An American History - Quinequine.org/USPS-pub100.pdf · An American History 1775 – 2002 3 O n July 26, 1775, members of the Second Continental Congress, meeting in Philadelphia,

The

UnitedStatesPostalServiceAn American History1775– 2002

T HE STORY OF THE UNITED STATES POSTAL SERVICE IS A STORY OF

TRANSFORMATION. Starting as an informal network that kept settlers andcolonists in touch with each other and with their homelands, America’s

postal system has changed to meet the needs of the nation it serves.

Postal history is a work in progress. It is an ongoing saga of enormousbreadth and depth, rooted in a single, great principle: that every person in theUnited States — no matter who, no matter where — has the right to equal accessto secure, efficient, and affordable mail service. For more than 225 years, theUnited States Postal Service has delivered on that promise, reaching further asthe nation has grown and moving faster as technology has developed.

Our universal mail system has strengthened the bonds of friendship, family,and community. It has encouraged civic discourse and advanced the spread ofinformation and educational opportunity. It has been a key element of oureconomy, both as the hub of a vital industry and as a trusted courier of thenation’s — and the world’s — business.

The story of the United States Postal Service is also the story of technology.Whether in transportation or in leading the development of new and betterways to process the nation’s mail, the Postal Service always has sought out thelatest and most effective ways to get the job done.

Above all, the story of the United States Postal Service is the story of menand women whose daily efforts have provided our nation with the finest andmost efficient mail service in the world. Each and every day, they keep the mailmoving, as they have for more than two centuries. Neither snow, nor rain, norheat, nor the winds of change, nor a nation challenged have kept them fromtheir rounds.

Our transformation will continue. The communications world has changedradically since the Post Office Department became the United States PostalService in 1971. Our ability to provide affordable, universal mail service foreveryone in America depends on our transformation. If our history has taughtus one thing, it is that the United States Postal Service is one of the mostadaptable organizations in America.

Please enjoy this history of the United States Postal Service. It’s a story thatwe will continue to write every day — together.

Sincerely,

John E. PotterPostmaster General

An American History 1775 – 2002 1

Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION 3COLONIAL TIMES 4THE POSTAL SERVICE BEGINS 6

Early Postal Legislation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6The Constitution and the Post Office . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7Ebenezer Hazard, Postmaster of New York . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7Benjamin Franklin, First Postmaster General . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8Abraham Lincoln, Postmaster . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9Other Famous Postal Workers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9

THE POSTAL ROLE IN U.S. DEVELOPMENT 10Alexis de Tocqueville . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .11

MOVING THE MAIL 12Steamboats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .12The Pony Express . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .13The Confederate Post Office Department . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .14Mail by Rail . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .15Owney, Mascot of the Railway Mail Service . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .17Star Routes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .18

REACHING OUT TO EVERYONE 20Free City Delivery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .20City Delivery Pioneer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .21Rural Free Delivery (RFD) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .22Postmasters in the Mid-19th Century . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .23

THE 20TH CENTURY 26Parcel Post . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .26Postal Savings System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .27Airmail . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .27New York to San Francisco . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .29Airmail Pilot Bill Hopson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .30ZIP Code . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .31U.S. Postage Stamps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .32

POSTAL REORGANIZATION 34Reform Proposal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .34Postal Reorganization Act . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .35

UNITED STATES POSTAL SERVICE 36Finances and Rates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .36Personnel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .36Labor-Management Relations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .36Transportation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .36Pay . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .37Postal Mechanization and Early Automation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .37Rates for Domestic Letters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .37ZIP+4 Code . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .39The Automation Age . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .40Beyond the Processing Plant . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .40The Postal Service Board of Governors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .42Governors of the Postal Service . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .43Citizens’ Stamp Advisory Committee . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .44

COMPETITION AND CHANGE 46Transformation Plan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .46Funding Civil Service Retirement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .47President’s Commission on the Postal Service . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .47Commission Members . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .48Industry Support for the Commission . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .48Dealing with the Unimaginable . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .48Medal of Freedom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .48Postal Insignia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .49

POSTMASTERS GENERAL 50STATISTICS: PIECES & POST OFFICES 52SIGNIFICANT YEARS IN U.S. POSTAL HISTORY 54RESEARCH SOURCES 56BIBLIOGRAPHY 58NOTES 60

2 The United States Postal Service


On July 26, 1775, members ofthe Second ContinentalCongress, meeting in

Philadelphia, agreed

That a postmaster General be appointedfor the United Colonies, who shall hold hisoffice at Philada, and shall be allowed asalary of 1000 dollars per an: for himself,and 340 dollars per an: for a secretary andComptroller, with power to appoint such,and so many deputies as to him may seemproper and necessary.

That a line of posts be appointed underthe direction of the Postmaster general, fromFalmouth in New England to Savannah inGeorgia, with as many cross posts as he shallthink fit.1

This simple statement signaled thebirth of the Post Office Department,the predecessor of the United StatesPostal Service and the second oldestfederal department or agency of theUnited States of America.


Colonial Times

18th Century TavernIn colonial times, overseas mail oftenwas brought to taverns and coffeehouses.

In early colonial times, correspon-dents depended on friends, merchants, and Native Americans

to carry messages among the colonies.However, most correspondence ranbetween the colonists and England, theNetherlands, or Sweden—their mothercountries. It was largely to handle thismail that, in 1639, the first officialnotice of mail service in the coloniesappeared. The General Court ofMassachusetts designated RichardFairbanks’ tavern in Boston as the offi-cial repository of mail brought from orsent overseas, in line with the Europeanpractice of using coffee houses and tav-erns as mail drops.

Local authorities operated post routeswithin the colonies. Then, in 1673,Governor Francis Lovelace of New Yorkset up a monthly post between NewYork and Boston. The service was short-lived, but the post rider’s trail becameknown as the Old Boston Post Road,part of today’s U.S. Route 1.

Governor William Penn establishedPennsylvania’s first Post Office in 1683.In the South, private messengers, usuallyslaves, connected the huge plantations; ahogshead (a barrel 43 inches high and 26inches in diameter) of tobacco was thepenalty for failing to relay mail to thenext plantation. As plantations expandedinland from port regions, so did thecommunications network.

Central postal organization came tothe colonies only after 1692, whenThomas Neale received a 21-year grantfrom the British Crown, whose settle-ments dominated the Atlantic seaboard,for a North American postal system.2

Neale never visited America. Instead, heappointed Governor Andrew Hamiltonof New Jersey as his Deputy PostmasterGeneral. Neale’s franchise cost him onlysix shillings and eight pence a year butwas no bargain. He died heavily in debtin 1699 after assigning his interests inAmerica to Andrew Hamilton andanother Englishman, Robert West.

In 1707, the British governmentbought the rights to the North Americanpostal system from West and AndrewHamilton’s widow. The governmentthen appointed Hamilton’s son John asDeputy Postmaster General of America.He served until 1721, when he was suc-ceeded by John Lloyd of Charleston,South Carolina.

In 1730, Alexander Spotswood, a for-mer lieutenant governor of Virginia,became Deputy Postmaster General ofAmerica. The appointment of BenjaminFranklin as Postmaster of Philadelphiain 1737 may have been Spotswood’smost notable achievement. Franklin,only 31 years old at the time, was a suc-cessful printer, publisher, and civicleader. He would later become one ofthe most popular men of his age.

Two other Virginians succeededSpotswood: Head Lynch in 1739 andElliot Benger in 1743. When Bengerdied in 1753, Benjamin Franklin andWilliam Hunter, Postmaster ofWilliamsburg, Virginia, were appointedby the Crown as joint PostmastersGeneral for the colonies. Hunter diedin 1761, and John Foxcroft of NewYork succeeded him, serving until theoutbreak of the Revolutionary War.

During his time as joint PostmasterGeneral for the Crown, Franklin madeimportant and lasting improvements inthe colonial posts. He began to reor-ganize the service, setting out on along tour to inspect Post Offices in theNorth and as far south as Virginia.New surveys were made, milestoneswere placed on principal roads, andnew and shorter routes were laid out.For the first time, post riders carriedmail at night to speed service betweenPhiladelphia and New York.

Thanks in large part to Franklin’sefforts, the colonial posts in NorthAmerica registered their first profit in1760. When Franklin left office, postroads operated from Maine to Floridaand from New York to Canada. Mailbetween the colonies and the mothercountry operated on a regular schedule,with posted times.

The Crown dismissed Franklin in1774 for actions sympathetic to the

cause of the colonies. Shortly after,William Goddard, a printer, newspaperpublisher, and former Postmaster, set upthe Constitutional Post for intercolonialmail service. Colonies funded it by sub-scription, and net revenues were to beused to improve mail service rather thanto be paid back to the subscribers. By1775, when the Continental Congressmet at Philadelphia, Goddard’s post wasflourishing, and 30 Post Offices operatedbetween Williamsburg and Portsmouth,New Hampshire.

The Constitutional Post requiredeach Postmaster to hire only reputablepost riders. Each post rider had to swearto secure his mail under lock and key.As for the Crown’s service, Goddardwarned:

Letters are liable to be stopped & openedby ministerial mandates, & their Contentsconstrued into treasonable Conspiracies; andNews Papers, those necessary and importantvehicles, especially in Times of public Danger,may be rendered of little avail for want ofCirculation ... 3

The Constitutional Post affordedsecurity to colonial messages and pro-vided a communication line that playeda vital role in bringing about Americanindependence. ■


Benjamin Franklinby Charles Willson Peale, 1787The last known portrait of Franklin.

Libr

ary

of C

ongr

ess

18th Century Post Route Map A version of this map appeared inHerman Moll’s Atlas Minor, published inLondon in 1729. The map’s legend,“An account of ye Post of ye Continentof Nth America,” describes weekly mailservice to and from the 13 PostOffices, including “the 3 Great Offices… Boston, New York & Philadelphia.”


Three weeks after the battles ofLexington and Concord, theSecond Continental Congress

met in Philadelphia in May 1775 toplan for the defense of the coloniesagainst British aggression and “totake into consideration the state ofAmerica.”4 The conveyance of lettersand intelligence was essential to thecause of liberty. A committee,chaired by Benjamin Franklin andincluding Samuel Adams, RichardHenry Lee, Philip Livingston,Thomas Lynch, and Thomas Willing,was named to consider the creationof a postal system.

The committee reported back toCongress on July 25, 1775. TheContinental Congress agreed to thecommittee’s recommendations on thefollowing day, creating the position ofPostmaster General, and namingFranklin to it. Richard Bache, Franklin’sson-in-law, was named comptroller,and William Goddard was appointedsurveyor.

Under Franklin and his immediatesuccessors, the postal system mainly car-ried communications between Congressand the armies. Postmasters and postriders were exempt from military dutiesso service would not be interrupted.

Benjamin Franklin served asPostmaster General until November 7,1776. America’s present Postal Servicedescends in an unbroken line from thesystem Franklin planned and placed inoperation. History rightfully accordshim major credit for establishing thebasis of the system that has well servedthe growing and changing needs of theAmerican people.

Early Postal LegislationIn 1781, Congress ratified the Articles ofConfederation. Article IX addressedpostal issues:

The United States in Congress assembledshall also have the sole and exclusive rightand power of … establishing or regulatingpost offices from one State to another,throughout all the United States, and exact-

ing such postage on the papers passingthrough the same as may be requisite todefray the expenses of the said office …

Postmaster General EbenezerHazard, serving from 1782 to 1789,created new east-west post routes as thepopulation expanded westward, includ-ing a route to serve the frontier town ofPittsburgh. Although he devoted mostof his energies to developing inlandservice, Hazard also reestablishedmonthly mail service to Europe, whichthe war had disrupted.

Authorized by Congress in 1785 to contract with stagecoach companiesto carry mail on heavily traveledroutes, Hazard established a regularmail route via stagecoach betweenBoston and Portsmouth. PresidentGeorge Washington criticized Hazardwhen he substituted riders on horse-back on some routes to improve serviceand reduce costs. Washington support-ed the use of postal allocations for subsidiary purposes and looked atcoaches as giving “a facility to themeans of traveling for strangers … acircumstance highly beneficial to anycountry.”5

During Hazard’s tenure the entirepostal headquarters staff consisted ofhimself, a secretary/comptroller, aninspector of dead letters, three surveyors,and 26 post riders. He wrote a friendabout his job’s demands:

… I have not had time for properrelaxation, and, in three years past, havenot been to the distance of ten miles fromthis city. I once hired a clerk, but found mysalary was not equal to that expence inaddition to the support of my family, andwas obliged to dismiss him.6

At Hazard’s suggestion, Congresspassed the Ordinance of October 18,1782, revising and codifying postal lawsand regulations. The ordinance gavethe federal government a monopoly onmail, restricted censorship to times ofwar or when specifically ordered by thePostmaster General or Congress, and

The Postal Service Begins


allowed post riders to carry newspapersat moderate rates.

The Constitution and thePost OfficeIn June 1788, the ninth state ratified theConstitution, which gave Congress thepower “To establish Post Offices andpost Roads” in Article I, Section 8. Ayear later, the Act of September 22,1789 (1 Stat. 70), continued the PostOffice and made the Postmaster Generalsubject to the direction of the President.Four days later, President Washingtonappointed Samuel Osgood as the firstPostmaster General under theConstitution. A population of almostfour million was served by 75 PostOffices and about 2,400 miles of postroads.

The Post Office received two 1-yearextensions by the Acts of August 4,1790 (1 Stat. 178), and March 3, 1791(1 Stat. 218). The Act of February 20,1792 (1 Stat. 232), continued the PostOffice for another 2 years and made

more specific provisions. The act for-mally admitted newspapers to the mails,gave Congress the power to establishpost routes, and prohibited postal offi-cials from opening letters. Later legisla-tion enlarged the duties of the PostOffice, strengthened and unified itsorganization, and provided rules andregulations for its development. The Actof May 8, 1794 (1 Stat. 354), continuedthe Post Office indefinitely.

The Post Office moved fromPhiladelphia in 1800 when Washington,D.C., became the seat of government.Two horse-drawn wagons carried allpostal records, furniture, and supplies. ■

Ebenezer Hazard, Postmaster of New York

Ebenezer Hazard was Postmaster ofNew York from October 5, 1775, untilthe close of the RevolutionaryWar, when he was appoint-ed Postmaster General.On November 14,1776, PostmasterHazard petitionedthe ContinentalCongress for asalary increase,noting his previousyear's salary was"by no means acompensation forhis services" due tothe extraordinary costsassociated with the war.7

Hazard hoped that his friend,the Reverend John Witherspoon, amember of the Continental Congress,would intercede on his behalf, andwrote to Witherspoon of the financialand physical challenges he faced.The general Hazard refers to isGeorge Washington.

I shall only observe, that the word‘incidents’ used in our quarterlyaccounts … certainly can mean

nothing more than those inci-dents which are usual in

time of peace; such asoffice rent, firewood,sealing-wax, etc., andcannot justly be con-strued to include theextraordinary expens-es occasioned by thepresent war, whichcould not have been

foreseen at the time ofthe institution of a Post

Office by Congress.… The necessity of

keeping the office near Head-Quarters arose from the importanceof the General’s despatches, and hisbeing near the centre of the Army,who are almost the only persons forwhom letters now come per post.The General has doubtless informedCongress of his different removals. In

each of these I have followed him;and I am sorry I have reason to say,that so little attention has been paidto me as a gentleman, or respectshown to the Congress’s commis-sion with which I am honoured, that Ihave been obliged to follow him onfoot. I do not mean even to hint areflection upon the General, whom Iesteem and respect. Furnishing mewith a horse did not belong to hisdepartment; but those whose busi-ness it was have not treated megenteelly. However, lest it should besaid that I was unfaithful in my office,and to convince his Excellency of myreadiness to oblige him, and servethe publick, I submitted to this indig-nity, and the fatigue consequentupon it, although it was not my busi-ness, as a Postmaster, to follow theArmy like a sutler.8

A sutler was a peddler who fol-lowed an army and sold to it.

StagecoachesBeginning in 1785, the ContinentalCongress encouraged the use ofstagecoaches to transport mailbetween Post Offices to subsidize thegrowth of stagecoach lines. Althoughmore costly and sometimes lesssuitable for mail transport than a rideron horseback, stagecoaches werefavored when awarding mailtransportation contracts until 1845.


Born in Boston in 1706, BenjaminFranklin left school at age 10 towork in his father's candle shop.9 In1718, Franklin apprenticed to hisbrother James, a printer and founderof Boston’s New England Courant.Franklin read voraciously, con-tributed anonymous articles to hisbrother's newspaper, and managedthe paper while his brother wasimprisoned for a political offense. At17, Franklin ran away and ended upin Philadelphia, where he found workas a printer. Franklin started his ownprint shop by 1728 and purchasedThe Pennsylvania Gazette. His wildlysuccessful Poor Richard’s Almanacksecured his fortune.

Postal Career BeginsFranklin was appointed Postmasterof Philadelphia by the British CrownPost in 1737. Newspaper publishersoften served as Postmasters, whichhelped them to gather and distributenews. Postmasters decided whichnewspapers could travel free in themail — or in the mail at all.

Postmaster General Elliott Bengeradded to Franklin’s duties by makinghim comptroller, with financial over-sight for nearby Post Offices. Franklinlobbied the British to succeed Bengerwhen his health failed and, withVirginia’s William Hunter, was namedjoint Postmaster General for theCrown on August 10, 1753.

Franklin surveyed post roads andPost Offices, introduced a simpleaccounting method for Postmasters,and had riders carry mail both nightand day. He encouragedPostmasters to establish the pennypost where letters not called for atthe Post Office were delivered for apenny. Remembering his experiencewith the Gazette, Franklin mandateddelivery of all newspapers for a smallfee. His efforts contributed to theCrown’s first North American profit in1760.

In 1757, while serving as jointPostmaster General, Franklin went toLondon to represent Pennsylvania’sgovernment. In 1763, back in thecolonies, he traveled 1,600 miles sur-

veying post roads and Post Officesfrom Virginia to New England.

In 1764, Franklin returned toLondon, where he represented theinterests of several colonial govern-ments. In 1774, judged too sympa-thetic to the colonies, he was dis-missed as joint Postmaster General.

First Postmaster General underthe Continental CongressBack on American soil in 1775,Franklin served as a member of theSecond Continental Congress,which appointed him PostmasterGeneral on July 26 of that year. Withan annual salary of $1,000 and $340for a secretary and comptroller,Franklin was responsible for all PostOffices from Massachusetts toGeorgia and had authority to hirePostmasters as necessary.

Founding Father of a New NationIn 1776, Franklin worked with thecommittee that created the Declarationof Independence, then left for Paris tosecure French support for the war withEngland. The treaty of alliance henegotiated in 1778 was vital to thesuccess of the American Revolution.Later, Franklin helped negotiate thepeace treaty with Great Britain.

Franklin returned to Philadelphia in1785. He attended the ConstitutionalConvention in 1787 and lived to seethe Constitution adopted. He diedApril 17, 1790.

Franklin was a postal pioneer, print-er, writer, statesman, diplomat, civicleader, scientist, and inventor. Hehelped establish a library, fire company,academy, philosophical society, militia,hospital, and better streets and streetlighting in Philadelphia. His scientificcontributions included a study of elec-tricity and lightning, theories of heatabsorption, measurement of the GulfStream, and invention of the lightningrod, bifocals, and the Franklin stove.

Biographer Carl Van Doren wrote:

In any age, in any place, Franklinwould have been great … (N)umer-ous as his achievements were, theywere less than he was.10

Benjamin Franklin, First PostmasterGeneral

Two Postmasters became U.S.Presidents later in their careers —Abraham Lincoln and Harry Truman.Truman held the title and signedpapers but immediately turned theposition and its pay over to an assis-tant. Lincoln was the only Presidentwho had served as a Postmaster.

