years from 1848, he made and sold a series of postage stamps that today rank among the rarest of philatelic gems.

Experts estimate that there are no more than a dozen specimens of the original Perot stamp in existence. Collectors divide them into two classes: one printed in black, the other in carmine.

The birthplace of Perot's stamps was the building we know as the Perot Post Office on Queen Street.

Postmaster Perot issued the first Bermuda stamp in 1848 to end the problem of people posting letters for free.

At the time, it was the practice of people mailing letters to attach a single penny to cover the postage. Mr. Perot affixed a box to his office door where the public could drop letters and pennies in his absence, but he often found that the number of pennies did not tally with the number of letters, and of course he was unable to determine who had paid and who hadn't.

With his meagre salary, Perot knew he had to find a more satisfactory system, so he amended his office cancellation stamp to create his famous postage stamps, which he sold in sheets of one dozen for one shilling. Thus did Perot become the father of the British colonial postal system.

He also inaugurated the first house-to-house delivery of mail in Hamilton. A keen gardener, William Perot also spent a great deal of his time in the grounds of his Par-la-Ville residence (now the Bermuda Library), superintending the planting and nurturing of many fine trees, shrubs and flowers sent to him from the West Indies and the US by his sons.

Mr. Perot married Susannah Butterfield Cranberry Stowe and fathered 11 children, nine of whom survived. He died on a stormy Friday in October, 1871 at the age of 80 without knowing that he had made philatelic history. His remains are interred in St. John's churchyard, Pembroke.