The full ceremony of lighting the Olympic torch and the torch relay were first held in 1936. It was a very impressive performance. A young Greek girl dressed in a white robe lit the torch from the natural rays of the sun in the ruins of the Temple of Zeus. The day  the torch was lit at Olympia (July 20, 1936), the Olympic postal services used the first special postmark for cancelling correspondence. From the Helsinki Games (1952) the representation of the "sacred flame" became traditional on postage stamps. The motif became so popular that in 1956 the flaming torch became the main component of the emblem of the Games. Among the "torch stamps" issued for the 17th Olympic Games at Rome mention should be given to a Republic of Ghana issue. 

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