The No Fee Fish and Game Stamps of California
Fishing Stamps Issued
The California State legislature passed an act to amend the Fish and Game Code, as proposed by Assembly Bill 616, during the spring of 1957. It was approved by the governor on June 10 and put into effect on September 11 of the same year. By this act section 428 of the code was amended to require most anglers to purchase fishing license stamps (Statues of California, 1957 Regular Session). On December 27, 1957, the DFG issued the following press release: “Fishing licenses for 1958, and the new license stamps, are now on sale throughout the state at all license dealers…. All sports fishermen will require a basic sport fishing license, which will cost them $3.00 apiece [for residents], same as last year.
The basic license is good for fishing in ocean waters only. In addition, they will require one or two license stamps affixed to this basic license if they are fishing in inland waters. A license stamp will cost $1.00 and may be purchased at any time. California fishermen will need only one stamp on their basic license if they want to fish for steelhead and warm water species in inland waters (except for trout or frogs). They will need two of these $1.00 stamps if they want to fish for trout or take frogs. Each stamp must be permanently affixed in the space provided on the basic license and each stamp must be signed in ink by the license owner.”
The 1958 inland fishing stamp was designed by Paul B. Johnson. After attending the San Francisco School of Fine Arts on a scholarship, Johnson moved to Sacramento to work for the California Department of Public Works (DPW) in their Division of Architecture. Johnson, an avid sportsman, while working for DPW also served as a wildlife artist for the DFG. Johnson was commissioned to illustrate various DFG publications starting in 1953 (Outdoor California, 1971). Over the years he designed all of California’s pictorial fishing stamps, the state’s pheasant stamps and the first seven state duck stamps. I was fortunate to acquire Johnson’s original pencil drawing for the first fishing license stamp from Tom Richardson, a fish and game collector and dealer, in the year 2000 (see Figure 7).
Figure 7. Letter from Tom Richardson (left), the original pencil drawing made by Paul Johnson for California’s first fishing license stamp in 1958 (upper right) and a stamp signed by Johnson (lower right). Note that these images are not to scale.
The 1958 stamp featured a California Golden Trout, the official state fish, and was printed in shades of black, brown and salmon colored inks on white paper by the California State Printing Office (Vanderford, 1973). The stamps were issued in booklet panes of five (1 x 5) with a tab at the top and stapled five panes to a book (see Figure 8). They are rouletted 9 1/2 between stamps. Serial numbers were applied to the reverse of each stamp in black ink.
Figure 8. Booklet cover and pane of California’s first inland fishing stamp, issued in 1958.
Imperforate stamps exist that are lacking a serial number. These stamps originated from a large uncut sheet that once hung in the DFG Headquarters in Sacramento. The sheet was obtained by E. L. Vanderford, cut down into blocks and pairs and traded amongst collectors. Vanderford recalls that the sheet consisted of about 200 stamps and that a large portion was heavily creased (see Figure 9).
Figure 9. This block of six is believed to be the largest remaining multiple form the original uncut sheet that once hung in DFG Headquarters in Sacramento.
California’s 1958 inland fishing stamp is noteworthy in that it is the earliest state or local fish and game stamp to have a print made for it. Johnson had an edition of 85 signed and numbered prints published of the golden trout image (see Figure 10). In 1971 Johnson was also commissioned to produce the state’s first duck stamp and subsequently became the first artist to have a state duck stamp print published. Two editions totaling 650 prints were produced of his design featuring a pair of pintails.
Figure 10. California’s 1958 inland fishing stamp was the earliest state or local fish or game stamp to have a print made for it.
The fishing stamps were sold at DFG offices throughout the state. Stamps were also distributed to private businesses, such as sporting goods dealers, who served as bonded license agents. For the convenience of sports men who lived along the Nevada and Oregon borders, several out of state businesses served as agents.
The agents were allowed to retain fifteen cents per sport fishing license sold but received no compensation for selling the stamps. The balance of all license and stamp sales was to be remitted to the Fish and Game Commission “within ten days following the last day of each calendar month” (Statutes of California, 1957 Regular Session).
The total number of regular inland fishing stamps sold in 1958 was 1,882,631 (DFG Monthly Progress Report for March of 1959). For a breakdown of stamp sales by county, see Table I. The DFG received their operating money from the Fish and Game Preservation Fund and all monies received from license and stamp sales went into this fund (Oliver, 1990).