On May 7, 1833, 24-year-oldLincoln was appointed Postmaster ofNew Salem, Illinois. Lincoln serveduntil the office was closed May 30,1836. The United States OfficialRegister, published in odd-numberedyears, dutifully records A. Lincoln asreceiving compensation of $55.70 inthe 1835 volume and $19.48 for onequarter's work in the 1837 volume.Besides his pay, Lincoln, asPostmaster, could send and receivepersonal letters free and get onedaily newspaper delivered free.

Mail arrived once a week. If anaddressee did not collect his or hermail from the Post Office, as was thecustom, Lincoln delivered it personally— usually carrying the mail in his hat.Even then, Lincoln was “Honest Abe.”

According to Lincoln’s biographer,Benjamin P. Thomas:

Dr. A. G. Henry, one of Lincoln'sclosest friends, and himself postmas-ter for a time at Sangamontown, toldIsaac N. Arnold that when the NewSalem office was discontinued Lincolnhad on hand a balance of some six-teen or eighteen dollars which hebrought with him to Springfield.Perhaps the Post Office Departmentoverlooked this small sum, for not untilmonths later did an agent call onLincoln to collect it. During the inter-vening time Lincoln had been financial-ly hard-pressed, and Dr. Henry, whowas present when the agent called,was afraid that Lincoln might not havethe money. Henry told Arnold:

“I was about to call him asideand loan him the money, when heasked the agent to be seated amoment, while he went over tohis trunk at his boarding house,and returned with an old bluesock with a quantity of silver andcopper coin tied up in it. Untying

the sock, he poured the contentson the table and proceeded tocount the coin, which consistedof such silver and copper piecesas the country-people were thenin the habit of using in payingpostage. On counting it up therewas found the exact amount, to acent, of the draft, and in the iden-tical coin which had beenreceived. He never used, underany circumstances, trust funds.”11

Lithographed and publishedby Edw. Mendel.

Abraham Lincoln, Postmaster


John BrownAbolitionist, Postmaster, Randolph, PA

Bing CrosbySinger and actor, clerk, Spokane, WA

Walt DisneyProducer, substitute carrier, Chicago, IL

Charles R. DrewScientist and surgeon, part-time special

delivery messenger, Washington, D.C.

William FaulknerNovelist, Postmaster, University, MS

Samuel L. GravelyFirst African-American admiral, railway mail

clerk

Will HaysPresident, Motion Picture Producers and

Distributors of America, PostmasterGeneral

Sherman HemsleyActor, clerk, Philadelphia, PA, and

New York, NY

Conrad HiltonBusinessman, Postmaster, San Antonio, NM

Harry HooperBaseball Hall-of-Famer, Postmaster,

Capitola, CA

Rock HudsonActor, letter carrier, Winnetka, IL

Sidney LanierPoet, clerk, Macon, GA

Charles LindberghAviator, contract airmail pilot

Bill NyeHumorist, Postmaster, Laramie, WY

Knute RockneFootball coach, clerk, Chicago, IL

Adlai E. StevensonVice President, First Assistant

Postmaster General

Noah WebsterLexicographer, special agent

Richard Wright Author, substitute clerk, Chicago, IL

Other Famous Postal Workers

Libr

ary

of C

ongr

ess


The Postal Role in U.S. Development

The 19th century saw the growthof the United States. The PostOffice Department, the commu-

nications system that helped bind thenation together, developed new servicesthat have lasted into the 21st centuryand subsidized development of everymajor form of transportation.

Between 1789, when the federal gov-ernment began operations, and 1861,when civil war broke out, the UnitedStates grew dramatically. Its territoryextended into the Midwest in 1787through the Northwest Ordinance,reached down the Mississippi River andwest to the Rocky Mountains after theLouisiana Purchase in 1803, andstretched to the Pacific coast by the1840s. The country’s population grewfrom 3.9 million people in 1790 to31.4 million in 1860.

The Post Office Department grewtoo. The number of Post Officesincreased from 75 in 1790 to 28,498in 1860. By the end of 1819, theDepartment served citizens in 22states, including the newest states ofIllinois (1818) and Alabama (1819). The

number of post roads (roads on whichmail travels) increased from 59,473 milesat the beginning of 1819 to 84,860 bythe end of 1823.

These new territories and states, aswell as established communities,pressed the Post Office Department formore routes and faster delivery. TheDepartment met these needs, expand-ing its service and developing ways tomove mail more quickly. By 1822, ittook only 11 days to move mailbetween Washington, D.C., andNashville, Tennessee.

In 1828, there were 7,530 PostOffices and 29,956 postal employees,mail contractors, and carriers, makingthe Department the largest employer inthe Executive Branch. Because theDepartment awarded a large number ofjobs and contracts, the PostmasterGeneral’s power grew as well. PresidentAndrew Jackson recognized the poten-tial for patronage and, in 1829, invitedWilliam T. Barry of Kentucky tobecome the first Postmaster General tosit as a member of the President’sCabinet. Barry’s predecessor, John

The United States in 1857

McLean of Ohio, had been the firstPostmaster General to refer to the PostOffice, or General Post Office as itsometimes was called, as the PostOffice Department, but the organiza-tion was not specifically established asan executive department by Congressuntil June 8, 1872 (17 Stat. 283).

An Office of Instructions and MailDepredations was established in 1830as the investigative and inspectionbranch of the Post Office Department.The head of that office, Preston S.Loughborough, is considered the firstChief Postal Inspector. PostalInspectors have safeguarded the sancti-ty of the U.S. Mail and protectedpostal employees, property, and rev-enue for two centuries, investigatingcrimes such as robberies, mail theft,and fraud.

By 1831, postal employees account-ed for 76 percent of the civilian federalworkforce. Postmasters outnumberedsoldiers 8,764 to 6,332 and were themost widespread representatives of thefederal government.

As the country grew, people in newstates and territories petitioned Congressfor even more post routes, regardless oftheir cost or profitability. The PostOffice Department, and thus the federalgovernment, had to decide whether to

subsidize routes that promoted settle-ment but did not generate enoughrevenue to pay for themselves or tooperate in the black. The Departmentstruggled with this issue. With congres-sional support and keeping fiscalresponsibility firmly in mind, theDepartment ultimately made decisionsin the 19th century that reflected publicservice as its highest aim. It funded postroutes that supported national develop-ment and instituted services to benefitall residents of the country.

The Post Office Department alsosimplified rates in the middle of the19th century. Before that time, postagewas based on the number of sheets in aletter and the distance a letter traveled.Families, friends, or businesses furtherdistant paid more to keep in touch. Forinstance, from 1799 to 1815, it cost:

8 cents/sheet sent 40 miles or less

10 cents/sheet sent 41 to 90 miles

12 1/2 cents/sheet sent 91 to 150 miles



25 cents/sheet sent more than 500 miles

In 1845, the Department begancharging rates essentially based onweight and whether a letter was goingmore or less than 300 miles. In 1855,the rate structure was three cents for aletter weighing a half-ounce and travel-ing up to 3,000 miles, which includedmost of the United States and its territo-ries. Letters going farther than 3,000miles were charged postage of 10 centsper sheet.

The Act of March 3, 1863 (12 Stat.704), based postage for a letter on itsweight and eliminated all differencesbased on distance, thus providing uni-versal service to customers no matterwhere they lived in the country.

The act also created three classesof mail: First-Class Mail, whichembraced letters; second-class mail,which covered publications issued at reg-ular periods; and third-class mail, whichincluded all other mailable matter. ■

Alexis deTocqueville

In 1831, Frenchman Alexis deTocqueville began his travels inAmerica, a journey that led to hisclassic book, Democracy inAmerica. He wrote of the mail:

I traveled along a portion ofthe frontier of the United Statesin a sort of cart, which wastermed the mail. Day and nightwe passed with great rapidityalong the roads, which werescarcely marked out throughimmense forests. When thegloom of the woods becameimpenetrable, the driver lightedbranches of pine, and we jour-neyed along by the light theycast. From time to time wecame to a hut in the midst ofthe forest; this was a post-office. The mail dropped anenormous bundle of letters atthe door of this isolateddwelling, and we pursued ourway at full gallop, leaving theinhabitants of the neighboringlog houses to send for theirshare of the treasure.12


Libr

ary

of C

ongr

ess


Moving the Mail

SteamboatsIn 1811, cutting-edge technology metup with the nation’s mail system, andthere was no looking back. Fast-movingsteamboats began traveling the rivers,replacing packet boats, rowboats, andrafts as a means to carry mail.

Beginning in 1815, managers ofsteamboats and other craft had todeliver the letters and packets they car-ried to local Postmasters within 3 hoursof docking in daylight or 2 hours aftersunrise the following day. By the1820s, more than 200 steamboats regu-larly served river communities, and thePost Office Department issued con-tracts for these vessels to carry mail. In1823, Congress declared waterways tobe post roads. Use of steamboats tocarry mail peaked in 1853 prior to theexpansion of railroads.

Even before gold was discovered inCalifornia in 1848, the Post OfficeDepartment had awarded contracts totwo steamship companies to carry mailbetween New York and California. Theaim was to get a letter from the EastCoast to California in 3 to 4 weeks,but this goal often was missed. Mailtraveled by ship from New York toPanama, moved across Panama bycanoes and mules, then went on to SanFrancisco by ship. When the PanamaRailroad was completed in 1855, it

eased transit across the isthmus, but aspeedier method was needed to movemail.

As early as 1848, some overland mailreached California, if erratically, via themilitary. Scheduled, semiweekly over-land service began September 15, 1858,with a contract to John Butterfield’sOverland Mail Company, using the2,800-mile southern stage route betweenTipton, Missouri, and San Francisco.The specified running time was 24 days,but it often took months.

Californians felt their isolation. Forexample, Los Angeles learnedCalifornia was admitted to the Union 6 weeks after the fact. Three years later,an article attributed to the Los AngelesStar (October 1, 1853) asked its readers:

Can somebody tell us what has become ofthe U.S. mail for this section of the world?Some four weeks since it has arrived here. Themail rider comes and goes regularly enough,but the mailbags do not. One time he says themail is not landed in San Diego; anothertime there was so much of it the donkey couldnot bring it, and he sent it to San Pedro onthe steamer — which carried it up to SanFrancisco. Thus it goes wandering up anddown the ocean …

Faster transportation to the Pacificcoast was needed.

SteamboatCarrying mail, passengers, and freight,the “City of Providence” traveled theMississippi River from St. Louis toNew Orleans from 1880 to 1894.

E. B. and N. Philip Norman Collection, Mss. 1084, Louisiana and Lower Mississippi Valley Collections, LSU Libraries,Baton Rouge, LA


The Pony ExpressThe Pony Express rider gallopingacross the Plains and through far-flungsettlements holds a permanent placein the American imagination eventhough the Pony Express ran for only18 months, from April 1860 toOctober 1861.

The Pony ExpressAmerican transportation pioneerWilliam H. Russell advertised forhostlers and riders to work on theOverland Express Route via Salt LakeCity in March 1860.

Russell had failed repeatedly to getthe backing of the Senate Post Officeand Post Roads Committee for anexpress route to carry mail betweenSt. Joseph, Missouri — the westernmostpoint reached by the railroad andtelegraph — and California. St. Josephwas the starting point for the nearly2,000-mile central route to the West.Except for a few forts and settlements,the route beyond St. Joseph was a vast,unknown land, inhabited primarily byNative Americans.

Many thought that year-round trans-portation across this area was impossiblebecause of extreme weather conditions.Russell organized his own express toprove otherwise.

With partners Alexander Majors andWilliam B. Waddell, Russell formed theCentral Overland California and Pike’sPeak Express Company. They built newrelay stations and readied existing ones.The country was combed for good hors-es — hardy enough to challenge deserts

and mountains and to withstand thirstin summer and ice in winter. Riderswere recruited hastily but, before beinghired, had to swear on a Bible not tocuss, fight, or abuse their animals and toconduct themselves honestly.

On April 3, 1860, the Pony Expressbegan its run through parts of Missouri,Kansas, Nebraska, Colorado, Wyoming,Utah, Nevada, and California. On aver-age, a rider covered 75 to 100 milesdaily. He changed horses at relay stationsset 10 to 15 miles apart, swiftly transfer-ring himself and his mochila (a saddlecover with four pockets or cantinas formail) to the new mount.

The first mail by Pony Express fromSt. Joseph to Sacramento took 10 days,cutting the overland stage time via thesouthern route by more than half. Thefastest delivery was in March 1861,when President Abraham Lincoln’sinaugural address was carried fromSt. Joseph to Sacramento in 7 days and17 hours.

On July 1, 1861, the Pony Expressbegan operating under contract as amail route. The Pony Express officiallyended October 26, 1861, after thetranscontinental telegraph line was com-pleted, and became an enduring legend.


The DeWitt ClintonThe DeWitt Clinton, the first train in New York to carry passengersand one of the first locomotives built in the United States, ranfrom Albany to Schenectady, a 17-mile distance, in less than anhour on August 9, 1831. The Post Office Department was quickto use this new technology to move mail.

The Post Office Department of theConfederate States of America wasestablished February 21, 1861, byan Act of the Provisional Congressof the Confederate States. OnMarch 6, 1861, the day afterMontgomery Blair's appointment byPresident Abraham Lincoln asPostmaster General of the UnitedStates, former U.S. CongressmanJohn Henninger Reagan wasappointed Postmaster General ofthe Confederate States of Americaby Jefferson Davis, President of theConfederate States.

South Carolina, Mississippi,Florida, Alabama, Georgia,Louisiana, and Texas already hadseceded from the Union. In the fol-lowing months, Virginia, Arkansas,North Carolina, and most ofTennessee followed suit. Reaganinstructed southern Postmasters tocontinue to render their accounts tothe United States as before until theConfederate postal system wasorganized. Meanwhile, he sent joboffers to southern men in the PostOffice Department in Washington.

Many accepted and brought alongtheir expertise, as well as copies ofpostal reports, forms in use, postalmaps, and other supplies.

In May 1861, Reagan issued aproclamation stating that he officiallywould assume control of the PostOffice Department of theConfederate States on June 1, 1861.Postmaster General Blair respondedby ordering the cessation of UnitedStates mail service throughout theSouth on May 31, 1861.

Although an able administratorheaded the Confederate Post OfficeDepartment, its mail service wascontinuously interrupted. Through acombination of pay and personnelcuts, postage rate increases, andstreamlining of mail routes, Reaganeliminated the postal deficit thatexisted in the South. But blockadesand the invading Northern army, aswell as a growing scarcity ofpostage stamps, severely hamperedpostal operations.

Federal mail service in the Southgradually resumed as the war cameto an end. By November 15, 1865,

241 mail routes had been restored,and by November 1, 1866, 3,234Post Offices out of 8,902 werereturned to federal control in theSouth.

Postmaster General Reagan wasarrested at the end of the war butlater was pardoned and eventuallymade it back to Congress, wherehe became chairman of theCommittee on Post Offices andPost Roads.

The Confederate Post Office Department

John Henninger Reagan


Mail by RailSome three decades before the PonyExpress galloped into postal history, the“iron horse” made its formal appear-ance. In August 1829, an English-builtlocomotive, the Stourbridge Lion, com-pleted the first locomotive run in theUnited States on the Delaware andHudson Canal Company Road inHonesdale, Pennsylvania. The nextmonth, the South Carolina RailroadCompany adopted the locomotive as itstractive power.

In 1830, the Baltimore & Ohio'sTom Thumb, America's first steam loco-motive, successfully carried more than40 people at over 10 miles per hour.This beginning was considered lessthan auspicious when, in late August1830, a stage driver's horse outran theTom Thumb on a parallel track in a raceat Ellicott’s Mills, Maryland. Later,however, a steam locomotive reachedthe unheard-of speed of 30 miles perhour in an 1831 competition inBaltimore.

The Post Office Department recog-nized the value of rail to move mailas early as November 30, 1832, whenstagecoach contractors on a routefrom Philadelphia to Lancaster,Pennsylvania, were granted anallowance of $400 per year “for carry-ing the mail on the railroad as far asWest Chester from December 5,1832.”13 Although the Departmentapparently awarded several contractsfor rail transportation as a part ofstagecoach routes in succeeding years,the Postmaster General listed onlyone railroad company as a contractorduring the first 6 months of 1836 forRoute 1036 from Philadelphia toMauch Chunk, Pennsylvania.

The Department appointed thefirst route agent, John Kendall,nephew of Postmaster General AmosKendall, to accompany the mailsbetween Albany and Utica, New York,in 1837. An Act of July 7, 1838, desig-nated all United States railroads aspost routes, and railroad mail serviceincreased rapidly.

In June 1840, two mail agents wereappointed to the Boston-Springfieldroute, “to make exchanges of mail,attend to delivery, and receive and for-ward all unpaid way letters and pack-ages received.”14 The route agentsopened the pouches from local offices,separated mail for other local pointson the line for inclusion in the pouch-es for those offices, and sent the bal-ance to distributing Post Offices forfurther sorting. Gradually, the clerksbegan to make up mail for connectinglines and local offices, and the idea ofsorting mail on the cars evolved.

In 1862, former PostmasterWilliam A. Davis of St. Joseph,Missouri, began the first experiment indistributing mail in railroad cars on theHannibal-St. Joseph run. Although thispractice expedited the connection withthe overland stage at St. Joseph, it wasdiscontinued in January 1863. OnAugust 28, 1864, the first U.S. RailwayPost Office (RPO) route was estab-lished officially when George B.Armstrong, Chicago’s AssistantPostmaster, placed a car equipped forgeneral distribution in service betweenChicago and Clinton, Iowa, on theChicago and North Western Railroad.

New

Yor

k C

entr

al R

ailro

ad


Similar routes were established betweenNew York and Washington, D.C.;Chicago and Rock Island, Illinois;Chicago and Quincy, Illinois; and NewYork and Erie, Pennsylvania.

When railway mail service began,the cars were equipped primarily tosort and distribute letter mail. By about1869, other mail was being sorted.Parcel Post service, added in 1913,soon outgrew the limited space aboardtrains. Terminals, established adjacentto major railroad stations, allowedparcels to be sorted then loaded intomail cars and RPOs for transport tocities and towns.

In 1930, more than 10,000 trainsmoved mail. Following passage of theTransportation Act of 1958, whichallowed the discontinuance of money-losing passenger trains, mail-carryingpassenger trains began to decline rapid-ly. By 1965, only 190 trains carriedmail, and by 1970, the railroads carriedvirtually no First-Class Mail.

On April 30, 1971, the Post OfficeDepartment terminated seven of theeight remaining routes. The last RailwayPost Office, which operated betweenNew York and Washington, D.C., onPenn Central/Conrail, made its finalrun on June 30, 1977.

Highway and air congestion and anincrease in the weight of catalogs andadvertising mail during the 1980s ledto renewed rail use. Amtrak carriedmail on many trains, and freight trainspulled flatcars holding trailers full ofmail. In 1993, Amtrak and the PostalService reintroduced the RoadRailer,special equipment that can travel onhighways and on rails without havingto be hoisted onto a railroad flatcar.

Following the terrorist attacks ofSeptember 11, 2001, rail transportationof mail helped close the gap caused bytemporary disruptions to commercialair service.

In 2002, Amtrak continued to carryperiodicals between many Post Offices. ■

The MississippiThe Mississippi, an early steamengine, was built in 1834.


On an autumn day in 1888, a shaggypup took his first step towardbecoming a postal legend when hecrept into the Albany, New York, PostOffice. Postal employees allowed himto stay and named him Owney.

