The One-dollar Prexie
Twice Airmail to New Zealand
The airmail rate to New Zealand was fifty cents per half ounce from August 31, 1939 until November 1, 1946.
This cover was mailed from New York to Auckland, New Zealand at twice the 50˘ per half-ounce airmail rate on November 19, 1941. It was mailed too late to catch the California Clipper, which left San Francisco for Los Angeles on November 17, but in plenty of time for the Pacific Clipper flight leaving San Francisco December 1.
This flight departed Honolulu on December 4 for Canton Island, where it remained the night of December 5. Stopping at Suva, Fiji, the flight went on to Noumea, New Caledonia, leaving there the morning of December 8 for Auckland. Since by then the International Date Line had been crossed, this was the morning of December 7 in Honolulu. A notation in ink on the cover by its recipient, A. D. Baldwin, shows that it was delivered promptly: “Arrived Auckland Dec 9th – Japan Declares War.”
The tale of the historic round-the-world flight of the Pacific Clipper to return home is told in great detail in “Pacific Pioneers – The Rest of the Story” by Jon Krupnick. In effect, flight Captain Robert Ford was told on December 14 that he should not try to return via the Pacific, but go west until he reached New York. This he did, on a route through Australia, Java, Ceylon, India, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, the Belgian Congo, Brazil, Trinidad, and, finally, New York. Though unintended at the outset, the flight set a record as the first commercial flight around the world.
