors, as well to special friends of the Administration. (Farley himself did not collect stamps.)

"When ordinary stamp collectors learned of this, they complained, and in 1935 many more stamps were reprinted for them, and it was established that new stamps had to be made immediately available to the general public. Today the souvenir sheets and single cutout reprints are not scarce. The original sheets were autographed to distinguish them from the reprints, and fifteen of them were displayed in an exhibit at the Smithsonian's National Postal Museum in June 2009."

Shown above, FDC with James Farley photo and one of the "reprints."

For more on Farley, click here.

To view "Farley's Follies," click here.