Front:
22
Big Brothers Big Sisters
CHIC
OCT
IL
1985
60601
Back:
BIG BROTHERS & BIG SISTERS
First Day of Issue: October 7, 1985
First Issue Location: Chicago, Illinois
For over eighty years, Big Brothers/Big Sisters of America
has been serving troubled children from single parent
homes throughout the United States. Around the turn of
the century, Ernest K. Coulter, the clerk of the New York
Children's Court, became concerned about the plight of
young offenders. On December 3, 1904, on behalf of
one particular boy, he spoke to a New York Men's Club
asking if there was any man who would volunteer to be
the child's big brother. Instead of one volunteer, Coulter
got forty . . . and Big Brothers was born. Even before
Coulter's historic plea, Catholic women had been be-
friending girls who came before the New York Children's
Court and they eventually became known as the Catholic
Big Sisters. By 1917, the national organization was
founded in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Although the Great
Depression saw the organization falter, it was revived
and officially became the Big Brothers/Big Sisters of
America in 1977.
No. 85-56
©1985 The Maximum Card Collection
A Division of Unicover Corporation • Cheyenne, WY 82008-0007
Original painting by John Benson.
An Official Issue of
Big Brothers/Big Sisters.
