The chronology of presidents on U.S. postage begins with George Washington. Near the end of Washington's second term as president, Martha Washington commissioned the well-known portrait artist Gilbert Stuart to paint both her portrait and the . Stuart was known for the length of time it took him to complete a painting, and consequently neither the president nor his wife ever saw the finished paintings. The two portraits remained unfinished and tacked to a door in Stuart's Boston studio until his death in 1828. In 1860, artist Rembrandt Peale , filling in where this artist had left off. Stuart's portrait of WashingtonThis is Stuart's most famous and celebrated portrayal of Washington, known as 'The Athenaeum', which, was used to model the engravings on the U.S. one dollar bill and various postage stamps of the 19th and 20th centuries.Gilbert Stuart Birthplace and Museum Gilbert Stuart Biography became the model image for a good number of postage issues of the 19th and 20th centuries.
