About This Stamp
The U.S. Postal Service® continues to honor the sacrifices of the men and women who serve in the U.S. military with the issuance of the Purple Heart Medal 2019 stamp that depicts the medal suspended from its purple and white ribbon. The Purple Heart is awarded in the name of the president of the United States to members of the U.S. military who have been wounded or killed in action. According to the Military Order of the Purple Heart, an organization for combat-wounded veterans, the medal is "the oldest military decoration in the world in present use and the first award made available to a common soldier." Established by General George Washington during the Revolutionary War, the badge of distinction for meritorious action — a heart made of purple cloth — was discontinued after the war. In 1932, on the 200th anniversary of Washington’s birth, the decoration was reinstated and redesigned as a purple heart of metal bordered by gold, suspended from a purple and white ribbon. In the center of the medal is a profile bust of George Washington beneath his family coat of arms. The Purple Heart Medal 2019 stamp is a redesign of the 2012 Purple Heart Medal stamp and features a purple border matching the brilliant purple of the medal and its ribbon. Ira Wexler photographed the medal. William J. Gicker served as art director with Bryan Duefrene as designer. The Purple Heart Medal 2019 stamp is being issued as a Forever® stamp in self-adhesive sheets of twenty. This Forever stamp is always equal in value to the current First-Class Mail® one-ounce price.
Stamp Art Director
William Gicker
William Gicker served as Director of Stamp Services for the U.S. Postal Service from 2020 until his retirement in 2023. In that position he oversaw stamp development, stamp products and exhibitions, stamp manufacturing, stamp fulfillment, and the Postmaster General’s Citizens’ Stamp Advisory Committee (CSAC).
Gicker began working for the U.S. Postal Service in 1998. Initially assistant editor of USA Philatelic, the quarterly stamp catalog produced by Stamp Services, he soon became editor where he oversaw the catalog’s award-winning program until 2013.
Named creative director of stamps in 2001, Gicker became manager and creative director of Stamp Development in 2015. Working closely with Postal Service art directors and CSAC, he managed the creative development and quality control of more than 800 stamp issuances and 1,700 individual stamp designs.
He has served as art director for some of the most popular stamps issued by the Postal Service: the five-year Art of Disney series; Star Wars; Holy Family; Harry Potter; and Hot Wheels. As both art director and designer, Gicker lists among his many stamps, Holiday Baubles; the first international rate Global stamp in 2013; and the Gifts of Friendship joint issuance with Japan. He was also art director for the first stamp to celebrate Diwali, eight more Global Forever® stamps, and several Christmas Madonna and Child issuances, the most recent in 2024.
A native of Pennsylvania, Gicker graduated from West Chester University with a bachelor of arts degree in English Literature. He and his family live in Washington, DC.
Stamp Designer
Bryan Duefrene
Senior Stamp Development Specialist Bryan Duefrene enjoys the daily contact he has with the creative people involved in stamp design and the problem-solving challenges that arise on a regular basis.
Born into a military family, Duefrene spent much of his early life in Western Europe, principally in Germany. His family took advantage of living abroad by regularly traveling to surrounding countries where he developed an appreciation of other cultures and learned of their histories.
For college, he attended the Art Institute of Washington, where he earned a bachelor of arts degree in graphic design, summa cum laude. Upon graduation in 2006, he accepted a position as a graphic designer in the Corporate Communications Department of the U.S. Postal Service. He has been part of Stamp Services since 2015.
Duefrene redesigned the Purple Heart stamp, first issued in 2016, and was the art director and designer for the 2024 Thank You, Healthcare Community stamp.
He has lived in Washington, D.C., since 1996, and satisfies his love of travel with frequent trips to Wales and other parts of Europe.
Typographer
Greg Breeding
Greg Breeding is a graphic designer and principal of Journey Group, a design company he co-founded in 1992, located in Charlottesville, Virginia. He was creative director until 2013, at which time he began serving as president and continued in that role through 2023.
Breeding’s fascination with modernism began while studying design at Virginia Commonwealth University. His affinity with the movement continues and motivates his ongoing advanced studies at the Basel School of Design in Switzerland most every summer.
As an art director for postage stamp design since 2012, Breeding has designed more than 100 stamps covering a diverse array of subjects, from Star Wars droids and Batman to Harlem Renaissance writers and the transcontinental railroad.
His work has been recognized in annual design competitions held by Graphis, AIGA, PRINT magazine, and Communication Arts.
Breeding lives in North Garden, Virginia, with his wife and enjoys nothing so much as frolicking on the floor with his grandchildren.
Photographer
Ira Wexler
Ira Wexler, an award-winning advertising photographer, has been creating compelling images for more than forty years. A native of the Jersey Shore, Wexler has lived in the Washington, D.C. area since the early 1970s, working with clients such as Citibank, Coca-Cola, Exxon, Hilton Hotels, GlaxoSmithKline, Hewlett-Packard, Miller Beer, and McDonald’s. Prior to establishing his studio, Wexler was personal photographer to guitarist and singer-songwriter Stephen Stills of Crosby, Stills and Nash.
Founding president of the D.C. chapter of the American Society of Media Photographers and a national board member, Wexler is the author of The Business of Commercial Photography (Amphoto Books, New York) and is a frequent college lecturer.
Wexler's photographs appear on the Teddy Bear (1998), Purple Heart (2003), Hanukkah (2009), Purple Heart with Ribbon (2011), and Purple Heart Medal (2012, 2014, 2019) stamps.
Wexler lives on a mountaintop in Maryland near Camp David with his wife, Paula, and their three pugs.