A US healthcare magnate’s long standing love affair with Bermuda will go on display, starting tomorrow evening, with a trove of rare stamps and early postal artefacts at the Masterworks Museum of Bermuda Art.

The exhibition is part of a host of events celebrating the 75th birthday of David R Pitts, who will bring more than 200 guests and dignitaries to the Island over the coming week.

These include former Governor of Louisiana Charles Roemer and two bishops of the US Episcopal Church — plus Judy Faulkner, CEO of Epic Systems, last year dubbed “the most powerful woman in healthcare” by Forbes magazine.

“It’s going to be big,” said Mr Pitts’ daughter, Jackie Pitre, director of corporate services for Pitts Management Associates.

“He is a very big admirer of Bermuda. If he could move there and live there forever, he would.”

Not everybody gets the Bermuda Regiment Band to perform for their birthday; Mr Pitts’ 75th, on July 5, will also be marked with fireworks over Hamilton Harbour.

Hamilton’s Anglican Cathedral will be used for the Pitts Family Foundation Honours, as well as a Eucharist ceremony.

“Mr Pitts came to Bermuda maybe 40 or 50 years ago and fell in love with it,” Ms Pitre said. “That’s when he started exclusively collecting British colonial stamps, with an emphasis on Bermuda — anything and everything he can get. He loves Bermuda history, the people — everything.

“This is where he celebrated his 50th birthday and now we’re back for his 75th. We’re looking forward to the 100th.”

A dedicated stamp collector, Mr Pitts has amassed “what is now, undoubtedly, the most important Bermuda collection in existence”, said fellow collector and friend Horst Augustinovic.

Mr Pitts’ award winning collection includes two rare Perot stamps out of the 11 in existence.

“That’s just part of it — the exhibit goes back earlier, to 1620,” Mr Augustinovic said. “It will exhibit how Bermuda communicated with the world before there was actually a post office.”

The show of material, which spans 1620 to 1874, opens at 5.30pm tomorrow at Masterworks and runs until July 7. A private reception, exclusive to Mr Pitts and his guests but closed to the public, will be held on July 3 with a ribbon cutting by Governor George Fergusson.