At first, Owney stayed close tothe Post Office, but he soon beganriding mail wagons to the traindepot and then rode the railwaymail car down to New York City andback to Albany. As Owney traveledfarther, his friends at the AlbanyPost Office feared he might wandertoo far away to find his way homeagain so they purchased a leathercollar with a tag reading “Owney,Post Office, Albany, N.Y.” TheRailway Mail Service clerks recordedOwney’s travels by attaching metalbaggage tags to his collar to identifythe rail lines he traveled on.

He was soon weighed down byhis collection of tags. Postmaster

General John Wanamaker present-ed Owney with a little jacket to dis-tribute their weight more evenly.

Owney took to traveling fartherand staying away longer, eventuallyvisiting Mexico, Canada, Japan,China, Singapore, Suez,Algiers, and the Azores.

While being shown off toan Ohio newspaper reporter,Owney bit the postal clerkwho was handling him. ThePostmaster had Owney put downon June 11, 1897. Railway mailclerks chipped in money to have ataxidermist preserve Owney’s body,which then was sent to postalHeadquarters in Washington, D.C.,for exhibit.

In 1911, the Post OfficeDepartment entrusted Owney to theSmithsonian Institution. Since 1993,Owney has been part of the NationalPostal Museum in Washington, D.C.

Owney, Mascot of the Railway Mail Service

Catching MailA Railway Mail Service clerk operatesa catcher arm to grab a mailbag froma mail crane alongside the tracks ashis train races past, 1913.

Post riders on horseback were thefirst contractors to carry mail betweenPost Offices. In 1773, post road sur-veyor Hugh Finlay noted that a stage-coach driver held a contract to carrysemi-weekly mail betweenPortsmouth, New Hampshire, andBoston, Massachusetts. In 1785, theContinental Congress authorized thePostmaster General to award mailtransportation contracts to stage-coach operators, in effect subsidizingpublic travel and commerce withpostal funds. Despite their highercosts and sometimes lesser efficien-cy, stagecoach proposals were pre-ferred over horseback.

An Act of March 3, 1845, tooksteps to reduce mail transportationcosts. Congress abandoned its pref-erence for stagecoaches, with con-tracts to be awarded to the lowestbidder for what “may be necessary toprovide for the due celerity, certaintyand security of such transportation.”15

These were known as “celerity, cer-tainty and security” bids. Postal clerksshortened the phrase to three aster-isks or stars (***). The bids becameknown as star bids, and the routesbecame known as star routes.

In 1845, more than two-thirds ofthe Post Office Department’s budgetwas for transportation. By 1849, theDepartment cut transportation costson all routes — horseback, stage,steamboat and railroad — by 17 per-cent, from $2,938,551 in 1844 to$2,428,515. Route distances rose 20 percent for the same years, from35.4 million miles to 42.5 million milesin 1849. Star routes were largelyresponsible for the savings as con-tractors switched to horseback, cut-ting per-mile costs 38 percent, from7.2 cents to 4.5 cents.

Throughout the 1850s, theDepartment continued to favor stage-coaches over horses on certainroutes. In 1852, Postmaster GeneralSamuel D. Hubbard instructedcontract bidders to state the type ofconveyance “if a higher mode thanhorseback be intended,” noting that

stagecoaches were preferred oncertain routes.16

Postmaster General Joseph Holt’s1859 Annual Report criticized the“enormous sums” paid to stagecoachcompanies to transport mails, “someof which [were] so light as scarcely toyield a revenue sufficient to defray theexpense of carrying them on horse-back.” He declared, “In advertising forthe new lettings, ‘Star Bids’… willalone be invited … without any desig-nation of modes of conveyance.”17

The 1860 Annual Report is the last todiscriminate between “coach” and“inferior” modes of service.18

Contractors had to be at least 16years old until 1902, when the agelimit was raised to 21. Subcontractorsor carriers could be 16. Contractorswere bonded and took an oath ofoffice. On subcontracted routes, carri-ers also took the oath.

From 1802 to 1859, postal lawsrequired carriers to be free white per-sons. Violators were fined. The typical4-year contract did not provide pay-ment for missed trips, regardless ofweather conditions. Unexcused serv-ice failures could result in fines up tothree times the trip’s price.

Regular schedules made carrierseasy targets for thieves. Criminal pun-ishment was harsh. Anyone foundguilty of robbing carriers could receive5 to 10 years of hard labor for the firstoffense and death for the second.Meanwhile, some carriers faced thehazards of snow, avalanches, icepacks, cliff-hugging roads, seas ofmud, and dangerous waters.

Contractors provided their ownequipment. A 1930s-era Post OfficeDepartment memo quotes HarryElfers, who transported mail 10 milesfrom Sandusky, Ohio, to KelleysIsland in Lake Erie. In bad weather, hewould sail from the island toMarblehead, the closest mainlandpoint, only 4 miles away. That couldtake 20 minutes or 8 hours, depend-ing on the weather. Either way, hispay was the same. Elfers recalled thespecialized equipment he used:


Mail by MuleThe contract mail route to theHavasupai Indian Reservation,Supai, Arizona, far below thesouthern rim of the GrandCanyon, is the last mule traindelivery in the United States.Helicopters and mail drops areimpractical here, so a muletrain makes the 6- to 8-hourround trip 5 days a week,bringing everything from foodto furniture to the reservation.

Star Routes

When I was a youngster I was outin a boat about all the time. Now Idon't care for ordinary sailing butbattling with the ice has a fascinationfor me. As soon as the ice begins toform, I feel eager to get out one ofthe 'ironclads' and fight my wayacross. An 'ironclad' is a flat-bot-tomed skiff. There's a sail in the bowto carry us through the water or overthe ice when conditions are right.There are two iron-shod runners onthe bottom so the boat may be usedas a sled. The sides are sheathedwith galvanized iron. This is veryimportant, because thin ice will cut aboat like a knife.19

Most star route carriers traveledby horse or horse-drawn vehicleuntil the early 20th century. Boats,sleds, snowshoes, and skis alsowere used. Today’s contractors usetrucks, tractor trailers, and automo-biles or whatever it takes — muletrains into the Grand Canyon, flat-bottomed pole boats in theLouisiana bayous, and airplanesand hovercraft in Alaska. Dog sleds

were used in Alaska until 1963.Today, mail is dropped by parachuteon some Alaskan routes. During thewinter, snowmobiles carry mail inthe highlands of Utah, Colorado,and Montana.

In The Story of Our Post Office,Marshall Cushing writes about Mrs.Clara Carter, who, while carrying mailbetween Maine’s West Ellsworth andEllsworth Post Offices around 1892,also delivered mail to customers onthe route.20 Such unofficial arrange-ments were formalized beginningJuly 1, 1900, when some contractsprovided for delivery to and collec-tion from rural mail boxes erectedalong the routes. By 1918, somecontracts also permitted the sale ofstamps, money orders, and regis-tered mail along routes.

In 1948, Congress allowed thePostmaster General to renew 4-yearcontracts with satisfactory serviceproviders rather than award a newcontract to the lowest, acceptablebidder to prevent the many contractfailures resulting from speculators whounderbid tried-and-true carriers by just

a few dollars. Congressman ThomasJ. Murray of Tennessee explained:

I think when a star-route contrac-tor has carried the mail for 20 to 25years … it is unjust and unfair for himto be deprived of his contract foranother 4-year term by cut-throatbidding.21

Star routes declined in the 1950sas unnecessary and duplicate servicewas eliminated. However, the 1960ssaw growth as the Highway Act of1958 improved highways and railservice declined. Between 1960 and1970, star-route miles more than dou-bled. In the 1970s, star routes official-ly became known as highway con-tract routes, although popular usageof the older term continues.

The number of highway contractroutes keeps growing. In 2002, therewere approximately 17,300 highwaycontract routes, with about 37 percentproviding delivery to customers alongtheir routes.

Mail by Sled Star route contractors have a history of employing any means necessary totransport the mail. This carrier transported mail into the mountains of Idaho viahorse-drawn sled circa 1920. His horses wore special snow shoes.



Free City DeliveryBefore 1863, postage paid only for thedelivery of mail from Post Office to PostOffice. Citizens picked up their mail,although in some cities they could payan extra 2-cent fee for letter delivery oruse private delivery firms. Among thepostal reforms suggested by progressivePostmaster General Montgomery Blairin his 1862 report to the President wasfree delivery of mail by salaried lettercarriers, which he felt would “greatlyaccelerate deliveries, and promote thepublic convenience.”22 He reasoned thatif the system of mailing and receivingletters was more convenient, peoplewould use it more often, and pointed toincreasing postal revenues in England,which already had adopted free citydelivery.

Congress agreed. An Act ofCongress of March 3, 1863, effectiveJuly 1, 1863, provided that free citydelivery be established at Post Officeswhere income from local postage wasmore than sufficient to pay all expenses

Reaching Out To Everyone

of the service. For the first time,Americans had to put street addresseson their letters.

By June 30, 1864, free city deliveryhad been established in 65 cities nation-wide, with 685 carriers delivering mailin cities such as Boston, Baltimore,Brooklyn, Chicago, Cincinnati,Cleveland, Detroit, New York,Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, andWashington, D.C. By 1880, 104 citieswere served by 2,628 letter carriers, andby 1900, 15,322 carriers provided serv-ice to 796 cities.

Postmasters, groups of citizens, orcity authorities could petition the PostOffice Department for free delivery serv-ice if their city met population or postalrevenue requirements. The city had toprovide sidewalks and crosswalks, ensurethat streets were named and lit, andassign numbers to houses.

Initially, carriers hand-delivered mailto customers. If a customer did notanswer the carrier’s knock, ring, or whis-tle, the mail remained in the carrier’s

New York CityFifth Avenue, 1913

Libr

ary

of C

ongr

ess

City Delivery Pioneer

Joseph William Briggs, aCleveland, Ohio, postal clerk, oftenis credited with conceiving the idea

of free city delivery whilecontemplating long

lines of customerstrying to keepwarm as theyinched towardhis window inthe winter of1862. Manywere womenhoping for news

of loved ones inthe Civil War.

Briggs enlisted localbusinesses to serve

as staging areas for sort-ing customers’ mail, and he

began delivering mail to hispatrons free of cost.

In 1864, Briggs wrotePostmaster General MontgomeryBlair, suggesting improvements tothe free letter carrier system,launched in 1863. Blair likedBriggs’ ideas, brought him toWashington, and appointed himspecial agent in charge of super-intending the operation of the let-ter carrier system, a role he per-formed until his death onFebruary 23, 1872.

A 1921 postal committeecharged with determining whoshould be credited with the estab-lishment of free city delivery, afterexamining the available evidence,reported to Postmaster GeneralWill Hays that “no one individualcan be considered the author ororiginator of this service …” Thecommittee said, “Mr. Briggs can-not be properly credited as theauthor of the City Free DeliveryService, but the evidence seemssufficient to warrant the statementthat he was the first letter carrier inthe city of Cleveland, Ohio.”24

A plaque in the ClevelandPost Office commemoratesBriggs' service as that city’s firstfree letter carrier and his contribu-tions to establishing the servicenationwide.

satchel to be redelivered when the cus-tomer was home. By 1912, new cus-tomers were required to provide mailslots or receptacles, and Postmasterswere urged to encourage existing cus-tomers to provide them as well. As lateas 1914, First Assistant PostmasterGeneral Daniel C. Roper estimated thata letter carrier spent 30 minutes to anhour each day waiting at doors wherethere was person-to-person delivery.Only half of city delivery addresses hadmail slots or receptacles. Carriers con-tinued to announce the arrival of mailwhen depositing it in door slots or mailreceptacles.

By the 1930s, as a convenience tocustomers living on the margins of acity, letter carriers began delivering tocustomers with “suitable boxes at thecurb line.”23 American suburbanizationin the ensuing decades — whichexploded in the 1950s — brought anincrease in curbside mail boxes. TheDepartment introduced curbside clusterboxes in 1967. Their use has beenincreasingly encouraged in recentdecades to promote efficiency andeconomy of service.

Originally, letter carriers worked 52weeks a year, typically 9 to 11 hours a

day from Monday through Saturday,and if necessary, part of Sunday. AnAct of Congress in 1884 grantedthem 15 days of leave per year.In 1888, Congress declaredthat 8 hours was a full day’swork and that carriers wouldbe paid for additional hoursworked per day. The 40-hourwork week began in 1935.

Carriers walked as manyas 22 miles a day, carrying upto 50 pounds of mail at atime. They were instructed todeliver letters frequently andpromptly — generally twice a day tohomes and up to four times a day tobusinesses. The second residential deliv-ery was discontinued on April 17, 1950,in most cities. Multiple deliveries tobusinesses were phased out over thenext few decades as changing transporta-tion patterns made most mail availablefor first-trip delivery. The weight limit ofa carrier’s load was reduced to 35pounds by the mid-1950s and remainsthe same today.

In 2002, 233,639 letter carriers deliv-ered mail in the nation's cities.



Rural Free Delivery (RFD)In 1890, nearly 41 million people — 65 percent of the American population— lived in rural areas. Although manycity dwellers had enjoyed free homedelivery since 1863, rural citizens hadto pick up their mail at the Post Office,leading one farmer to ask: “Whyshould the cities have fancy mail serv-ice and the old colonial system stillprevail in the country districts?”25

Postmaster General John Wanamaker,who served from 1889 to 1893, was amerchant who became one of the mostinnovative and energetic people ever tolead the Post Office Department. Hethought it made more sense to haveone person deliver mail than to have 50people ride into town to collect theirmail. He cited business logic and socialphilosophy as reasons to give ruraldwellers free delivery. Businesses couldexpand their markets. Rural customerspaid the same postage rates as city peo-ple. Rural people needed the importantinformation provided by newspapers yetdid not always have time to walk or rideto the Post Office. Young people mightstay on the farm if correspondence andmagazines eased their isolation.

“I think the growth of the Farmers’Alliance movement and the other farm-ers’ movements in the past few years hasbeen due to this hunger for something

social as much as to anything else,”Wanamaker wrote in 1891.26 He pro-posed that rural customers receive freedelivery.

On October 1, 1890, Congressauthorized funding of $10,000 to testthe “practicability” of delivering mail tosmall towns, defined as those havingpopulations of from 300 to 5,000 peo-ple, and nearby rural districts.27 For theexperiment, it was suggested that eachPostmaster hire a man or boy for anhour or two a day to deliver the mail orthat school teachers give the mail topupils for delivery to parents or neigh-bors. However, only adults wereemployed. Twelve communities wereselected for what was called village freedelivery. The results were satisfactoryalthough some customers returned tocollecting their mail from the PostOffice by choice when the novelty woreoff. People further away from moreheavily populated areas still had nodelivery.

In January 1892, CongressmanJames O’Donnell introduced “A Bill toExtend the Free Delivery System ofMails to Rural Communities,” but theHouse Committee on Post Office andPost Roads balked at the proposed $6million price tag. An amendmentbringing the figure down to $100,000also was rejected.

Rural Carrier, Rural Route No. 2, Rochester, IndianaAlthough a uniform has never beenprescribed for rural carriers, some,such as this carrier, chose to wearone. When it was established inOctober 1900, this carrier’s routewas 35 miles long and served 1,000customers.


In 1860, Postmasters took thefollowing oath: “I, ________, doswear/affirm that I will faithfullyperform all the duties required ofme, and abstain from everythingforbidden by the laws in relationto the establishment of the PostOffice and post roads within theUnited States. I do solemnlyswear/affirm that I will support theConstitution of the UnitedStates.”

Postmasters had to post abond and reside in the communitywhere the Post Office was locat-ed. The Postmaster was exemptfrom militia duty but could becalled upon to work on the roads.

The job of Postmaster was animportant one — candidates forthe job were proposed by theoutgoing Postmaster, the localcommunity, or local congressmen.Beginning in 1836, Postmastersat the largest Post Offices wereappointed by the President andusually received the job as a polit-ical plum. The PostmasterGeneral continued to appointPostmasters at smaller Post

Offices. The Post Office often waskept as a sideline to thePostmaster’s primary occupation,such as storekeeper.

The Postmaster had to keepthe Post Office open during nor-mal business hours and, if mailwas delivered on a Sunday, forone hour after the delivery of mail.If a church service was going on,the Postmaster had to wait until itconcluded and then open theoffice for an hour. This decisiondated back to the 19th-centurycontroversies over the drivers ofmail wagons blowing on a horn ora trumpet as the wagon cameinto town. Some ministers com-plained that the men would riseup, leave the church, and headfor the Post Office, where theywould visit with each other andeven play cards.

The decision to keep the PostOffice closed during services wasa compromise. However, thePostmaster General refused tostop mail wagons from running onSundays, since this would delaythe mail too much.

Postmasters in the Mid-19th Century

Postmasters’ ConventionPostmasters met in Waco, Texas, on July 12, 1899, forthe first convention of the Texas Postmasters Association.

Francis E. Bush, PostmasterPostmasters often were pillars of theircommunities. Francis E. Bush, 95,served two terms as Postmaster ofStanding Stone, Pennsylvania, from1875 to 1889 and then from 1901to 1929.


A year and two months later, onMarch 3, 1893, a bill introduced byone-term Georgia Congressman TomWatson passed. It appropriated $10,000for experimental rural free delivery. OnMarch 6, 1893, Wilson S. Bissell wassworn in as Postmaster General. He didnot pursue the experiment, citing thepressure of more important concernsand the need for at least $20 million toinaugurate rural free delivery, a figurelater identified as a guess. Instead, herecommended establishing additionalPost Offices where needed.

Bissell was succeeded by William L.Wilson on March 1, 1895. Wilson agreedwith his predecessor that rural free deliv-ery was not practical but was willing toattempt the experiment if Congress mademoney available. That year, Congressappropriated $20,000 for the experimentand another $10,000 in 1896, bringingthe total to $40,000 — enough for thePost Office Department to begin its ruralfree delivery experiment.

On October 1, 1896, rural free deliv-ery service began in Charles Town,Halltown, and Uvilla in West Virginia,Postmaster General Wilson’s home state.Within a year, 44 routes were underwayin 29 states.

Just 5 days before Christmas in 1899,the Post Office Department decided toexperiment with extending RFD acrossan entire county. Postmaster GeneralCharles Emory Smith ordered that 63small Post Offices and the routes of 35star route contractors and mail messen-

gers be discontinued and that rural freedelivery be established in their place inCarroll County, Maryland. County-widedelivery proved viable.

Judged a success, rural free deliverybecame a permanent service effectiveJuly 1, 1902. The word “free” wasdropped in 1906, since it was under-stood.

During the 6 experimental yearsbefore rural delivery became a perma-nent service, customers sent more than10,000 petitions asking that routes beestablished. The Department had timeto evaluate the extent to which RFDcould replace small, fourth-class PostOffices and star routes, whether it couldbe used to offer services such as moneyorders, and what national RFD servicewould cost. The Department also hadan opportunity to see what else wasneeded to make the service successful:good roads, standardized mailboxes,and a “great army of rural carriers” —about 8,500 in 1902. The Post OfficeDepartment claimed that, “as a classthere are no more faithful employees inthe Government service.”28

The backing of the National Grange,National Farmers’ Congress, and StateFarmers’ Alliance was important to ruraldelivery’s establishment and success, aswas the enthusiastic response of ruralcustomers. Although one Kansas farmerexpressed concern that rural peoplewould become lazy if they did not haveto pick up their mail, more typical werereactions such as those of the Colorado

Rural Carrier, Harbor Springs,Michigan, circa 1910Rural free delivery stimulated roadimprovement nationwide, sincepassable roads were a prerequisitefor establishing new delivery routes.Rural carriers supplied their owntransportation — from horses andbuggies to bicycles, motorcycles,and automobiles — to deliver themail. They were allowed to useautomobiles on their routes as earlyas 1907, where roads andtopography permitted.


