The Postmaster General's Report for 1897 says:—
The contract with the British American Bank Note Company expired on the 22nd April, 1897, and a contract was entered into with the American Bank Note Company for the manufacture and supply of postage stamps &c. An estimate of the probable ordinary requirements for the next fiscal year and the comparison based thereon between the old and the present rates show that, under the new contract, stamp supplies will cost the department, say, $10,000 per annum less than under the old contract, a reduction in outlay of about 20%.
It is also noted that during 1896-7 electric cancelling ("mail marking") machines were introduced, six of which were rented and installed in the Montreal Post Office and one at Ottawa.
The reduction in the domestic letter rate from 3 cents to 2 cents per ounce is forecasted, as well as a proposed reduction from 5 cents to 2 cents per ½ ounce on letters between Great Britain and many of her colonial possessions. This will be more thoroughly discussed later.
Concerning the postal changes we have been considering the report says:—
Owing to the change of contract for the manufacture and supply of postage stamps, a new series of stamps became necessary at the begin
ning of the present fiscal year. New stamps ranging in value from the ½ cent to the 10 cent denomination (inclusive) were printed, and the first supplies thereof sent out to postmasters as the corresponding denominations of the old stamps became exhausted. A considerable quantity of the higher values of that series (15 cents, 20 cents and 50 cents) remaining over from the late contract, these three stamps continued to be issued, so that the department, previous to the introduction of the same denominations in the new series, might, in accordance with the universal practice, dispose of the old stamps in each case before issuing any of the new. The design of the new stamps is of a uniform character, and consists of an engraved copy (reduced) of an authorized photograph of Her Majesty taken during the Diamond Jubilee year. This, placed within an oval bearing the usual inscriptions, is enclosed in a rectangular frame, a maple leaf on a lined ground occupying each of the triangular spaces between the two frames. To conform to the regulations of the Universal Postal Union, the colour of the new 1 cent stamp is green, and that of the 5 cents a deep blue. This necessitated corresponding changes in the colours of the other stamps of the new series; for example, purple, instead of green, being selected for the 2 cent denomination, and orange instead of slate for the 8 cent.
The special delivery system was also introduced, and will be treated of later.
[141] American Journal of Philately, 2nd Series, X: 502.
[142] Weekly Philatelic Era, XII: 86.