The Story Of Mail Delivery
If you have a need to mail a letter, it is an easy task to do in
this age. And although we may seem to complain about the postage
rates, even once in awhile, it is by all accounts the most service
that we can get for the small fee that is paid, but the mail service
of today took many years to develop.
In early colonial days any person that had reason to post a
letter usually found that any type of service was irregular,
haphazard and in most instances, in private hands. Back then, for a
fee of just one penny, the colonists in seaport towns could post
letters to their relatives who lived abroad with the captains of
merchant ships.
Mail arriving in this country from Europe was left at
coffeehouses and seaport taverns for pickup. Most military letters
and documents were sent on naval vessels and entrusted to the captain
of the ship.
The first attempt to regulate foreign mail was made in 1639, when
the Richard Fairbanks tavern in Boston was designated the official
repository of mail going overseas by the General Court of
Massachusetts.
It was 1672 when an overland postal service between New York and
Boston was established. It was the first inter-city service in
Colonial America. Similar services and routes soon opened in the
Pennsylvania and Connecticut regions. Commercial activity and rapid
increases in population generated an increasing demand for postal
services. During 1693 mounted courier service was operating between
Portsmouth, New Hampshire and Philadelphia.
Benjamin Franklin who had served as Philadelphia's postmaster
from 1737, was appointed as the deputy postmaster general for America
in 1753. It was Franklin who made many fundamental improvements in
the colonial postal services, by personally conducting periodic
inspection tours, making new surveys and mapping shorter routes for
postal deliveries between stations.
He also introduced the use of stagecoaches as mail carriers,
milestoned main routes and scheduled runs by night between
Philadelphia, Boston and New York. By the time Franklin was
discharged from office in 1774, he had established post roads from
Maine to Florida and from New York to Canada.
It was on July 26, 1775 that Benjamin Franklin was appointed as
postmaster general by the Continental Congress. He served in this
capacity for a short time, until Nov. 7, 1776 when his talents were
needed elsewhere. Those talents would be used in drafting . . . . .
the Constitution of the United States.
Mr. Franklin was well aware of the importance of post offices and
the delivery of mail and saw to it that this vital system to a new
government would be protected. The Constitution of 1789 mandated the
establishment of post offices and post roads. Congress made the U. S.
Post Office a part of the federal government. President Washington
appointed Samuel Osgood as the first postmaster general. When Mr.
Osgood assumed office he had about 75 post offices and 2,400 miles of
post roads. Within a decade both numbers multiplied many times, as
had the postal revenues.
The earliest station within Lee County, Illinois, was Ogee's
Ferry, established in May of 1829 and later renamed to Dixon's Ferry
in November of 1833. Other stations soon followed, with names of Gap
Grove, Inlet, East Grove, Pawpaw Grove, Scottsville, Melugins Grove,
Winooski, Shelburn, Brookfield, Equator and Temperance Hill. And
still more were becoming quickly established in the once barren
county areas.
Rates of postage, except for newspapers, had always been high.
Postage for a single sheet letter sent more than 400 miles was 25
cents from 1816 to 1845. Letter carriers earned no salaries, but
rather were paid 2 cents by the recipients for each letter they
delivered.
In 1847 the U. S. Congress authorized the use of adhesive postage
stamps. The California Gold Rush during 1849 precipitated an urgent
need for transcontinental mails. Steamships, by way of Panama and
improved overland coach routes helped to reduce transit time to 20
days.
The Pony Express, which was a private venture during 1860 offered
10 day horse courier service between Saint Joseph, Missouri and San
Francisco. It was 2,000 miles but the 10 day delivery was half the
time taken by the Overland Mail Company. Fresh mounts for riders were
located every 10 to 15 miles at 190 way stations located along the
route. Mail costs were $5 an ounce. In October of 1861 when overland
telegraph connections were completed, it ultimately put an end to the
overland riders.
By 1863 postal rates had shrunk to 3 cents per half-ounce.
Additionally, the Railway Mail Service was established and remained
the most valued postal innovation until shortly after World War II.
In 1869 the railroad now provided 7 day mail service between New York
and San Francisco and by 1889 special trains moved transcontinental
mails in 109 hours.
Rural free delivery became permanent in 1896 on a nationwide
basis and in 1915 the automobile facilitated service and extensions
of rural routes, largely in response to demands by farmers. Airmail
was first tried in 1911. By 1924, New York to San Francisco air
routes were flown in just 34 hours. A national parcel-post service
started in 1913.
Through the years new innovations such as canceling machines,
mechanical sorting devices, zip codes and automatic address-reading
machines have helped in keeping the ever increasing flow of mail
moving steadily along. No matter what the weather, be it rain, snow
or sunshine, the mail gets through. What future developments lie
ahead in postal service? Only time will tell, but the outcome will be
just as interesting as its past history.
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