page_title: Postage stamps and postal history of the Canal Zone
section_title: 8-cent surcharge
hierarchical_section_title: Postage stamps and postal history of the Canal Zone / 1904 issues, third series / 8-cent surcharge
caption_attribution_description: English: Canal Zone-50/8c, 1904 Issue.jpg
context_page_description: Postage stamps and postal history of the Canal Zone is a subject that covers the postal system, postage stamps used and mail sent to and from the Panama Canal Zone from 1904 up until October 1978, after the United States relinquished its authority of the Zone in compliance with the treaty it reached with Panama.
  The Canal Zone was a strip of territory 50 miles long and 10 miles wide across the Isthmus of Panama, and was ceded to the United States for the purpose of constructing and operating the canal which connected the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. Upon the establishment of the Canal Zone in 1903, seventeen Post Offices had also been established and were operated by the U.S. Government. The Canal Zone and its post offices, with the main distributing office in Cristobal, operated as an independent government agency under the direct authority of the President of the United States. In the towns where there were railroad stations, the station agents of the Panama Railroad functioned as postmasters. Along with ships and freight, domestic mail and mail from around the world moved through the canal.
context_section_description: In December 1904 the Canal Zone postal authorities requested from Panama a supply of 8¢ stamps for to be employed as registration fee stamps. Panama at the time did not have an 8¢ denomination in its current series of postage, making it necessary to prepare an 8¢ surcharge stamp to existing stocks of postage stamps. To this end Panama used their regular 50¢ stamp from their current series of issues. The 8¢ surcharge was made in Panama on Colombian stamps already overprinted with a red colored bar and the word PANAMA and occurs in varying thickness and forms. There are three varieties of the '8' in the surcharge.
caption: 8-cent surcharge of 1904
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