Early Rural MailboxesUntil the Post Office Departmentstandardized specifications for ruralmailboxes, a variety of boxes andcontainers were used.

woman who was glad to “have our mailfresh instead of stale” and the Arizonacitizen who wrote:

I am more than ever proud of being anAmerican citizen. … I live three and a halfmiles from the Tempe post-office, and havebeen sick for a week past, yet my mail isbrought to my door every morning, exceptSunday. … It looks as if “Uncle Sam” hadat last turned his eye in our direction.29

Farmers helped by putting out boxesfor the rural carriers — everything fromlard pails and syrup cans to old apple,soap, and cigar boxes. Postal officialsdecided a standardized box wouldimprove service and, in 1901, askedmanufacturers to design boxes to thefollowing specifications:

The box must be made of metal, 6 by 8by 18 inches, and weather-proof.

Boxes should be constructed so they canbe fastened to a post at a height conven-ient to the carrier without alighting.

Keys for customers’ boxes should beeasy to use by a carrier with “onegloved hand in the severest weather.”30

Manufacturers stenciled the words“Approved by the Postmaster-General”on satisfactory boxes. In 1902, the PostOffice Department required customersto have these boxes in order to receiverural free delivery. Boxes could besquare, oblong, circular, or semicircularbut had to protect mail from rain, snow,and dust.

Rural carriers sold stamps andmoney orders, registered letters, and, inshort, served as traveling Post Offices.They were the vanguard for delivery insuburban areas, a “middle territory, nei-

ther distinctly city nor rural in charac-ter” first mentioned by the Post OfficeDepartment in its Annual Report of1902, with Bridgeport, Connecticut,cited as an example.31 Rural carriersserved suburban areas until these areaswere annexed by an adjacent city postaldistrict. Carriers supplied their owntransportation — usually horses and wag-ons until, in 1929, the Post OfficeDepartment noted that improved roadshad led to “almost a complete change inrural delivery from horse-drawn vehiclesto motor cars.”32

By 1904, rural customers began ask-ing carriers to deliver small packagesfrom local merchants, and the PostOffice Department asked Congress toallow the delivery of packages depositedat the local Post Office. Five years later,the Postmaster General again asked forauthorization to experiment with thedelivery of packages on rural routes. In1911, Frank H. Hitchcock recommend-ed that Congress allow such service inrural and urban areas and requested atotal of $150,000 for such an experi-ment, with the thought of paving theway for a general Parcel Post.

The increase in the number of ruraldelivery routes led to a decrease in thenumber of small Post Offices. In 1901,the Post Office Department operatedthe largest number of Post Offices inAmerican history, 76,945. The next year,there were 1,000 fewer Post Offices.Despite a growing population and moremail, the number of Post Offices contin-ued to drop each subsequent year, withthe exception of 1947.

In 2002, more than 33 millionhomes and businesses were served bythe Postal Service’s rural letter carriers.Rural delivery continues to provide avital link between urban and ruralAmerica. ■


At the start of the 20th century,Americans were served by thePost Office Department. At the

century’s close, they were served by theUnited States Postal Service. At thebeginning of the 20th century, mostAmericans lived in rural areas. By itsend, the country was an industrial andservice economy of international pre-eminence, and the character, volume,and means of transporting mail hadchanged. The Post Office Department,transformed into the United StatesPostal Service, continued its traditionof innovation, adaptation, and changeto better serve postal customers.

Parcel Post By law, the Post Office Departmentcould not carry parcels weighing morethan 4 pounds at the beginning of the20th century. Private express companies,which had begun to flourish in the mid-1800s, delivered large packages.

The establishment of rural free deliv-ery had provided a heady taste of lifefor rural Americans. Soon the demandincreased for the delivery of packagescontaining food, dry goods, drugs, andother commodities not easily availableto farmers. When Congress consideredenacting a law to allow Parcel Post serv-ice, express companies and country mer-chants fought long and hard against it.Rural residents, who represented 54 per-cent of the country’s population in1910, were equally emphatic in wantingParcel Post. While Congress was hotlydebating the question, one express com-pany declared a large dividend to stock-holders. Public indignation at their so-called exorbitant profits helpedCongress decide the issue.

The Act of August 24, 1912 (37 Stat.539), authorized Parcel Post, a servicethat would:

embrace all other matter, including farmand factory products not now embraced bylaw in either the first, second or third class,not exceeding eleven pounds in weight, norgreater in size than seventy-two inches inlength and girth combined …

Parcel Post began on January 1,1913. It was an instant success, with300 million parcels mailed in the first6 months the service was offered. Theeffect on the national economy waselectric. Marketing and merchandisingthrough Parcel Post spurred the growthof the great mail-order houses.Montgomery Ward, the first mail-ordercompany, started with a catalog ofmore than 100 products in 1872. Sears,Roebuck and Company followedMontgomery Ward in 1893. The yearParcel Post began, Sears handled fivetimes as many orders as it did the yearbefore. Five years later, Sears doubledits revenues.

Parcel Post grew too, literally and involume. Its weight and size limits wereexpanded to 70 pounds and 100 incheson August 1, 1931. After World War II,Parcel Post’s comparatively low ratesstimulated its growth while the businessof express companies began to decrease.Eventually, Congress intervened to res-cue the Railway Express Agency from aprecarious financial position. OnJanuary 1, 1952, the weight of parcelssent via the mails to large (first class)Post Offices was reduced to 40 pounds,if the parcels were traveling up to 150miles, and to 20 pounds for any greaterdistance. None of these parcels couldexceed 72 inches in length and girthcombined. Parcels bound for other PostOffices still could weigh up to 70pounds and be up to 100 inches in size.Parcel Post volume fell.

To offset this, weight and size limitsfor parcels moving between larger PostOffices gradually were increased start-ing on July 1, 1967, so that by July 1,1969, the weight limit for all suchparcels had been increased to 40pounds, and by July 1, 1971, the sizelimit had been increased to 84 inches.

On February 27, 1983, a uniformweight and size limit was set at 70pounds, 108 inches, for parcels mailedfrom any Post Office to any destina-tion within the United States. OnJanuary 10, 1999, the size limit forParcel Post increased to 130 inches.

The 20th Century


Postal Savings SystemAn Act of Congress of June 25, 1910,established the Postal Savings System indesignated Post Offices, effectiveJanuary 1, 1911. The legislation aimedto get money out of hiding, attract thesavings of immigrants accustomed tosaving at Post Offices in their nativecountries, provide safe depositories forpeople who had lost confidence inbanks, and furnish more convenientdepositories for working people.

The system paid 2 percent interest peryear. Initially, the minimum deposit was$1, and the balance in an account couldnot exceed $500, excluding interest.

Deposits were slow at first, but by1929, $153 million was on deposit.Savings spurted to $1.2 billion duringthe 1930s and jumped again duringWorld War II, peaking in 1947 atalmost $3.4 billion.

After the war, banks raised their inter-est rates and began offering the samegovernmental guarantee as the PostalSavings System. Savings bonds also gavehigher interest rates. Deposits in thePostal Savings System declined, drop-ping to $416 million by 1964.

On April 27, 1966, the Post OfficeDepartment stopped accepting depositsto existing accounts, refused to opennew accounts, and cut off interest pay-ments as the annual anniversary date ofexisting accounts came up. When thesystem ended officially July 1, 1967,about $50 million in unclaimeddeposits of more than 600,000 deposi-tors was turned over to the U.S.Treasury Department to be held intrust indefinitely.

An Act of August 13, 1971, author-ized the Treasury to turn over the moneystill on deposit to various states and juris-dictions, each sharing proportionatelybased on its own deposits. Some moneywas kept on deposit for future claims,but under the Postal Savings SystemStatute of Limitations Act of July 13,1984 (Public Law 98-359), no claimscould be brought more than 1 year afterenactment. Thus, no claims made afterJuly 13, 1985, have been honored.

AirmailThe Post Office Department's mostextraordinary role in transportation wasprobably played in the sky, a role little

known today except to postal employeesand pioneers of American aviation.

The U.S. government had been cau-tious in exploring the airplane’s potential.In 1905, the War Department consideredthree separate offers by Orville andWilbur Wright to share their scientificdiscoveries on flight, then declined forbudgetary reasons. Although by 1908 theWright brothers had convinced manyEuropean nations that flight was feasible,America owned only one airplane, andthat crashed.

The Post Office Department, howev-er, was intrigued with the possibility ofcarrying mail through the skies andauthorized its first experimental mailflight at an aviation meet on Long Islandin New York in 1911. Earle Ovington,sworn in as a mail carrier by PostmasterGeneral Frank Hitchcock, made dailyflights between Garden City Estates andMineola, New York, dropping his mailbags from the plane to the ground wherethey were picked up by the MineolaPostmaster.

Later, in 1911 and 1912, theDepartment authorized another 31experimental flights at fairs, carnivals,and air meets in more than 16 states.These flights convinced the Departmentthat the airplane could carry a payloadof mail. Officials repeatedly urgedCongress in 1912 to appropriate moneyto launch airmail service. In 1916,Congress finally authorized the use of$50,000 from steam-and-powerboat serv-ice appropriations for airmail experi-ments. The Department advertised forbids for contract service inMassachusetts and Alaska but receivedno acceptable responses.

In 1918, Congress appropriated$100,000 to establish experimental air-mail routes. The Post Office Departmenturged the Army Signal Corps to lend itsplanes and pilots to the Department tostart an airmail service. Carrying themail, the Department argued, wouldprovide invaluable cross-country experi-ence to student flyers. The Secretary ofWar agreed.

The Post Office Department beganscheduled airmail service between NewYork and Washington, D.C., May 15,1918, an important date in commercialaviation. Simultaneous takeoffs weremade from Washington's Polo Grounds

Parcel Post Truck, LakeMinnetonka, Minnesota, circa 1926

Postal Savings System, 1946

Airmail PilotAn airmail pilot immediately handedover the mail after flying the last leg ofthe transcontinental route from SanFrancisco to New York in the early1920s.


and from Belmont Park, Long Island,both trips by way of Philadelphia.

During the first 3 months of opera-tion, the Post Office Department usedArmy pilots and six Army Curtiss JN-4H (“Jenny”) training planes. OnAugust 12, 1918, the Department tookover all phases of airmail service, usingnewly hired civilian pilots and mechan-ics and six specially built mail planesfrom the Standard Aircraft Corporation.

These early mail planes had noinstruments, radios, or other naviga-tional aids. Pilots flew by dead reckon-ing or “by the seat of their pants.”Forced landings occurred frequentlydue to bad weather, but fatalities inthose early months were rare, largelybecause of the planes’ small size,maneuverability, and slow landingspeed.

Congress authorized airmail postageof 24 cents, including special delivery.The public was reluctant to use thismore expensive service. During the firstyear, airmail bags contained as muchregular mail as airmail. To better itsdelivery time on long hauls and to lurethe public into using airmail, theDepartment's long-range plans calledfor a transcontinental air route from

New York to San Francisco. The firstlegs of this transcontinental route —from New York to Cleveland with astop at Bellefonte, Pennsylvania, thenfrom Cleveland to Chicago, with a stopat Bryan, Ohio — opened in 1919. Athird leg opened in 1920 from Chicagoto Omaha, via Iowa City, and feederlines were established from St. Louisand Minneapolis to Chicago. The lasttranscontinental segment, from Omahato San Francisco, via North Platte,Cheyenne, Rawlins, Rock Springs, SaltLake City, Elko, and Reno, opened onSeptember 8, 1920.

At this time, mail was carried ontrains at night and flown by day. Still,the new service was 22 hours faster thanthe cross-country all-rail time.

In August 1920, the Departmentbegan installing radio stations at eachairfield to provide pilots with currentweather information. By November, tenstations were operating, including twoNavy stations. When airmail traffic per-mitted, other government departmentsused the radios instead of the telegraphfor special messages, and theDepartment of Agriculture used theradios to transmit weather forecasts andstock market reports.

Airmail PlaneA compartment in the wing of thisFord Tri-Motor Mail Passenger planewas lowered to allow mail to beloaded or unloaded, circa 1930.

February 22, 1921, marked the firsttime mail was flown both day andnight over the entire distance from SanFrancisco to New York. Congress wasimpressed. It appropriated $1,250,000for the expansion of airmail service. ThePost Office Department installed addi-tional landing fields, as well as towers,beacons, searchlights, and boundarymarkers, across the country. TheDepartment also equipped the planeswith luminescent instruments, naviga-tional lights, and parachute flares.

In 1922 and 1923, the Departmentwas awarded the Collier Trophy forimportant contributions to the develop-ment of aeronautics, especially in safetyand for demonstrating the feasibility ofnight flying.

On February 2, 1925, Congresspassed “An Act to encourage commer-cial aviation and to authorize thePostmaster General to contract for air-mail service.” The Post OfficeDepartment immediately invited bidsfrom commercial aviation companies.By the end of 1926, 11 out of 12 con-tracted airmail routes were operating.

The first commercial airmail flight inthe United States occurred February 15,1926. As commercial airlines took over,

the Post Office Department transferredits lights, airways, and radio service tothe Department of Commerce, includ-ing 17 fully equipped stations, 89 emer-gency landing fields, and 405 beacons.Terminal airports, except governmentproperties in Chicago, Omaha, and SanFrancisco, were transferred to themunicipalities in which they were locat-ed. Some planes were sold to airmailcontractors, while others were trans-ferred to interested government depart-ments. By September 1, 1927, all airmailwas carried under contract.

Charles I. Stanton, an early airmailpilot who later headed the CivilAeronautics Administration, said aboutthose early days of scheduled airmailservice:

We planted four seeds … They were air-ways, communications, navigation aids,and multi-engined aircraft. Not all of thesecame full blown into the transportationscene; in fact, the last one withered and diedand had to be planted over again nearly adecade later. But they are the cornerstones onwhich our present world-wide transportstructure is built, and they came, one by one,out of our experience in daily, uninterruptedflying of the mail.33

New York to San FranciscoBest delivery times for mail

2002 Airplane6–7 hours

1924 Transcontinental airmail1 day, 10 hours, 20 minutes

1921 Airplane and railroad3 days, 11 hours

1906 Special through-train3 days, 18 hours

1900 Transcontinental railroad4 days, 10 hours

1869 Transcontinental railroad7 days, 2 hours

1860 Railroad to St. Joseph, MO, then via Pony Express13–14 days (3–4 railroad, 10 horseback)

1858 Railroad to Tipton, MO, thenoverland mail route30–35 days (6–10 railroad, then 24–25stagecoach)

1849 Ship or steamboat via the Isthmus of Panama1 month or longer



William C. Hopson was less thanimpressed with photographs of himself.

Submitting a photo to the Post OfficeDepartment’s Airmail Service in the early1920s, he wrote:

Enclosed please find photo of bumpilot … When finished with picture justpost in cellar, it’s guaranteed to keepaway all rats, mice and other vermin.34

Hopson had 741 hours of flighttime when he became an airmailpilot on April 14, 1920. He trained atHempstead, Long Island, and won apilot's incentive contest sponsoredby Otto Praeger, the SecondAssistant Postmaster General.Hopson flew 413,034 miles, morethan all but two of the service’s 44pilots, logging 4,043 hours in the air.

Like many airmail pilots, Hopsonflew the British-designed De Haviland(DH-4B) biplane. Its front cockpit,transformed into a cargo hold, couldcarry about 500 pounds of mail, andthe plane cruised at 95–100 m.p.h.Although considered reliable, DH-4Bstended to stall, and their high landingspeeds made them difficult to land inshort fields. But, wrote Hopson, they“are the only suitable ships for moun-tains in all weather.”35

For most of his career, Hopsonflew the Omaha-Chicago leg of thetranscontinental route. In 1925, heflew into a severe storm near Anita,Iowa. An air pocket dropped theplane almost to the ground beforeHopson regained control. By then,his landing gear and lower wings hadharvested about 75 bushels of corn.The plane turned over, pinningHopson underneath. Surrounded bycornstalks and deluged by rain, hefired his revolver into the air to attractattention. The official report said:

The Pilot was only slightly injured, themail wet in spots, and the plane practi-cally a washout.36

Between weather and primitiveinstrumentation, each airmail trip was anadventure. As Hopson wrote:

The best system of flying badweather is not so much to go rip roar-ing through nasty weather, but to useyour head for something else besidesa hat-rack, and fly where bad weatheraint.37

In 1925, base pay for beginning air-mail pilots was $2,000 to $2,800,depending on how much night flyingthey did. Pilots also earned 5 to 7cents per mile flown, double for nightflight. Pilots agreed, in writing, to fly inall kinds of weather.

Hopson’s last flight for theDepartment was on August 27, 1927.On September 1, contract carriersbegan transporting all airmail. Hopsonleft the Airmail Service 2 days later andwas hired to fly National Air Transport’sContract Air Mail Route 17 betweenNew York and Chicago. This was theAllegheny route, one of the most diffi-cult because of limited safe places foremergency landings.

Hopson died October 18, 1928,when his plane crashed into the top of a tree on a hill near Polk,Pennsylvania, during a bad storm.One man, grateful that Hopson hadsaved his life during an earlier flight,wrote a tribute that appeared in TheSt. Louis Times on October 20, 1928:

It was a dark, rainy, cloudy day onthe New York end of the air mail. Noplanes through in two days. I wanted toget home to my family in California. Iinsisted on going. It wasn't bravery — itwas dumb ignorance, and an unlimitedconfidence in all air mail pilots.

“We will try to get through if youinsist,” Pilot W.P. Hopson said. And wegot through, clear to Cleveland.

Thursday he didn't get through. Ikinder feel like his skill saved my life.So “Hoppie,” Old Boy, here's hopingyou are piloting the best cloud theBoss has got in his hangar up there,and you don't have to worry aboutlow ceiling, engine missing, headwinds, or even whether the old ripcord will pull in case —.

Yours,Will Rogers

Airmail Pilot Bill Hopson

Mr. ZIPMr. ZIP was unveiled in October 1962during a Postmasters’ convention

and later became a widelyrecognized postal symbol.

ZIP CodeDuring World War II, thousands ofexperienced postal employees left toserve with the military. To offset theloss, in May 1943 the Post OfficeDepartment began a zoning addresssystem in 124 of the largest PostOffices. Under this system, deliveryunits or zones were identified by oneor two numbers between the city andstate — for example, Birmingham 7,Alabama — so that mail could be sepa-rated by employees who did not havedetailed scheme knowledge.

Twenty years later, the Departmentimplemented an even farther reachingplan, the Zoning Improvement Plan(ZIP) Code.

The social correspondence of the19th century had given way, graduallythen explosively, to business mail. By1963, 80 percent of all mail in theUnited States was business mail. Thedevelopment of the computer broughtcentralization of accounts and sent agrowing mass of utility bills and pay-ments, bank deposits and receipts,advertising, magazines, credit cardtransactions, mortgage bills and pay-ments, and Social Security checksthrough the mail. Yet while mail vol-ume grew and while the Post OfficeDepartment had been at the forefrontof advances in transportation, themethods and much of the equipmentused to sort mail in thousands of PostOffices remained the same as inBenjamin Franklin’s day. A better wayto sort mail was needed.

In June 1962, after a study of mech-anization, the presidentially appointedAdvisory Board of the Post OfficeDepartment made several recommen-dations. One was the development of acoding system, an idea the Departmenthad considered for a decade or more.A number of coding programswere examined and discard-ed before the Departmentselected a systemadvanced by Departmentofficials. PostmasterGeneral J. Edward Dayannounced that the ZIPCode would launch July 1,1963.

