Did you know that Norway once appeared on a U.S. postage stamp? That fact is both true and not true at the same time. The 1969 U.S. Christmas stamp was based on a painting named “Winter Sunday in Norway, Maine,” picturing a snowy scene of people on their way to church. The artist is unknown, but the original painting is in the collection of the Fenimore Art Museum in Cooperstown, New York.

The painting was found in a barn sale in Norway around 1940 and purchased by a Connecticut woman who was visiting the area. She paid 50 cents for it, because the seller felt all the value was in the frame. The woman collected so-called primitive paintings and this one appealed to her. A few years later, she published a book of American primitive paintings and included the one she purchased here. Because the painting didn’t have a name, she described it for her book as “Winter Sunday in Norway, Maine,” because she thought it might depict the town where she bought it. The name stuck.

Many people have debated what Norway view is in the painting, but there has never been a church like that in Norway, nor is the terrain like what surrounded any Norway church in the 1800s. It seems the artist created a peaceful scene that could be anywhere. The painting “Winter Sunday in Norway, Maine” isn’t a winter Sunday in Norway, Maine.