Dacic and Hill at the promotion of postage stamps dedicated to Tesla and Pupin

The Minister of Foreign Affairs of Serbia, Ivica Dacic, and the Ambassador of the United States, Christopher Hill, attended the presentation of commemorative postage stamps "Nikola Tesla and Mihajlo Pupin - our geniuses" at the Postal Museum today, Tanjug reports.

Director of the Post of Serbia, Zoran Djordjevic, ceremoniously presented Hill and Dacic with commemorative stamps with the images of the two scientists, symbolically on the day in 1918 when the Serbian flag was flown at the White House in Washington, thanks to American President Woodrow Wilson.

Stamps dedicated to Tesla and Pupin were issued to mark the centenary of the first publication of Pupin's Pulitzer Prize-winning autobiography "From Pastures to Scientist" and 125 years since Tesla's first public demonstration of radio control.

Hill thanked the Post of Serbia for commemorating Tesla and Pupin with commemorative stamps, "two great scientists, inventors, and engineers, whose genius deserved this honor."

"Tesla is now a household name in the USA. Every American knows who Nikola Tesla is, just as he knows about some of your basketball and tennis players. And Pupin did great things for mutual relations during the First World War. He brought Americans to help Serbia," Hill said.

According to his words, it was the relationship between Pupin and Wilson that led to the flying of the Serbian flag at the White House and the creation of great relations between the two countries.

Hill added that Tesla and Pupin remained an inspiration for the two countries on what to do next in the future.

Recalling Russia's "brutal attack on Ukrainian neighbors", Hill added that the US and Serbia should stick together as in previous difficult times, that both countries should be an inspiration to end the war quickly, and that there should be no others in Europe.

Hill assessed that the USA and Serbia had been allies in two world wars and that they should be allies in the future as well.

According to him, the existence of some complex issues should not be an obstacle to doing what is right.

Thanking the Post of Serbia for taking care of the great anniversaries of Serbian history, Dacic added that "the commemorative stamps are an important symbolic gesture" to Tesla and Pupin.

"We are promoting this edition today on the day when the Serbian flag was raised at the White House in 1918, which remained in the special memory of the Serbian and American public. This is not a fact that we have used too much and I even have the impression that we have forgotten it," Dacic said. 

Reminding that Wilson's decision did not apply only to the White House and that the Serbian flag was raised at all public institutions in the USA, Dacic said that during one visit he had received the American flag that had been flown at the Congress in 1918.

Dacic noted that after the First World War, Wilson had gotten his own street in Belgrade, which had been then "lost somewhere", and he pointed out that "it is a good initiative of the president (Aleksandr Vucic) to reassign the street to Wilson".

According to his words, the 142-year-old mutual relations oblige the two countries to work with each other, to improve relations and build partnerships.

Recalling that during the two world wars, the two countries were allies, Dacic expressed his belief that "wars must not be repeated", as well as that Serbia stood for peace and to become part of a united Europe.

Dacic added that Serbia appreciated the support of the USA in achieving those goals and hoped to have it in the future, while Tesla and Pupin "will forever be symbols of the partnership" of the two countries.

Djordjevic pointed out that the Post of Serbia had wanted to pay tribute to the two scientists, whose work had been a kind of "bridge between two people and a state", with commemorative stamps.

Hill and Dacic, accompanied by Djordjevic, visited the Postal Museum.

The artistic realization of the stamps was entrusted to the painter Boban Savic, the creator of stamps for the Post of Serbia.