Preparing for the new systeminvolved a realignment of the mail sys-

tem. The Post Office Department hadpreviously recognized that new avenuesof transportation would open and hadbegun to establish focal points for air,highway, and rail transportation. Calledthe Metro System, these transportationcenters were set up around 85 of thecountry's larger cities to deflect mailfrom congested city streets. The Metroconcept was expanded and eventuallybecame the core of 552 sectional cen-ters, each serving between 40 and 150surrounding Post Offices.

Once these sectional centers weredelineated, the next step in establishingthe ZIP Code was to assign codes to thecenters and the postal addresses theyserved. The existence of postal zones inthe larger cities, set in motion in 1943,helped to some extent, but in caseswhere the old zones failed to fit withinthe delivery areas, new numbers had tobe assigned.

By July 1963, a five-digit codehad been assigned to every addressthroughout the country. The first digitdesignated a broad geographical area ofthe United States, ranging from zerofor the Northeast to nine for the farWest. This number was followed bytwo digits that more closely pinpointedpopulation concentrations and thosesectional centers accessible to commontransportation networks. The final twodigits designated small Post Offices orpostal zones in larger zoned cities.

The ZIP Code began as scheduled.At first, use of the new code was notmandatory for anyone, but in 1967, theDepartment required mailers of second-and third-class bulk mail topresort by ZIP Code.The public and businessmailers alike adaptedwell to its use. ■

Postmaster GeneralJ. Edward DayDay launched the ZIP Code on July 1, 1963.


Clockwise from upper right:1847, First U.S. stamps,George Washington andBenjamin Franklin; 1907,Pocahontas; 1993, ElvisPresley; 1940, Booker T.Washington; 1998, BreastCancer Research, the firstsemipostal stamp.

U.S. PostageStamps


The Post Office Department issued itsfirst postage stamps on July 1, 1847.Previously, letters were taken to a PostOffice, where the Postmaster wouldnote the postage in the upper right cor-ner. The postage rate was based on thenumber of sheets in the letter and thedistance it would travel. Postage couldbe paid in advance by the writer, col-lected from the addressee on delivery,or paid partially in advance and partiallyupon delivery.

The First Postage StampsIn 1837, Great Britain’s Sir RowlandHill proposed a uniform rate ofpostage for mail going anywhere in theBritish Isles and prepayment by usingenvelopes with preprinted postage oradhesive labels. On May 6, 1840, thestamp that became known as thePenny Black, covering the one pennycharge for half-ounce letters sent any-where in the British Isles, becameavailable in postal facilities.

United States Postage StampsAlexander M. Greig’s City DespatchPost, a private New York City carrier,issued the first adhesive stamps in theUnited States on February 1, 1842.The Post Office Department boughtGreig’s business and continued use ofadhesive stamps to prepay postage.

After U.S. postage rates were stan-dardized in 1845, New York CityPostmaster Robert H. Morris, amongothers, provided special stamps ormarkings to indicate prepayment ofpostage. These now are known asPostmasters' Provisionals.

On March 3, 1847, Congressauthorized United States postagestamps. The first general issuepostage stamps went on sale in NewYork City, July 1, 1847. One, priced atfive cents, depicted BenjaminFranklin. The other, a 10-cent stamp,pictured George Washington. Clerksused scissors to cut the stamps frompregummed, nonperforated sheets.Only Franklin and Washingtonappeared on stamps until 1856, whena 5-cent stamp honoring Thomas

Jefferson was issued. A 2-centAndrew Jackson stamp was added in1863. George Washington hasappeared on more U.S. postagestamps than any other person.

Until government-issued stampsbecame obligatory January 1, 1856,other payment methods remainedlegal.

Postal StationeryThe first printed stamped envelopeswere issued July 1, 1853. They havealways been produced by private con-tractors and sold at the cost ofpostage plus the cost of manufacture.With the exception of manila newspa-per wrappers used from 1919 to1934, watermarks have been manda-tory for stamped-envelope paper since1853. The watermarks usuallychanged with every 4-year printingcontract to help identify the envelopeand paper manufacturers.

Austria issued the first postal cardin 1869. The United States followed inMay 1873. Postal cards, known todayas stamped cards, are produced bythe government and carry preprintedpostage, unlike privately producedpostcards, which do not bear postage.The 1873 Annual Report of thePostmaster General noted:

As predicted, they have been favor-ably received. They have supplied apublic want, and have made a newand remunerative business for theDepartment.38

Postal cards were sold at facevalue until January 10, 1999, when acharge for the cost of manufacturewas added.

Commemorative StampsIn 1893, the first U.S. commemora-tive stamps, honoring that year’sWorld Columbian Exposition inChicago, were issued. The subject— Columbus’s voyages to the NewWorld — and size of the stampswere innovative. Standard-sizedstamps were too small for engraved


reproductions of paintings that por-trayed events connected toColumbus’s voyages. The stampswere 7/8 inches high by 1-11/32inches wide, nearly double the sizeof previous stamps.

Over the years, commemorativestamps have been produced in manysizes and shapes, with the first trian-gular postage stamp issued in 1997and the first round stamp in 2000.

The first stamp honoring anAmerican woman was the 8-centMartha Washington stamp of 1902.The first to honor a Hispanic Americanwas the 1-dollar Admiral DavidFarragut stamp in 1903. NativeAmericans were portrayed in a generalway on several earlier stamps, but thefirst to feature a specific individual was1907’s 5-cent stamp honoringPocahontas. In 1940, a 10-centstamp commemorating Booker T.Washington became the first to honoran African American.

Other firsts include the 1993 29-cent stamp featuring Elvis Presley. Thepublic was invited to vote for the“young” or the “older” Elvis for thestamp’s design. Youth triumphed, andthis became the best-selling U.S.postage stamp to date.

SemipostalsSemipostals are stamps on which acharge beyond the cost of postage isdevoted to a particular cause. An Actof Congress resulted in the BreastCancer Research stamp, the firstUnited States semipostal, on July 29,1998. The Breast Cancer Researchsemipostal stamp is nondenominated.Its price and its contribution to breastcancer research have fluctuated aspostage rates have changed. OnJune 7, 2002, the Postal Serviceissued the Heroes of 2001 semi-postal. Proceeds beyond the cost ofpostage are distributed by theFederal Emergency ManagementAgency to the families of emergencyworkers killed or injured in connectionwith the September 11, 2001, terror-ist attacks on the United States.

BookletsStamp booklets were first issuedApril 16, 1900. They contained 12,24, or 48 2-cent stamps. Parafinnedpaper was placed between sheets ofstamps to keep them from stickingtogether. The books, which carried a1-cent premium until 1963, had lightcardboard covers printed with infor-mation about postage rates. Stampbooklets remain a staple and areenjoying a resurgence in popularitybecause of their availability at a widerange of non-postal retail outlets.

Coils and VendingThe first coil (roll) stamps were issuedon February 18, 1908, in response tobusiness requests. Coils were alsoused in stamp vending equipment.The Department hoped to placevending machines in Post Office lob-bies to provide round-the-clock serv-ice without extra work hours.Machines were also planned forhotels, train stations, newsstands,department stores, and drug stores.Twenty-five different vending machineswere tested, with six chosen for testsin the Baltimore, Minneapolis, NewYork, Washington, D.C., andIndianapolis Post Offices. Both coilstamps and imperforate sheets wereproduced for vending machines, withthe latter receiving a variety of distinc-tive perforations and separations.

Nondenominated StampsNondenominated stamps (stampswithout a printed value) were firstissued October 14, 1975, for twoChristmas stamps. The Postal Servicehad requested a rate change from 10to 13 cents and was unsure if orwhen the Postal Rate Commissionwould issue a recommended decisionin the case. When the rate changewas delayed, the stamps were soldfor 10 cents.

A similar situation led the PostalService to issue nondenominatedstamps on May 22, 1978. They borethe letter “A” rather than a denomina-tion. The stamps were prepared in

case of a shortage of stamps in theuncertain new denomination. Theywere sold for 15 cents for domesticuse only. Nondenominated stampswith letter designations through “H”were issued in conjunction withpostage rate changes through 1998.

AdhesivesThe Postal Service originally devel-oped self-adhesive stamps to makeprecanceled stamps more secure.Precanceled stamps are canceledacross the face before being sold. Inthe late 1960s, as many as 20 per-cent of them were soaked off andreused. Because they were precan-celed, they skipped a processing stepthat often caught reused stamps.

With the Christmas 1974 issue, thePostal Service experimented with aself-adhesive precanceled stamp. Itwas believed that the tightly bondedself-adhesive would not permitstamps to be soaked off. An addition-al security feature placed slits in thestamps to foil attempts to peel themoff. Unfortunately, the stamps costthree to five times more to producethan regular postage stamps, theycould still be soaked off and reused,and stamps in the hands of collectorsstarted to self-destruct.

In 1989, the Postal Service againexperimented with self-adhesivestamps, this time with emphasis oncustomer convenience. The new self-adhesives had a water-soluble adhe-sive and were produced on coatedpaper, so the effects of the adhesivewould not be destructive. Theybecame so popular that demandcould barely be met. Self-adhesivestamps are now issued in formats thatinclude booklets, coils, sheets, andsouvenir sheets.

Modern water-activated stampadhesives use a mixture of dextrinand resin. The dextrin is derived prin-cipally from corn and, sometimes,potatoes. In recent years, the PostalService has added more self-adhesivestamps and reduced the number ofwater-activated adhesive stamps.

By the mid-1960s, the Post OfficeDepartment had deep problemsdue to years of financial neglect

and fragmented control in the areas offacilities, equipment, wages and manage-ment efficiency. Highly subsidized ratesbore little relation to costs.

In October 1966, the Chicago PostOffice ground to a virtual halt under amountain of mail. In less than a week,the logjam was broken, but so was con-fidence in the status quo.

During February 1967 hearingsbefore the House AppropriationsSubcommittee on Treasury-Post Office,Postmaster General Lawrence F.O’Brien said that the Department wasin a “race with catastrophe.” O’Briendescribed the crisis:

At the peak of the crisis in Chicago, tenmillion pieces of mail were logjammed. Thesorting room floors were bursting with morethan 5 million letters, parcels, circulars, andmagazines that could not be processed.Outbound mail sacks formed small greymountain ranges while they waited to beshipped out.

Our new and beleaguered Chicago post-master summed it up pretty well when hesaid: “We had mail coming out of our ears.”

What happened in Chicago to cause thecrisis? The answer is not that something spe-cific happened in 1966, but that enough didnot happen in the previous 33 years. …we are trying to move our mail throughfacilities largely unchanged since the

days of Jim Farley when our mail volumewas 30 percent of what it is today.39

After Postmaster General O’Brienspoke, Oklahoma Congressman TomSteed, chairman of the subcommittee,asked:

… would this be a fair summary: that atthe present time, as the manager of the PostOffice Department, you have no control overyour workload, you have no control over therates of revenue, you have no control over thepay rates of the employees that you employ,you have very little control over the condi-tions of the service of these employees; youhave virtually no control, by the nature of it,of your physical facilities and you have onlya limited control, at best, over the transporta-tion facilities that you are compelled to use —all of which adds up to a staggering amountof “no control” in terms of the duties youhave to perform.40

The answer was yes. Congress, thePresident, and the Post OfficeDepartment moved to improve thissituation.

Reform Proposal In [April] 1967, President Lyndon B.Johnson appointed a Commission on Postal

Reorganization, chaired byAT&T’s Frederick R.

Kappel, to “determinewhether the postal sys-

tem as presentlyorganized is


Postal Reorganization

The Chicago Post OfficeFor a week in October 1966, theChicago Post Office, the largest PostOffice in the world with 60 acres offloor space, ground to a virtual haltunder a logjam of 10 million pieces ofmail. This crisis triggered a bipartisanlook at postal reform.


capable of meeting the demands of our grow-ing economy and our expanding popula-tion.” In June 1968, the Commission foundthat it was not.

The men who reached that conclusionincluded six heads of major corporations; thedean of the Harvard Business School; twoprominent Democrats; and the President ofthe AFL-CIO. Their view … was that “theprocedures for administering the ordinaryexecutive departments of Government areinappropriate for the Post Office.”

Having rejected political management,the Kappel Commission was equally clear inrejecting privatization. Leaving the dooropen for future consideration, its report saidthat “[T]ransfer of the postal system to theprivate sector is not feasible, largely for rea-sons of financing; the Post Office shouldtherefore continue under government owner-ship. The possibility remains of private own-ership at some future time, if such a transferwere then considered to be feasible and in thepublic interest.”

The Commission recommended:

A self-supporting government corporation.

Elimination of patronage, which con-trolled all top jobs, all Postmasterappointments, and thousands of otherpositions.

That rates be set by a Board ofDirectors “after hearings by expert RateCommissioners … subject to veto byconcurrent resolution of the Congress.”

That labor-management impasses overcontracts and pay be referred to thePresident, who “would be free to estab-lish whatever ad hoc methods hechooses to resolve the matter. The uncer-tainties for both parties… make formore meaningful bargaining and are,in our view, a source of strength.” 41

The Commission released its recom-mendations in June 1968. PresidentNixon supported the Commission’s rec-ommendations; others, including postalunion leaders, opposed it.

Postal Reorganization ActOn March 12, 1970, after extensive hear-ings, the House Post Office and Civil

Service Committee reported a compro-mise measure containing provisions sim-ilar to the Commission proposals andendorsed by President Nixon. The billincluded a 5.4 percent retroactive payraise and a system that would allowemployees to reach the top of their paygrade in 8 rather than 21 years. Postalemployees called it too little, too late.

On March 18, a work stoppagebegan. It ultimately involved 152,000postal employees in 671 locations. ThePresident ordered the Army to deliverthe mail, and the unions asked LaborSecretary George Shultz to intervene.Postmaster General Winton M. Blountagreed to negotiate with the sevenpostal unions when the employeesreturned to work. They did, and negoti-ations began March 25. Eight days later,the negotiating parties recommended ageneral wage increase of 6 percent,retroactive to December 27, 1969, for allfederal employees. Postal workers wouldget an additional 8 percent increase ifthere was agreement on, and enactmentof, legislation reorganizing the PostOffice Department.

On April 16, 1970, the Departmentand union leaders announced agree-ment on a reorganization plan, whichwas embodied in a legislative proposaland sent to Congress by PresidentNixon. It included four provisions thatPostmaster General Blount saw as nec-essary: adequate financing authority,removal of the system from politics toassure continuity of management, col-lective bargaining, and setting of ratesby the Postal Service after an opportu-nity for hearings before an impartialrate panel. In addition to the 8 percentpay increase, the bill provided fornegotiation of a new wage schedulepermitting employees to reach the topof their pay grade in 8 years.

On August 3, 1970, by a vote of 57to 7, the Senate approved the confer-ence report on House Resolution 17070,a modified version of the legislationproposed by the President. Three dayslater, the House of Representativesapproved it. On August 12, 1970,President Nixon signed into law themost comprehensive postal legislationsince the founding of the Republic,Public Law 91-375, the PostalReorganization Act. ■

Postal Reorganization Act of 1970As Postmaster General Winton M.Blount (far left) watched, PresidentRichard M. Nixon signed the PostalReorganization Act into law onAugust 12, 1970. The acttransformed the Post OfficeDepartment into the United StatesPostal Service.


The Post Office Department wastransformed into the UnitedStates Postal Service, an inde-

pendent establishment of the executivebranch of the Government of theUnited States. The mission of the PostalService remained the same, as stated inTitle 39 of the U.S. Code:

The Postal Service shall have as its basicfunction the obligation to provide postal serv-ices to bind the Nation together through thepersonal, educational, literary, and businesscorrespondence of the people. It shall provideprompt, reliable, and efficient services topatrons in all areas and shall render postalservices to all communities.

The new Postal Service officiallybegan operations on July 1, 1971, whenthe Postmaster General ceased to be amember of the President’s cabinet. ThePostal Service received:

Operational authority vested in aBoard of Governors and Postal Serviceexecutive management, rather than inCongress.

Authority to issue public bonds tofinance postal buildings and mecha-nization.

Direct collective bargaining betweenrepresentatives of management and theunions.

A new rate-setting procedure, builtaround an independent Postal RateCommission.

The Postal Reorganization Actchanged the United States postal systemin many ways.

Finances and ratesIt established an independent Postal RateCommission of five members, appointedby the U.S. President with the advice andconsent of the U.S. Senate, to recom-mend postal rates and mail classificationsfor adoption by the Postal ServiceGovernors. It authorized the Postal

Service to borrow money from the gener-al public and phased out the generalpublic service subsidy, which the PostalService ended earlier than required, lastaccepting an operational subsidy in 1982.It also authorized appropriations to reim-burse the Postal Service for carrying con-gressionally established categories of freeand reduced-rate mail and required thatrates for each class of mail cover directand indirect costs attributable to thatclass, plus a portion of institutional costs.

PersonnelIt established a postal career service, aframework that permits terms andconditions of employment to be setthrough collective bargaining. It alsoprohibited political recommendationsfor appointments within the PostalService. The Civil Service retirementprogram was retained.

Labor-management relationsThe act authorized collective bargainingon wages and working conditions underlaws applying to private industry andprovided for binding arbitration if animpasse persists 180 days after the start ofbargaining. The ban on strikes, applicableto all federal employees, remained. Theact authorized the National LaborRelations Board to determine properbargaining units, supervise representativeelections, and enforce the unfair laborpractices provisions. It also protected therights of all employees to form, join, orassist a labor organization or to refrainfrom such activity.

TransportationIt generally extended existing lawsgoverning transportation of mail, whileproviding some additional flexibility. Thedistinctions between various categories ofmotor carriers, previously contracted bythe Post Office Department, wereeliminated. The Civil Aeronautics Boardretained authority to regulate rates forairmail transportation, but the PostalService also was granted limited authorityto contract directly with the airlines forair transportation services.

United States Postal Service


PayThe act specified that the Postal Servicewould maintain compensation and ben-efits for its officers and employees com-parable to that offered by the privatesector for similar work. However, the actmandated that no officer or employeebe paid compensation at a rate higherthan a cabinet officer.

Postal Mechanization and EarlyAutomationAt the turn of the 20th century, despitegrowing mail volume and limited workspace, the Post Office Department reliedentirely on antiquated mailhandling

methods, such as the pigeonholemethod of letter sorting, a holdoverfrom colonial times. Although crudesorting machines were proposed byinventors of canceling machines in theearly 1900s and tested in the 1920s, theGreat Depression and World War IIpostponed widespread development ofmechanization until the mid-1950s.The Post Office Department then tookmajor steps toward mechanization byinitiating projects and awarding con-tracts for the development of a numberof machines and technologies. Theseincluded letter sorters, facer-cancelers,automatic address readers, parcel

Rates for Domestic Letters

Before the middle of the 19th cen-tury, rates were based on the number of sheets in a letter and thedistance it was traveling. In 1845,rates were based on the weight of

a letter and the distance it wasgoing. Beginning in 1863, domesticletter rates became "uniform," thatis, they were based solely onweight, regardless of distance.

Postage listed below is in cents.

Effective Date Per 1/2 Ounce

March 3, 1863 3March 3, 1883 2

Per Ounce

July 1, 1885 2November 3, 1917 3July 1, 1919 2July 6, 1932 3August 1, 1958 4January 7, 1963 5January 7, 1968 6May 16, 1971 8March 2, 1974 10

First Ounce Each Additional Ounce

September 14, 1975 10 9December 31, 1975 13 11May 29, 1978 15 13March 22, 1981 18 17November 1, 1981 20 17February 17, 1985 22 17April 3, 1988 25 20February 3, 1991 29 23January 1, 1995 32 23January 10, 1999 33 22January 7, 2001 34 21July 1, 2001 34 23June 30, 2002 37 23


Gehring Mail DistributingMachine, Washington, D.C.,1922Clerks tested new letter-sortingequipment to help speed mailservice.

sorters, advanced tray conveyors, flatsorters, and letter mail coding andstamp-tagging techniques.

