Kurt Gegenhuber, age 13, of Palatine, I11., for his question:

WHEN DID THE POSTAGE STAMP ORIGINATE?

Fast couriers and runners delivered letters as far back as 3000 B.C. But it took some years before the stamp came along.

The world's first public postal system was established in 1516, and it carried letters between Vienna and Berlin. But there were still no stamps.

The first stamps came along in 1840 in Great Britain. The United States issued stamps for the first time in 1847.

Austria became the first country to use postal cards, and this good idea was born in 1869. First regular air mail service was inaugurated in 1918. A regular flight between Washington, D.C., and New York City carried this special mail.