Ray & Helen St John Award
This award was established in March 1978 by the USS NATHAN HALE Chapter to honor Ray St. John, a long time USCS member, a past USCS president and director, USCS Historian and Catalog Business manager and a charter member and Vice President of the USS NATHAN HALE Chapter. At its meeting on April 6, 2000, the USCS Board of Directors (BOD) was advised that the Nathan Hale Chapter had approved presentation of this award as a USCS Service Award subject to conditions enumerated in the following. On July 6, 2001, the USCS BOD modified the official name of the award to Ray and Helen St. John Award to honor contributions of both to the USCS.
The purpose of this award is to recognize, over the long term, living individuals who have provided exceptional service(s) to the USCS or naval cover collecting. The required service shall have been sufficiently exemplary such that only a small percent of all USCS members will qualify. The length of service should be measured in years or decades.
Recipients of this Award:
Jim Russell (1977)
Tazewell Nicholson (1980)
Stan Honeyman (1982)
Robert Rawlins (1986)
David A Kent (1987)
Lorraine Kozicki (2002)
Richard Hoffner (2003)
John Young (2006)
Stewart Milstein (2008)
Phil Schreiber (2010)
Paul Helman (2011)
Steve Shay (2012)
Paul Huber (2022)
Richard Jones (2024)
Nominating and voting procedures:
Nominations for the Ray and Helen St. John Award (R&HSJ) may be made at any time to the Selection Committee Secretary. The nomination may be typed or handwritten, but must spell out in detail why the nominee should be considered for the Award. Nominations will be filed, and subsequently considered, in the order received.
1. Annually in December, a call for nominations for the Ray and Helen St. John and Annual Service Awards will be included in the USCS Log.
2. If, in the opinion of the Secretary, a nomination is more appropriate for one of the Annual Service Awards, the Secretary shall forward that nomination to the Annual Service Award Committee, copy to the sponsor of the nomination.
3. Annually by the end of February, the Secretary will submit one nomination, the earliest received in the file, to the Selection Committee. If no nominations are submitted and none on file, no Award will be made in that year.
4. The Selection Committee shall be composed of the USCS Vice President who shall chair the Committee, a member selected by the USS NATHAN HALE Chapter who shall act as Secretary and a member of the Board of Directors (BOD) appointed by the President. At least one member of the Committee shall be an R&HSJ Award recipient. If otherwise, the BOD member shall be replaced by an R&HSJ Award recipient. This requirement may be waived if there are no living R&HSJ members or none physically able to serve. The Committee should deliberate in person; however, a telephonic conference is an acceptable alternative.
5. The nominee, in order to be selected for the Ray and Helen St. John Award, must be unanimously elected by the Committee. The award will be announced and presented at the annual convention and publicized in the USCS Log. The USCS Public Relations Officer shall duly publicize the Award selection in the philatelic press.