The first semiautomatic parcel sort-ing machine was introduced inBaltimore in 1956. A year later, a for-eign-built multiposition letter sortingmachine (MPLSM), the Transorma, wasinstalled and tested for the first time inan American Post Office.

The first American-built lettersorter, based on a 1,000-pocketmachine adapted from a foreign design,was developed during the late 1950s.The first production contract was award-ed to the Burroughs Corporation for 10machines. The machine was successfullytested in Detroit in 1959 and eventuallybecame the backbone of letter-sortingoperations during the 1960s and 70s.

In 1959, the Post Office Departmentalso awarded its first volume order formechanization to Pitney-Bowes, Inc.,for the production of 75 Mark II facer-cancelers. In 1984, more than 1,000Mark II and M-36 facer-cancelers werein operation. By 1992, these machineswere outdated and replaced byadvanced facer-canceler systems (AFCS)purchased from ElectroCom L.P. TheAFCS processed more than 30,000

pieces of mail per hour, twice as fast asthe M-36 facer-cancelers. AFCSs elec-tronically identified and separated pre-barcoded mail, handwritten letters, andmachine-imprinted pieces for faster pro-cessing through automation.

The Department's accelerated mecha-nization program began in the late1960s and consisted of semiautomaticequipment such as the MPLSM, the sin-gle position letter sorting machine(SPLSM), and the facer-canceler. InNovember 1965, the Department put ahigh-speed optical character reader(OCR) into service in the Detroit PostOffice. This first-generation machinewas connected to an MPLSM frame andread the city/state/ZIP Code line oftyped addresses to sort letters to one of277 pockets. Subsequent handlings ofthe letter required that the address beread again.

Mechanization increased productivity.By the mid-1970s, however, it was clearthat cheaper, more efficient methodsand equipment were needed if thePostal Service was to offset rising costsassociated with growing mail volume.To reduce the number of mailpiece han-dlings, the Postal Service began to devel-op an expanded ZIP Code in 1978.


The new code required new equip-ment. In September 1982, the firstcomputer-driven, single-line OCR wasinstalled in Los Angeles. The equip-ment required a letter to be read onlyonce at the originating office by anOCR, which printed a barcode on theenvelope. At the destination PostOffice, a less expensive barcode sorter(BCS) sorted the mail by reading itsbarcode.

The Postal Service had begun todevelop an expanded ZIP Code offour add-on digits that would speedprocessing when coupled with newautomation capable of sortingmail to small geographic segments,such as city blocks or a singlebuilding.

Following the introduction of theZIP+4 code in 1983, the first deliveryphase of the new OCR channel sortersand BCSs was completed by mid-1984.

By the end of 1984, 252 OCRs wereinstalled in 118 major mail processingcenters across the country and wereprocessing an average of 6,200 piecesof mail per work hour — a substantialincrease compared to the 1,750 piecesper work hour processed by MPLSMs.

Zip+4 CodeThe ZIP+4 code added a hyphen andfour digits to the existing five-digit ZIPCode. The first five numbers continuedto identify an area of the country anddelivery office to which mail is direct-ed. The sixth and seventh numbersdenoted a delivery sector, which maybe several blocks, a group of streets, agroup of Post Office boxes, severaloffice buildings, a single high-rise officebuilding, a large apartment building, ora small geographic area. The last twonumbers denoted a delivery segment,which might be one floor of an office

City Letter Carriers,Mobile, Alabama, 1956City carriers sorted mail intodelivery sequence by hand until thelate 20th century.

ZIP+4 Code and BarcodeThe ZIP+4 code was introduced in1983. The markings in the barcodecorrespond to the numbers in theZIP+4 code.


Modern EquipmentTop: Delivery barcode sorter and itscrew of two. One person feeds instacks of letters, the other “sweeps”out sorted letters into trays in deliveryorder. Middle: An AFSM 100 sorts flats intotubs labeled with their destination.Bottom: The input subsystem on amultiline optical character reader tagsmail that needs further processing ata remote encoding center.

building, one side of a street betweenintersecting streets, specific depart-ments in a firm, or specific Post Officeboxes.

On October 1, 1983, the Governorsof the Postal Service approved priceincentives for First-Class Mail bearingthe ZIP+4 code.

The Automation AgeA new generation of equipment haschanged the way mail flows and hasimproved productivity. Advanced facer-canceler systems face, cancel and sortmail. Multiline optical character readers(MLOCRs) read the entire address onan envelope, spray a barcode on theenvelope, then sort it at a speed ofnine or more envelopes per second.Wide field of view cameras can read abarcode virtually anywhere on a letter.

The remote barcoding system(RBCS) processes images from lettermail that OCRs cannot read because ofprint quality or idiosyncratic handwrit-ing and transfers the information toremote encoding centers. First tested inTampa, Florida, in 1992, the centers nowprocess approximately 6 billion addressimages a year, versus 24 billion at theirpeak. Improved computer technologycan process more than 86 percent of alladdresses.

The ZIP+4 code has reduced thenumber of times a piece of mail is han-dled and has shortened the time carri-ers spend casing their mail (placing it inorder of delivery).

First tested in 1991, delivery pointbarcodes, which represent an 11-digitZIP Code, have virtually eliminatedthe need for carriers to case mailbecause it arrives in trays in the orderof delivery. The Postal Service hasinstalled more than 8,900 delivery bar-code sorters and carrier sequence bar-code sorters nationwide to perform thistask.

Letters constitute approximately 70 percent of United States mail, sothe Postal Service has given a greatdeal of attention to letter sortingequipment. Recently, the PostalService began automating systems toforward mail and process flats (largerpieces of mail that are sorted withoutbeing bent). The first fully automatedflat sorting machine (AFSM 100) for

processing periodicals and oversizedenvelopes was installed in Baltimore in1999. The AFSM 100 has a videoencoding feature to read addresses thatthe computer cannot decipher and tosend an image of the piece to a dataconversion operator at an RBCS site.The operator reads the address andkeys in the information that allows thepiece to be sorted properly.Deployment of the first AFSM 100sbegan in April 2000 and ended inApril 2002 with 534 systems installedat 229 mail processing facilities nation-wide. Each AFSM can process 300,000flats a day — almost three times asmany as the equipment it replaces.

In 1999, the Board of Governorsapproved funding to integrate roboticsinto its major processing plants. In2000 and 2001, 100 robotic container-ization systems were installed to auto-matically sort and load trays of mail tocontainers or pallets for transportation.

In 2002, the Postal Service initiateddeployment of the wide field of viewcamera to replace the wide area bar-code reader on delivery barcodesorters. The camera can read “electron-ic postage” and recognize barcodes oncertified mail, which will enable value-added services such as tracking andtracing a piece of mail from inductionto delivery.

Beyond the Processing PlantThe Postal Service has accelerated theinstallation of automated equipment inlobbies to better serve Post Office cus-tomers. In the 1990s, the backbone ofthis effort was the integrated retail ter-minal (IRT), a computer that incorpo-rates an electronic scale. It providesinformation to customers during atransaction and simplifies postalaccounting by consolidating data.Postage validation imprinters have beenattached to the IRTs to produce self-sticking postage labels with a barcodefor automated processing.

In 1998, the Postal Service startedrolling out the POS (Point of Service)ONE system. Eventually 60,000 retailterminals will be installed in 20,000facilities. By providing state-of-the-artcomputer technology and connectingretail units through phone lines orsatellite connections, POS ONE pro-


vides managers with real-time informa-tion and provides customers withfaster, more efficient service.

The Postal Service also has takenadvantage of personal computers tohelp small business and home officeusers. In March 1998, the Postal Serviceauthorized tests of PC Postage. Theseproducts, developed and distributed byUSPS-approved vendors, produceInformation Based Indicia, digitally-encoded, two-dimensional barcodes thatpostal customers can print directly ontoenvelopes or address labels. PC Postagegives customers access to postage 24hours a day, 7 days a week, from theconvenience of their home and officecomputers.

In March 1999, the Postal Servicelaunched Delivery Confirmation toprovide the date, time, and ZIP Codeof delivery for Priority Mail andparcels. Customers call a toll-free num-ber or visit the Postal Service’s Web sitefor this information. More than300,000 handheld scanners have beendeployed to letter carriers to supportDelivery Confirmation. In 2001, thePostal Service added SignatureConfirmation, allowing customers torequest a copy of the signature of theindividual who received the mailpiece.

In 2002, the Postal Service officiallylaunched Confirm service to providetracking information to participatingletter and flat mailers. Mailers print anidentifying barcode, known as a PLANET Code, on their mail.Automated equipment reads the bar-code and makes information availableto the mailer via the Internet on thetime, place, and operation that handledthe mail. ■

Flat-sortingPostal Service employees load flats into an AutomatedFlat Sorting Machine (AFSM) 100 for sorting.

The Postal Service Board of Governors


The Board of Governors was estab-lished by the Postal Reorganization Actof August 12, 1970. The Boardincludes nine Governors who areappointed by the President with theadvice and consent of the Senate. Thenine Governors select a PostmasterGeneral, who becomes a member ofthe Board, and those ten select aDeputy Postmaster General, who alsoserves on the Board. The PostmasterGeneral serves at the pleasure of theGovernors for an indefinite term. TheDeputy Postmaster General serves atthe pleasure of the Governors and thePostmaster General.

The Governors are chosen to rep-resent the public interest and cannotbe representatives of special interests.Not more than five of the nine maybelong to the same political party. ThePostmaster General and the DeputyPostmaster General participate withthe Governors on all matters exceptthat they may not vote on rate or clas-sification adjustments, adjustments tothe budget of the Postal RateCommission, selection and removal ofthe Inspector General, and election ofthe Chairman of the Board. While theentire Board approves requests to theindependent Postal Rate Commission

for changes in rates and classes ofmail, the Governors alone, uponreceiving a recommendation from theCommission, may approve, allowunder protest, reject, or modify thatrecommendation. The entire Boarddetermines the dates on which newrates and classification adjustmentsbecome effective.

The Board directs the exercise ofthe powers of the Postal Service,directs and controls its expenditures,reviews its practices, conducts long-range planning, and sets policies on allpostal matters. The Board takes upmatters such as service standards,capital investments, and facilities proj-ects exceeding $10 million. It alsoapproves officer compensation.

The first nine appointments werefor staggered terms of 1 to 9 years.Subsequent appointments have beenmade for a full 9 years or, whenvacancies have occurred, for theremainder of the unexpired terms.Each Governor’s term expires onDecember 8 of a given year.Governors may continue to serve fol-lowing expiration of their term until asuccessor is appointed, but not formore than 1 year.

Each January, the Governors electa Chairman of the Board to organizeand conduct their meetings. There arethree standing committees: Audit andFinance, Capital Projects, andStrategic Planning. The Governorsemploy a full-time secretary, whoserves as the primary staff assistant tothe Board and is generally responsiblefor coordinating the resources of thePostal Service so that the Board fulfillsits statutory duties in the most efficientand informed manner possible.

The Board of Governors meetsmonthly, usually on the first Mondayand Tuesday of the month. Meetinglocations are generally in Washington,D.C., but may be scheduled in someother city where the members can seea Postal Service or large mailer’s oper-ation firsthand. All meetings are opento the public, unless the Board specifi-cally votes to close all or part of ameeting in line with exemptions per-mitted by the Government in theSunshine Act [5 U.S.C. 552 b (b)].Each Governor receives $300 per dayfor not more than 42 days of meetingseach year and travel expenses, inaddition to an annual salary of$30,000.

The Capitol

Date Appointed

Theodore W. Braun January 11, 1971

Charles H. Codding January 11, 1971

Patrick E. Haggerty January 11, 1971

Andrew D. Holt January 11, 1971

George E. Johnson January 11, 1971

Frederick R. Kappel January 11, 1971

Elmer T. Klassen January 11, 1971

Crocker Nevin* January 11, 1971

Myron A. Wright January 11, 1971

John Y. Ing June 22, 1972

Robert E. Holding October 26, 1972

Hayes Robertson May 14, 1974

William A. Irvine March 3, 1975

Hung Wai Ching August 5, 1976

Robert L. Hardesty August 16, 1976

William J. Sullivan January 12, 1979

Richard R. Allen October 5, 1979

George W. Camp October 5, 1979

Paula D. Hughes August 19, 1980

David E. Babcock August 20, 1980

Timothy L. Jenkins August 20, 1980

Wallace N. Hyde December 31, 1980

John R. McKean March 9, 1982

Date Appointed

Peter E. Voss July 28, 1982

John L. Ryan May 10, 1983

Ruth O. Peters December 2, 1983

Frieda Waldman January 6, 1984

John N. Griesemer December 12, 1984

J. H. Tyler McConnell December 18, 1985

Robert Setrakian December 18, 1985

Crocker Nevin* August 15, 1986

Norma Pace May 21, 1987

Ira D. Hall November 23, 1987

Tirso del Junco, M.D. July 15, 1988

Susan E. Alvarado July 15, 1988

Bert H. Mackie December 9, 1988

LeGree S. Daniels August 6, 1990

Sam Winters November 23, 1991

Einar V. Dyhrkopp November 24, 1993

S. David Fineman May 26, 1995

Robert F. Rider May 26, 1995

Ned R. McWherter October 2, 1995

Ernesta Ballard November 13, 1997

John F. Walsh November 16, 1999

Alan C. Kessler November 3, 2000

Albert V. Casey August 6, 2002

Governors of the Postal Service

* Crocker Nevin served two separate terms.



The Post Office Department’s Citizens’Stamp Advisory Committee wasestablished March 21, 1957, byOrders of the Postmaster General56304 and 56305, to provide abreadth of judgment and depth ofexperience in various areas whichinfluence the subject matter, character,and beauty of postage stamps. Asannounced in the Federal Register ofTuesday, March 26, 1957:

The Stamp Advisory Committeeshall advise the Post OfficeDepartment on any matters pertainingto the subject matter, design, produc-tion and issuance of postage stamps.

The initial seven-member commit-tee was appointed by PostmasterGeneral Arthur E. Summerfield onMarch 26, 1957. Those serving wereDeputy Director of the United StatesInformation Agency, AbbottWashburn; three well-knownphilatelists — Franklin R. Bruns, Jr.,Sol Glass, and Harry L. Lindquist; andthree artists — Arnold Copeland,president of Westport Artists, Inc.;Ervine Metzl, president of the Societyof Illustrators; and William H. Buckley,president of the New York ArtDirectors Club. Franklin Bruns servedas the first chairman.

The artists were enthusiasticabout the committee and the conceptof using the skills of members fromtheir groups to help design UnitedStates postage stamps. (The com-bined memberships of the threegroups included an estimated 95 per-cent of all commercial artists in thecountry.) All three artists played animportant role in improving postagestamp designs by helping the PostOffice Department transition from neartotal reliance upon the Bureau ofEngraving and Printing to commercialartists.

The first meeting of the Citizens’Stamp Advisory Committee wasopened by Postmaster GeneralSummerfield on April 30, 1957. As

one of its first orders of business, theCommittee decided to establish stan-dards for the selection of subjects forcommemorative stamps.

These guidelines have beenchanged, as needed, over the years,and currently include the following:

It is a general policy that U.S.postage stamps and sta-tionery primarily will featureAmerican or American-relat-ed subjects.

No living person shall behonored by portrayal on U.S.postage.

Commemorative stampsor postal stationery items hon-oring individuals usually willbe issued on, or in conjunc-tion with, significant anniver-saries of their birth, but nopostal item will be issuedsooner than 10 years after theindividual’s death. The onlyexception to the 10-year ruleis the issuance of stamps hon-oring deceased United StatesPresidents. They may be hon-ored with a memorial stampon the first birth anniversaryfollowing death.

Events of historical signifi-cance shall be considered forcommemoration only onanniversaries in multiples of50 years.

Only events, persons, andthemes of widespreadnational appeal andsignificance will be consid-ered for commemoration.Events, persons, or themesof local or regional signifi-cance may be recognized bya philatelic or special postalcancellation, which may bearranged through the localPostmaster.

Citizens’ StampAdvisoryCommittee

Stamps recommended by theCitizens’ Stamp AdvisoryCommittee and approved by thePostmaster General for issuancein 2003, commemorated,clockwise from the top: theKorean War Veterans Memorial inWashington, D.C.; author ZoraNeale Hurston; lighthouses of theSoutheast; American reptiles andamphibians; Ohio statehood; andlabor activist Cesar E. Chavez.


Stamps or stationery itemsshall not be issued to honorfraternal, political, sectarian,or service/charitable organi-zations. Stamps or sta-tionery shall not be issued topromote or advertise com-mercial enterprises or prod-ucts. Commercial productsor enterprises might be usedto illustrate more generalconcepts related toAmerican culture.

Stamps or stationery itemsshall not be issued to honorcities, towns, municipalities,counties, primary or second-ary schools, hospitals,libraries, or similar institu-tions. Due to the limitationsplaced on annual postal pro-grams and the vast numberof such locales, organiza-tions, and institutions inexistence, it would be diffi-cult to single out any one forcommemoration.

Requests for observance ofstatehood anniversaries willbe considered for commem-orative postage stamps onlyat intervals of 50 years fromthe date of the state's firstentry into the Union.Requests for observance ofother state-related or region-al anniversaries will be con-sidered only as subjects forpostal stationery and againonly at intervals of 50 yearsfrom the date of the event.

Stamps or stationery itemsshall not be issued to honorreligious institutions or indi-viduals whose principalachievements are associatedwith religious undertakingsor beliefs.

Semipostal stamps aredesigned to raise funds forcauses determined to be inthe national public interestand appropriate. Semipostalstamps are sold for a priceabove their postage value.The difference between thesales price and the postagevalue of semipostal stampsconsists of an amount (lessa deduction for the PostalService’s reasonable costs)to be given to other execu-tive agencies in furtheranceof specified causes. ThePostal Service issues semipostals in accordancewith legislation.

Requests for commemora-tion of universities and otherinstitutions of higher educa-tion shall be considered onlyfor stamped cards and onlyin connection with the 200thanniversaries of their found-ing.

No stamp shall be consid-ered for issuance if onetreating the same subjecthas been issued in the past50 years. The only excep-tions to this rule are tradi-tional themes such asnational symbols and holi-days.

In November 1960, PostmasterGeneral Summerfield approved theBenjamin Franklin Award, then in theform of a certificate for members ofCongress, special advisory groups,or employees making a contributionto the Post Office Department notconnected with official employment.On December 15 of that year, mem-bers of the Citizens’ Stamp AdvisoryCommittee received the firstBenjamin Franklin awards in appreci-

ation for the distinguished and out-standing public service each ren-dered as a member of the Citizens'Stamp Advisory Committee.

Today, the Committee consists ofup to 15 members appointed by thePostmaster General. The membersshare a respect for philately and areexperts on history, science and tech-nology, art, education, sports, andother subjects of public interest.

The Committee meets four timesa year to review suggestions for newpostage stamps. Committee mem-bers receive travel expenses andnongovernment members receive ameeting stipend. Most subjects cho-sen to appear on stamps and postalstationery are suggested by the pub-lic. The Postal Service receivesapproximately 50,000 proposalseach year. Every proposal is consid-ered.

The Committee's primary goal isto select subjects that are both inter-esting and educational for recom-mendation to the PostmasterGeneral, who decides which stampswill be issued.

Besides recommending new sub-jects for commemorative stampseach year, the Committee also sug-gests subjects for the extensive lineof regular stamps. The Committeeconsiders the interests of stamp col-lectors as well as all citizens andlooks for subjects that will stand thetest of time, be consistent with pub-lic opinion, and have broad nationalappeal.

