Weltraum / Alan B. Shepard - 7 stamps mint never hinged, catalog no. 972-78, Paraguay

The seven stamps for an American's first space flight were also issued in a small edition as an imperforate version, but in different colors. The four small-format nominal values with the Mercury capsule now have a gray background instead of a blue background, and the colored bar with the inscription "CORREO DEL PARAGUAY" was designed in a different color. The high nominal values ultimately differ in the background colors of the brand image, which is now turquoise green instead of dark blue.
Alan B. Shepard took off on May 5, 1961 on board the Mercury capsule MR-3 for the first American space flight. He was the first American in space. It was not a matter of orbiting the earth, as was the case with Yuri Gagarin, but of a ballistic flight. Shepard reached an altitude of 187 km with his spaceship, which he himself gave the name "Freedom 7". The whole flight took just under 15 minutes.