Royal Mail rules out apple stamp
A request for Royal Mail to produce stamps celebrating the Bramley apple’s bicentenary next year has been refused.
Mrs Celia Steven is the great-granddaughter of Mr Henry Merryweather who was the first person to market Bramley apples commercially.
The Merryweather family, including Mrs Steven, is organising major events to celebrate the anniversary.
Mrs Steven, who moved from Southwell to Devon ten years ago, asked Royal Mail to issue stamps depicting the Bramley apple in 2009 when it will be 200-years-old.
“It is a great shame,” she said. “We could not have had better backing.
“It makes me wonder how they function and how you get something for the benefit of the community.”
Mrs Steven said the proposal had the backing of former Prime Minister, Sir John Major; the MP for Maidstone and The Weald, Ann Widdecombe; the Bishop of Southwell, the Right Rev George Cassidy; the MP for Newark, Mr Patrick Mercer; the MP for South West Devon, Mr Gary Streeter, and Southwell Town Council.
Mrs Steven said: “It would have helped the fruit industry as a whole and been a flagship for the country’s fruit industry.”
Mrs Steven said the apple was of great historical importance to Southwell and was part of her heritage.
She said to have the apple on a stamp would raise awareness of the bicentenary.
She said it would have been great publicity for Southwell and would have given the national apple industry a boost.
The chairman of Southwell Town Council, Mrs Beryl Prentice, said: “We are all deeply disappointed.
“It is a national apple and we really thought there was a good chance of getting a stamp.
“We do not get another crack at it because the anniversary is next year.
“It would have been really good for the town. We have the Bramley Apple Festival every year but next year is going to be a special one and a stamp would have been the icing on the cake.”
In a letter to the town council, Mr Russell Hawkins, Royal Mail’s product manager for stamps, said the number of subjects included in the special stamp programme each year was 11 or 12. He said they received 2,000 suggestions.
Mr Hawkins said the final choice was extremely difficult with so many worthwhile subjects to consider.
The original Bramley apple tree is in the garden of 75 Church Street, Southwell.
It was grown from a seed planted by a child, Mary Ann Brailsford. It produced its first fruit when the cottage was owned by Mr Matthew Bramley.
A gardener was seen carrying the fruit in a basket by Mr Henry Merryweather, the son of a nurseryman.
Mr Merryweather asked where the fruit was grown and then approached Mr Bramley and asked if he could take cuttings to reproduce the apple.
Mr Bramley said if the apples were ever commercialised, they should bear his name.
Fruit from the trees grown by Mr Merryweather was first exhibited before the Royal Horticultural Society in 1876.
The apples won a major award from the society at Chiswick Fruit Festival in 1883.