Ideas for stamp subjects shouldbe addressed to:

The Citizens' Stamp AdvisoryCommittee

Stamp DevelopmentUnited States Postal ServiceRoom 5670475 L'Enfant Plaza, SWWashington, DC 20260-2437

Despite improved technology,the Postal Service faced mount-ing financial and competitive

pressures in the late 20th century.Following a decade of prosperity in the1980s that saw a dramatic increase inmail volume, the nation entered a peri-od of slower economic growth in the1990s. Bankruptcies, consolidations,and a general restructuring of the mar-ketplace reduced the flow of businessmail. In 1991, overall mail volumedropped for the first time in 15 years.The following year, volume rose onlyslightly, and the Postal Service narrowlyavoided the first back-to-back declinesin mail volume since the GreatDepression.

Competition grew for every postalproduct. The rise of electronic commu-nications and other technologiesoffered alternatives for conveying state-ments, payments, and personal mes-sages. Private companies continued todominate the market for the urgentdelivery of mail and packages.

To become more competitive, thePostal Service began to change andrestructure. In 1990, the Postal Serviceawarded two contracts to private firmsto independently measure First-ClassMail service and customer satisfaction.The Postal Service also began to workmore closely with customers to identifyways to better meet their needs andexpanded customer conveniences suchas stamps on consignment. With thehelp of business mailers, the PostalService continued support for ratesreflecting customer work-sharing fea-tures, many tied to automation, to givecustomers more flexibility. At the same

time, the PostalService beganimplementingConsumerAdvisoryCouncils,

groups ofcitizenswho vol-unteeredto work

with local postal management on postalissues of interest to the community. Thename was changed to CustomerAdvisory Councils and, as of December2002, 212 were in place.

In the summer of 1992, followingthe appointment of Marvin Runyon asPostmaster General, the Postal Servicecreated a new organizational structurethat replaced 5 regions and 73 fielddivisions with 10 areas and 85 districts.

In 1993, the Postal Service awardedcontracts for two additional externalmeasurement systems, one to surveysatisfaction levels of business mailers,the other to track service performanceof third-class mail. Service performanceresults now are measured through theTransit Time Measurement System,which includes External First-Class(EXFC) and Priority End to End(PETE) measurements, among others.

In 1996, the Office of the InspectorGeneral (OIG) was created by law.Reporting directly to the postalGovernors, the OIG conducts inde-pendent financial audits, evaluations,and investigations of postal programsand operations to prevent fraud, waste,and abuse [5 U.S.C. app.3 § 8(g)].

Transformation PlanThe law that created today’s PostalService, the Postal Reorganization Actof 1970, placed the organization on abusinesslike footing by making postaloperations self-sufficient. The newbusiness environment led to unparal-leled levels of service and efficiency. In2002, the Postal Service improved serv-ice to record levels while aggressivelyholding the line on expenses. Volumedeclined, yet total factor productivityrose. By the end of 2002, the PostalService delivered 22 billion morepieces of mail to 12 million moreaddresses than it did in 1995 with thesame number of employees. However,technological and commercial trendshave been reshaping national andinternational services for collecting,transporting, and delivering all typesof postal products. At stake is the right


Competition and Change

The Transformation Plan“We are continuing our strongperformance focus, making thechanges that are possible within theframework of the existing legislationand working with the Administrationand Congress to bring aboutlegislative reform to achieve thistransformation.”

— Postmaster General John E. Potter

of every American to send and receivemail.

The Postal Service, with the assis-tance of stakeholders, created a com-prehensive Transformation Plan. It wassubmitted to Congress and theAmerican people in April 2002 andcontains views on the steps that mustbe taken now and the long-termoptions that appear feasible, as a deci-sive response to the challenges of a newcentury.

The Transformation Plan is a blue-print for the future of the Postal Service.It contains specific strategies that willfoster growth by increasing the value ofpostal products and services to cus-tomers, improve operational efficiency,and enhance a performance-based cul-ture.

The plan identified actions the PostalService can take — and is taking — withinthe context of existing law; moderate,short-term legislative change; and long-term structural change to ensure a soundpostal system for years to come.

Funding Civil Service Retirement In November 2002, the Office ofManagement and Budget announcedthat the Postal Service had almost fullyfunded its obligation to the CivilService Retirement System (CSRS).

Separate audits conducted by theOffice of Personnel Management andGeneral Accounting Office found that,without a change in law, the PostalService would overpay its CSRS obli-gation by more than $78 million, coststhat would have come from postageand fees paid by postal customers.

A change to the law would notaffect the benefits of current or futurepostal retirees covered by CSRS butwould provide the Postal Service withthe means to reduce debt and stabilizepostage rates until at least 2006.

Subsequent bipartisan legislation toallow the Postal Service to reduce itspayments to CSRS would later besigned into law.

President’s Commission on thePostal ServiceThe last presidential commission met in1967. By 1970, Congress subsidized 25percent of postal costs and the PostOffice Department was in the red. In

August 1970, the Postal ReorganizationAct was passed, creating the U.S. PostalService under the basic economicassumption that continuing growth inmail volume and revenue would sup-port continued infrastructure growth.Today, that regulatory model is nolonger valid. In a March 2001 letter tothe President, the Postal ServiceGovernors said that significant statutoryreform would be necessary for theorganization to continue to provideconsistent and satisfactory levels of uni-versal service to the American people.

We are at a point in our history when it’stime for the next phase in postal evolution.And this time we need help.

— Postmaster General John E. Potter

President George W. Bush issued anexecutive order on December 11, 2002,establishing the President’sCommission on the Postal Service.

The task of the nine-member bipar-tisan Commission was to identify theoperational, structural, and financial


The President’s Commissionon the United States PostalServiceThe nine-member bipartisancommission was tasked withidentifying the challenges facing thePostal Service, examining possiblesolutions, and charting a course to amore robust financial foundation.


challenges facing the Postal Service;examine potential solutions; and charta course to help build a healthierfinancial foundation. PostmasterGeneral Potter described the work ofthe Commission as consistent with —and complementary to — the PostalService’s Transformation Plan.

The Commission’s agenda includedgathering input from postal stakehold-ers, including congressional leaders,union officials, Postal Service employ-ees, customers, and other representa-tives of the nation’s $900 billion mail-ing industry. The Commission’s chartercalled for the preparation of a report tothe President in 2003 that would artic-ulate a proposed vision for the futureof the Postal Service and recommendlegislative and administrative reformsneeded to ensure its future viability.

Commission membersHarry Pearce and James Johnson werenamed as Commission co-chairs.Pearce is chairman of the board ofHughes Electronics. Johnson is vicechairman of Perseus, L.L.C.

Other members included RichardLevin, president, Yale University;Dionel Avilés, president, AvilesEngineering; Don Cogman, chairman,CC Investments; Carolyn Gallagher,former CEO, Texwood Furniture;Norman Seabrook, president, New YorkCity Correction Officers’ BenevolentAssociation; Robert Walker, CEO,Wexler Group; and Joseph Wright,CEO, PanAmSat.

Industry support for theCommissionMailing industry groups have praisedthe creation of the Commission.Among many endorsing the commis-sion were the Direct MarketingAssociation (DMA), Alliance ofNonprofit Mailers, MagazinePublishers of America, MailersCouncil, and Newspaper Associationof America.

Dealing With the UnimaginableOn September 11, 2001, terroristsattacked the United States, killingthousands. The Postal Service helpedkeep the lines of communication opendespite severe restrictions on commer-

The Postmaster General’s Medalof Freedom was created in 2001to recognize outstanding individualcontributions tothe PostalService.The firstrecipientsof themedalwereThomasMorris, Jr.,and JosephCurseen, Jr.Both men worked at theBrentwood mail processing facility in Washington, D.C., andboth died in October 2001 ofinhalation anthrax. The medalswere presented to their widowsduring a memorial service held intheir honor by the Postal Service.

The Postmaster General’sMedal of Freedom honored Mr.Morris and Mr. Curseen for makingthe ultimate sacrifice as theyserved others.

Thomas Morris, Jr.

Joseph Curseen, Jr.

Medal of Freedom


Postal Seals

1837–1970 1970–Present

Postal Corporate Signature 1993–Present

InscriptionsContrary to popular belief, the UnitedStates Postal Service has no officialmotto. However, a number of postalbuildings contain inscriptions, themost familiar of which appear in NewYork City and Washington, D.C.

General Post Office, New YorkCity, 8th Avenue and 33rd StreetNeither snow nor rain nor heat norgloom of night stays these couriersfrom the swift completion of theirappointed rounds.

From the works of Herodotusdescribing the expedition of theGreeks against the Persians underCyrus, about 500 B.C. The Persiansoperated a system of mounted postalcouriers who performed with greatfidelity.

Former Washington, D.C., CityPost Office, MassachusettsAvenue and North Capitol Street,now the site of the SmithsonianInstitution's National PostalMuseum

Messenger of Sympathy and Love

Servant of Parted FriendsConsoler of the LonelyBond of the Scattered FamilyEnlarger of the Common Life Carrier of News and KnowledgeInstrument of Trade and IndustryPromoter of Mutual AcquaintanceOf Peace and of Goodwill Among

Men and NationsFrom “The Letter,” by Dr. Charles

W. Eliot, former president of HarvardUniversity, as revised by PresidentWoodrow Wilson.

SealMercury, a post rider, and now theeagle have symbolized the U.S.postal system at various times.

In 1782, Postmaster GeneralEbenezer Hazard used the figure ofMercury, the messenger of the godsand the god of commerce and travelin Roman mythology. The seal wasmodified in 1808, to include a ser-pent-entwined staff and in 1824, toraise Mercury’s right hand.

The official seal used by the PostOffice Department from 1837 to 1970pictured, as directed by PostmasterGeneral Amos Kendall, “a Post Horsein speed, with Mail-bags and rider,encircled by the words ‘Post OfficeDepartment, United States ofAmerica.’”43

When President Nixon signed thePostal Reorganization Act into lawon August 12, 1970, the bald eaglebecame the center of the PostalService seal. The eagle was poisedfor flight on a white field, above redand blue bars framing the words“U.S. Mail,” which were in black. The ochre border featured the words“United States Postal Service” onthree sides and nine five-pointedstars at the base. The stars had nospecial symbolism.

On October 12, 1993, PostmasterGeneral Marvin Runyon unveiled anew corporate logo, an eagle’s headin white leaning into the wind, on ablue background. The 1993 corporatelogo became a registered trademarkon September 12, 1995. It has notreplaced the 1970 postal seal as theofficial seal of the United States PostalService.

Postal Insignia

1782–1837

cial air operations during this tragictime.

As the Postal Service dealt withthese challenges, a photo editor inBoca Raton, Florida, died from inhala-tion anthrax on October 5, 2001. Noone knew how he contracted the dis-ease, the first known case in theUnited States since 1976. A week later,a media employee in New York Citywas diagnosed with cutaneous anthraxafter opening a letter addressed to anNBC anchorman. On October 15,2001, a letter postmarked in Trenton,New Jersey, was delivered to theCapitol Hill office of a U.S. Senator.The letter claimed to contain anthrax,and this proved to be true. The PostalService then went to work with otheragencies to deal with bioterrorism.

The Postal Service announced theformation of a mail security taskforce, headed by the Chief PostalInspector; authorized its employees towear protective gear; and consideredways to sanitize mail, including irradi-ating it with electron beams. ThePostal Service also notified people atevery mailing address about how toidentify and handle suspicious lettersand packages.

On October 21, 2001, Joseph P.Curseen, Jr., an employee at theBrentwood postal facility inWashington, D.C., that handled mailfor Capitol Hill, was diagnosed withinhalation anthrax. That night, anotheremployee, Thomas L. Morris, Jr., diedfrom inhalation anthrax. The nextmorning, Curseen also died frominhalation anthrax.

Postmaster General John E. Potterannounced the sad news, then stated:

800,000 Postal Service employees areusing everything they’ve learned, doingeverything humanly possible, to keep themail safe and keep it moving. And we’redetermined not to let terrorists stop us.42

By October 27, anthrax spores hadbeen detected in other locations. Alltold, at least five deaths and severalcases of anthrax poisoning are known.

The Postal Service continues towork to strengthen the security of themail. ■

Postmasters General


Benjamin Franklin July 26, 1775 Continental CongressRichard Bache November 7, 1776Ebenezer Hazard January 28, 1782 Samuel Osgood September 26, 1789 George WashingtonTimothy Pickering August 12, 1791Joseph Habersham February 25, 1795

Joseph Habersham … John AdamsJoseph Habersham … Thomas Jefferson

Gideon Granger November 28, 1801Gideon Granger … James Madison

Return J. Meigs, Jr. March 17, 1814 Return J. Meigs, Jr. … James Monroe

John McLean June 26, 1823 John McLean … John Quincy Adams

William T. Barry March 9, 1829 Andrew JacksonAmos Kendall May 1, 1835

Amos Kendall … Martin Van BurenJohn M. Niles May 19, 1840 Francis Granger March 6, 1841 William Henry Harrison

Francis Granger … John TylerCharles A. Wickliffe September 13, 1841 Cave Johnson March 6, 1845 James K. PolkJacob Collamer March 8, 1849 Zachary TaylorNathan Kelsey Hall July 23, 1850 Millard FilmoreSamuel D. Hubbard August 31, 1852 James Campbell March 7, 1853 Franklin PierceAaron V. Brown March 6, 1857 James BuchananJoseph Holt March 14, 1859 Horatio King February 12, 1861 Montgomery Blair March 5, 1861 Abraham LincolnWilliam Dennison September 24, 1864

William Dennison … Andrew JohnsonAlexander W. Randall July 25, 1866 John A. J. Creswell March 5, 1869 Ulysses GrantJames W. Marshall July 3, 1874Marshall Jewell August 24, 1874 James N. Tyner July 12, 1876 David M. Key March 12, 1877 Rutherford B. HayesHorace Maynard August 26, 1880 Thomas L. James March 5, 1881 James A. Garfield

Thomas L. James … Chester A. ArthurTimothy O. Howe December 20, 1881 Walter Q. Gresham April 3, 1883 Frank Hatton October 14, 1884

A list of Postmasters General and the names of those who appointed them fol-lows. All appointments by the President were made with the advice and consentof the Senate. Dates prior to 1900 are the dates the Postmasters General wereappointed or commissioned. Dates after 1900 are the dates the PostmastersGeneral took office. Italics indicate a carryover from the previous administration.

Postmaster General Date Appointed by


William F. Vilas March 6, 1885 Grover ClevelandDon M. Dickinson January 16, 1888 John Wanamaker March 5, 1889 Benjamin HarrisonWilson S. Bissell March 6, 1893 Grover ClevelandWilliam L. Wilson March 1, 1895 James A. Gary March 5, 1897 William McKinleyCharles Emory Smith April 21, 1898

Charles Emory Smith … Theodore RooseveltHenry C. Payne January 15, 1902 Robert J. Wynne October 10, 1904George B. Cortelyou March 7, 1905George von L. Meyer March 5, 1907 Frank H. Hitchcock March 6, 1909 William H. TaftAlbert S. Burleson March 5, 1913 Woodrow WilsonWill H. Hays March 4, 1921 Warren G. HardingHubert Work March 4, 1922 Harry S. New March 5, 1923

Harry S. New … Calvin CoolidgeWalter F. Brown March 6, 1929 Herbert HooverJames A. Farley March 6, 1933 Franklin D. RooseveltFrank C. Walker September 11, 1940

Frank C. Walker … Harry S. TrumanRobert E. Hannegan June 30, 1945 Jesse M. Donaldson December 16, 1947 Arthur E. Summerfield January 21, 1953 Dwight D. EisenhowerJ. Edward Day January 21, 1961 John F. KennedyJohn A. Gronouski September 30, 1963

John A. Gronouski … Lyndon B. JohnsonLawrence F. O'Brien November 3, 1965 W. Marvin Watson April 26, 1968 Winton M. Blount January 22, 1969 Richard M. Nixon

Appointed by the Governors of the United States Postal Service

Winton M. Blount July 1, 1971 E. T. Klassen January 1, 1972 Benjamin F. Bailar February 16, 1975William F. Bolger March 15, 1978 Paul N. Carlin January 1, 1985 Albert V. Casey January 7, 1986 Preston R. Tisch August 16, 1986 Anthony M. Frank March 1, 1988 Marvin T. Runyon July 6, 1992William J. Henderson May 16, 1998John E. Potter June 1, 2001

Postmaster General Date Appointed by


1789 … 75 $ 7,510 $ 7,560

Income and expenses listed for 1789 are for 3 months only.

1790 … 75 37,935 32,140

1795 … 453 160,620 117,893

1800 … 903 280,804 213,994

1805 … 1,558 421,373 377,367

1810 … 2,300 551,684 495,969

1815 … 3,000 1,043,065 748,121

1820 … 4,500 1,111,927 1,160,926

1825 … 5,677 1,306,525 1,229,043

1830 … 8,450 1,850,583 1,932,708

1835 … 10,770 2,993,556 2,757,350

1840 … 13,468 4,543,522 4,718,236

1845 … 14,183 4,289,842 4,320,732

1850 … 18,417 5,499,985 5,212,953

1855 … 24,410 6,642,136 9,968,342

1860 … 28,498 8,518,067 14,874,601

1865 … 28,882 14,556,159 13,694,728

1870 … 28,492 18,879,537 23,998,838

1875 … 35,547 26,791,314 33,611,309

1880 … 42,989 33,315,479 36,542,804

1885 … 51,252 42,560,844 50,046,235

1890 4,005,408,000 62,401 60,882,098 66,259,548

1895 5,134,281,000 70,064 76,983,128 87,179,551

1900 7,129,990,000 76,688 102,353,579 107,740,268

1905 10,187,506,000 68,131 152,826,585 167,399,169

1910 14,850,103,000 59,580 224,128,658 229,977,225

Pieces of Mail Number of Total Operating Total OperatingYear Handled Post Offices Revenue Expenses

Statistics: Pieces & Post Offices


1915 … 56,380 $ 287,248,165 $ 298,546,026

1920 … 52,641 437,150,212 454,322,609

1925 … 50,957 599,591,478 639,281,648

1930 27,887,823,000 49,063 705,484,098 803,667,219

1935 22,331,752,000 45,686 630,795,302 696,503,235

1940 27,749,467,000 44,024 766,948,627 807,629,180

1945 37,912,067,000 41,792 1,314,240,132 1,145,002,246

1950 45,063,737,000 41,464 1,677,486,967 2,222,949,000

1955 55,233,564,000 38,316 2,349,476,528 2,712,150,214

1960 63,674,604,000 35,238 3,276,588,433 3,873,952,908

1965 71,873,166,000 33,624 4,483,389,833 5,275,839,877

1970 84,881,833,000 32,002 6,472,737,791 7,982,551,936

Effective July 1, 1971, the Post Office Department was transformed into the United StatesPostal Service, an independent establishment of the executive branch of the Governmentof the United States.

1971 86,983,000,000 31,947 8,751,484,000 8,955,264,000

1975 89,265,979,000 30,754 11,548,104,000 12,574,205,000

1980 106,311,062,000 30,326 18,752,915,000 19,412,587,000

1985 140,097,956,000 29,557 28,705,691,000 29,207,201,000

1990 166,300,770,000 28,959 39,654,830,000 40,489,884,000

1995 180,733,700,000 28,392 54,293,500,000 50,730,200,000

2000 207,882,200,000 27,876 64,540,000,000 62,992,000,000

2002 202,821,900,000 27,791 66,463,000,000 65,234,000,000

Pieces of Mail Number of Total Operating Total OperatingYear Handled Post Offices Revenue Expenses


Significant Years in U.S. Postal History

1874 General Postal Union established(later Universal Postal Union)

1879 Domestic mail divided into fourclasses

1880 Congress established title ofChief Post Office Inspector

1885 Special delivery began

1887 International Parcel Postinstituted

1893 First commemorative stampsissued

1896 Rural free delivery beganexperimentally

1898 Private postcards authorized

1902 Rural free delivery becamepermanent service

1911 Postal Savings System started

First carriage of mail by airplanesanctioned by the Post OfficeDepartment

1912 Village delivery offered

1913 Parcel Post began

Insurance offered

Collect on delivery (COD)offered

1914 Government-owned and -operated vehicle serviceinstituted

1916 Postal inspectors solve last knownstagecoach robbery

1918 Scheduled airmail service began

Non-profit second-class rateseffective

1920 Metered postage authorized

1924 Scheduled transcontinentalairmail service began

1925 Special handling offered

1927 International airmail began

1935 Trans-Pacific airmail began

1939 Trans-Atlantic airmail began

Autogiro service startedexperimentally

1941 Highway Post Offices started

1942 V-mail inaugurated

1943 Postal zoning system began in124 large Post Offices

1948 Domestic and International AirParcel Post inaugurated

1950 Residential deliveries reduced toonce a day

1952 Non-profit third-class rateseffective

1953 Piggy-back mail service by trailersor railroad flatcars started

1955 Certified mail introduced

1957 Citizens’ Stamp AdvisoryCommittee created

1959 Missile mail dispatched fromsubmarine to mainland Florida

1960 Facsimile mail offered

1963 ZIP Code and sectional centerplan implemented

1964 Self-service Post Offices openPostmark simplified

1965 Optical scanner (ZIP Codereader) tested

1966 Postal Savings System terminated

1967 Presorting by ZIP Code becamemandatory for second- and third-class mailers

1968 Priority Mail established as asubclass of First-Class Mail

1969 Patronage eliminated inPostmaster and rural carrierappointments

1970 Postal Reorganization Act signed

Express Mail beganexperimentally

MAILGRAM instituted

1971 United States Postal Servicebegan operations

Postmaster General no longer inCabinet

Labor contract negotiatedthrough collective bargaining, afirst for the federal government

National service standardsestablished

Letter cancelled on moon byApollo 15 mission

1639 Richard Fairbanks’ tavern inBoston named repository foroverseas mail

1775 Benjamin Franklin was appointedfirst Postmaster General underContinental Congress

1777 Continental Congress authorizedappointment of an inspector ofdead letters

1789 Samuel Osgood was appointedfirst Postmaster General underConstitution

1823 Navigable waters designated postroads by Congress

1829 Postmaster General joinedCabinet

1830 Office of Instructions and MailDepredations established, laterbecame Office of the ChiefPostal Inspector

1838 Railroads designated post routesby Congress

1845 Act of Congress created starroutes

1847 U.S. postage stamps issued

1853 Stamped envelopes issued

1855 Registered Mail began

Prepayment of postage required

1858 Street letter boxes installed

1860 Pony Express started

1862 Railway Mail Service beganexperimentally

1863 Free city delivery instituted

Postage rates became uniform,regardless of distance

Domestic mail divided into threeclasses

1864 Post offices categorized by class

Railway Mail Service inaugurated

Postal money order systemcreated

1869 International money ordersoffered

1872 Congress enacted Mail FraudStatute

1873 U.S. postal cards issued


1972 Stamps by mail instituted

Passport applications accepted inPost Offices

1973 National service standardsexpanded

1974 Highway Post Offices terminated

Satellite transmission ofMAILGRAMs began

Self-adhesive stamps introduced

1975 Post Office class categorieseliminated

1976 Discount offered for presortedFirst-Class Mail

1977 Airmail abolished as a separaterate category

Express Mail became permanentnew class of service

Final run of Railroad Post Officeon June 30

1978 Discount offered for presortedsecond-class mail

Postage stamps and otherphilatelic items copyrighted

1979 Discount offered for presortedbulk third-class mail

Postal Career Executive Service(PCES) established

New size standards implemented

1980 INTELPOST (high-speedinternational electronic messageservice) began

1981 Controlled circulationclassification discontinued

Discount offered for First-ClassMail presorted to carrier routes

1982 Automation began withinstallation of optical characterreaders

E-COM (Electronic Computer-Originated Mail) offered

Last year Postal Service receivedpublic service subsidy

1983 ZIP+4 code instituted

1984 Integrated retail terminalsautomated postal windows

1985 E-COM terminated

1986 Field divisions created

1987 Stamps by Phone available

Multiline optical characterreaders ordered

1988 Small parcel and bundle sortersdeployed

Delivery point sequenceprocessing began

1989 First Postal Store opened

1990 International business reply mailoffered

Easy Stamp allowed computerpurchase of stamps

Independent measurement ofFirst-Class Mail serviceimplemented

Wide area barcode sorters added

1992 Remote barcoding systemintroduced

Area and district offices createdfor customer service and mailprocessing

Stamps sold through automaticteller machines

Flats barcoded for automatedsorting

1993 New corporate logo introduced

Postal Service sold First DayCovers

National Postal Museum openedin Washington, D.C.

1996 Classification reform enacted

Standard Mail category created

Inspector General appointed byGovernors

Postal Service released automatedpostage software via Internet

Self-adhesive coil stamps sold

1997 Postal Service launched publicInternet site

Robotic containerization systemsdeployed

Flat-sorters modified to handlenewspapers and magazines

Linerless self-adhesive coil stampsoffered

StampsOnline instituted

1998 U.S. semipostal stamp issued

1999 Delivery Confirmation launched

PC Postage introduced

Resolve Employment DisputesReach Equitable SolutionsSwiftly (REDRESS) implemented

POS (Point of Service) ONEbegan

AFSM 100 (Automated flatsorting machine) installed

Lance Armstrong of the USPSPro Cycling Team won his firstTour de France

2000 Report of the USPS Commissionon a Safe and Secure Workplace(Califano Report) issued

External First Class (EXFC)scores reached record high of94 percent for the first time

2001 Business alliance with FedExformed

Mail irradiated due to anthraxthreat

Signature Confirmation launched

2002 Segway Human Transporter usedexperimentally

Transformation Plan released

President’s Commission on theUnited States Postal Serviceestablished

Record levels of serviceperformance posted for First-Class Mail and Priority Mail


See also U.S. Postal Service, Sources ofHistorical Information on Post Offices,Postal Employees, Mail Routes, and MailContractors, Publication 119, listed inthe bibliography.

American Philatelic ResearchLibrary100 Oakwood AvenuePost Office Box 8000State College, PA 16803-8000www.stamplibrary.orgThe American Philatelic ResearchLibrary, the library of the AmericanPhilatelic Society, is the largest publicphilatelic library in the United States.The library publishes a quarterly jour-nal, Philatelic Literature Review.

Corporate LibraryUnited States Postal Service 475 L'Enfant Plaza SW Washington, DC 20260-1540The Postal Service's Corporate Libraryhas a collection of historical material,including the Annual Report of thePostmaster General since 1789, PostalLaws and Regulations since 1794, theUnited States Official Postal Guide from1874 to 1954, and the Postal Bulletinsince 1880. (Exact titles vary.) While thelibrary does not lend out its historicalmaterials, its collection is open to thegeneral public during regular businesshours. The library also has many sec-ondary sources on postal history,including many listed in the bibliogra-phy of this publication.

HistorianUnited States Postal Service 475 L'Enfant Plaza SW Washington, DC 20260-0012The Historian maintains PostmasterFinder, the Postal Service's nationalhistoric record of Postmasters by PostOffice, online at www.usps.com/postmasterfinder. The Historian's staff can provide guidance in researching specific aspects of postal history. Uponrequest, the Historian's staff can provide the names and appointmentdates of Postmasters who have served at

Research Sources

particular Post Offices, Post Officeestablishment and discontinuance dates,and the dates of any Post Office namechanges. Response time varies with thenumber of requests received.

Library of Congress101 Independence Avenue SEWashington, DC 20540-0002www.loc.govThe Library's Geography and MapDivision has early post route, railroad,and other historical maps. Some ofthese maps have been digitized and canbe viewed or downloaded from theirWeb site. From www.loc.gov, search for“map collections.”

National Archives and RecordsAdministration700 Pennsylvania Avenue NWWashington, DC 20408-0001www.nara.govThe National Archives houses postalrecords prior to 1971. Some of therecords most useful in researching localpostal history have been reproduced onmicrofilm, including National ArchivesMicrofilm Publication M1131, Record ofAppointment of Postmasters, October1789–1832; Publication M841, Record ofAppointment of Postmasters,1832–September 30, 1971; andPublication M1126, Post OfficeDepartment Reports of Site Locations,1837–1950. For more information onthese and other records, write to theNational Archives or visit its Web site.

National Personnel RecordsCenterCivilian Records Facility111 Winnebago StreetSt. Louis, MO 63118-4126 The Civilian Records Facility has per-sonnel records for many postal employ-ees whose service ended after 1910.Researchers should provide as muchidentifying information as possibleabout the former employee and his/herplace and dates of employment. TheCivilian Records Facility also housesrural route cards, filed by Post Office,


Pony Express ResourcesLexington Historical Museum112 South 13th StreetLexington, MO 64067-1402

Pony Express Museum914 Penn StreetSt. Joseph, MO 64503-2544www.ponyexpress.org

Patee House Museum1202 Penn StreetPost Office Box 1022St. Joseph, MO 64502-1022

St. Joseph Museum Library1100 Charles StreetSt. Joseph, MO 64501-2875www.stjosephmuseum.org

The Huntington Library1151 Oxford RoadSan Marino, CA 91108-1218 www.huntington.org

The Wells Fargo Bank HistoryMuseum420 Montgomery StreetSan Francisco, CA 94104-1205 www.wellsfargo.com, then search for“museum”

which provide details on rural routesand carriers.

National Postal MuseumSmithsonian Institution2 Massachusetts Avenue, NEWashington, DC 20002-9997www.si.edu/postalThe National Postal Museum offersexhibits tracing the history of the postalsystem in the United States. It housesmore than 13 million postal-relateditems — mostly stamps, but also postalstationery, greeting cards, covers and let-ters, mailboxes, postal vehicles, hand-stamps, metering machines, patentmodels, uniforms, badges, and otherobjects related to postal history and phi-lately. The museum’s library, with morethan 40,000 volumes and manuscripts,is open to the public by appointment.

Railway Mail Service Library12 East Rosemont AvenueAlexandria, VA 22301-2325 The Railway Mail Service Library hasartifacts, mail route schedules, schemesof mail distribution, and publicationsrelating to the Railway MailService/Postal Transportation Service.The library is open by appointment buthandles most requests by mail. ■


Beecher, Henry W., and Anthony S. Wawrukiewicz. U.S. Domestic Postal Rates, 1872-1999, Revised SecondEdition. Portland, OR: CAMA Publishing Company, 1999. 338 pp.

Bowyer, Mathew J. They Carried the Mail: A Survey of Postal History and Hobbies. New York, NY: Robert B.Luce, Inc., 1972. 223 pp.

Bradley, Glenn D. The Story of the Pony Express. Chicago, IL: A. C. McClurg & Co, 1913. 175 pp.Bruns, James H. Great American Post Offices. New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1998. 274 pp. ———Mail on the Move. Polo, IL: Transportation Trails, 1992. 224 pp.———Motorized Mail. Iola, WI: Krause Publications, 1997. 253 pp.Butler, Ruth Lapham. Doctor Franklin, Postmaster General. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, Doran &

Company, Inc., 1928. 200 pp.Chapman, Arthur. The Pony Express: The Record of a Romantic Adventure in Business. New York, NY: G. P.

Putnam's Sons, 1932. 319 pp.Cullinan, Gerald. The United States Postal Service. New York, NY: Praeger Publishers, 1973. 271 pp.Cushing, Marshall Henry. The Story of Our Post Office. Boston, MA: A. M. Thayer & Co., 1893. 1,034 pp.Dietz, August. The Postal Service of the Confederate States of America. Richmond, VA: Press of The Dietz

Printing Co., 1929. 439 pp.The Expressmen. New York, NY: Time-Life Books, 1974. 240 pp.Finlay, Hugh. Journal Kept by Hugh Finlay, Surveyor of the Post Roads on the Continent of North America.

Brooklyn, NY: F. H. Norton, 1867. 94 pp.Fleishman, Joel L., editor. The Future of the Postal Service. New York, NY: Praeger Publishers, 1983. 310 pp.Fowler, Dorothy Ganfield. The Cabinet Politician: The Postmasters General, 1829-1909. New York: Columbia

University Press, 1943. 344 pp.———Unmailable: Congress and the Post Office. Athens, GA: The University of Georgia Press, 1977. 266 pp.Fuller, Wayne E. The American Mail: Enlarger of the Common Life. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago

Press, 1972. 378 pp.———RFD, The Changing Face of Rural America. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1964. 361 pp.Graham, Richard B. United States Postal History Sampler. Sidney, OH: Linn's Stamp News, 1992. 186 pp.Hafen, Le Roy R. The Overland Mail, 1849-1869. Cleveland, OH: The Arthur H. Clark Company, 1926.

361 pp.Harlow, Alvin Fay. Old Post Bags. New York, NY: D. Appleton & Company, 1928. 500 pp.Holmes, Donald B. Airmail: An Illustrated History, 1793-1981. New York, NY: Clarkson N. Potter, Inc.,

1981. 226 pp.Ingram, Jane H. Post Office Lockbox Doors: Illustrated Guide, Second Edition. Greenville, SC: Jane H. Ingram,

1999. 257 pp.Jackson, Donald Dale. Flying the Mail. Alexandria, VA: Time-Life Books, 1982. 176 pp.John, Richard R. Spreading the News: The American Postal System from Franklin to Morse. Cambridge, MA:

Harvard University Press, 1995. 369 pp.———“Taking Sabbatarianism Seriously: The Postal System, the Sabbath, and the Transformation of

American Political Culture.” Journal of the Early Republic, 10 (Winter 1990), 517-567.Kahn, E. J., Jr. Fraud. New York, NY: Harper and Row, 1973. 321 pp.Kelly, Clyde. United States Postal Policy. New York, NY: D. Appleton & Co., 1931. 321 pp.Kielbowicz, Richard B. News in the Mail: The Press, Post Office, and Public Information, 1700-1860s. Westport,

CT: Greenwood Press, 1989. 209 pp.Konwiser, Harry Myron. Colonial and Revolutionary Posts. Richmond, VA: Press of The Dietz Printing Co.,

1931. 81 pp.Leary, William M. Aerial Pioneers: The U.S. Air Mail Service, 1918-1927. Washington, DC: Smithsonian

Institution Press, 1985. 309 pp.Leech, D. D. T. The Post Office Department of the United States of America. Washington, DC: Judd and

Detweiler, Publishers, 1879. 109 pp.Long, Bryant Alden and William Jefferson Dennis. Mail by Rail: The Story of the Postal Transportation

Service. New York, NY: Simmons-Boardman Publishing Corp., 1951. 414 pp.Mackay, James A. The Guinness Book of Stamps: Facts & Feats. Enfield, Middlesex, England: Guinness

Superlatives Limited, 1982. 225 pp.Margolis, Richard J. At the Crossroads: An Inquiry into Rural Post Offices and the Communities They Serve.

Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1980. 55 pp.McReynolds, Ross Allan. History of the United States Post Office, 1607-1931. Chicago, IL: University of

Chicago, 1935. 559 pp.Melius, Louis. The American Postal Service, Second Edition. Washington, DC: National Capital Press, Inc.,

1917. 112 pp.Miner, Ward L. William Goddard, Newspaperman. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1962. 223 pp.(Moroney, Rita L.) Montgomery Blair, Postmaster General, 1861-1864. Washington, DC: United States

Postal Service, reissued 1989. 44 pp.Moroney, Rita L. “A Study of the Intent of Legislation on Second-Class Rates.” Washington, DC: United States

Postal Service, 1977. 49 pp.

Bibliography


Park, Marlene and Gerald E. Markowitz. Democratic Vistas: Post Offices and Public Art in the New Deal.Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1984. 247 pp.

Rich, Wesley Everett. The History of the United States Post Office to the Year 1829. Cambridge, MA: HarvardUniversity Press, 1924. 190 pp.

Robinson, Howard. The British Post Office: A History. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1948. 467pp.

Roper, Daniel C. The United States Post Office. New York, NY: Funk and Wagnalls Co., 1917. 382 pp.Scheele, Carl H. A Short History of the Mail Service. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1970.

250 pp.———The Story of the United States Mails. Northbrook, IL: Whitehall Company, 1972. 102 pp.Scott Specialized Catalogue of United States Stamps. Sidney, OH: Scott Publishing Co. Published annually.Smith, William. The History of the Post Office in British North America, 1639-1970. Cambridge, England:

University Press, 1920. 356 pp.Smithsonian Institution, Owney, Mascot of the Railway Mail Service. Washington, DC, revised 1992. 20 pp.Stets, Robert J. Postmasters & Postoffices of the United States, 1782-1811. Lake Oswego, OR: La Posta

Publications, 1994. 290 pp.The Story of the Post Office. Burlington, VT: Wells, Richardson & Co., 1889. 160 pp.Summerfield, Arthur E. U. S. Mail: The Story of the United States Postal Service. New York, NY: Holt,

Rinehart & Winston, 1960. 256 pp.Tierney, John T. Postal Reorganization: Managing the Public’s Business. Boston, MA: Auburn House

Publishing Company, 1981. 191 pp.———The U. S. Postal Service: Status and Prospects of a Public Enterprise. Dover, MA: Auburn House Publishing

Company, 1988. 238 pp.Towards Postal Excellence: The Report of the President’s Commission on Postal Organization. Washington, DC:

Government Printing Office, 1968. 212 pp.U.S. Post Office Department. A Brief History of the United States Postal Service. Washington, DC:

Government Printing Office, 1933. 11 pp.U.S. Postal Service, Annual Report. Washington, DC, published annually.———Glossary of Postal Terms, Publication 32. Washington, DC, 1997. 142 pp.———History of the Postal Inspection Service, Publication 259. Washington, DC, 1982.———The Postal Service Guide to U.S. Stamps. Washington, DC, published annually.———Sources of Historical Information on Post Offices, Postal Employees, Mail Routes, and Mail Contractors,

Publication 119. Washington, DC, 2001. 28 pp.van der Linden, F. Robert. Airlines and Air Mail: The Post Office and the Birth of the Commercial Aviation

Industry. Lexington, KY: The University Press of Kentucky, 2002. 349 pp.Walsh, John and Garth Mangum. Labor Struggle in the Post Office: From Selective Lobbying to Collective

Bargaining. Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, Inc., 1992. 271 pp.White, James E. A Life Span and Reminiscences of Railway Mail Service. Philadelphia, PA: Deemer &

Jaisohn, 1910. 274 pp.Woolley, Mary E. The Early History of the Colonial Post-Office. Providence, RI: Rhode Island Historical

Society, 1894. 33 pp.

Related InterestGannett, Henry. American Names: A Guide to the Origin of Place Names in the United States. Washington,

DC: Public Affairs Press, 1947. 334 pp.Harder, Kelsie B., editor. Illustrated Dictionary of Place Names: United States and Canada. New York, NY: Van

Nostrand Reinhold Company, 1976. 631 pp.Stewart, George R. American Place-Names: A Concise and Selective Dictionary for the Continental United States

of America. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1970. 550 pp.The United States Dictionary of Places, First Edition. New York, NY: Somerset Publishers, Inc., 1988. 644 pp. ■


Notes

1 Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774–1789 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1905), 2:208.2 The year of Neale’s grant is given according to the current, Gregorian calendar. Neale’s grant was

dated February 17, 1691, under the old, Julian calendar.3 William Goddard's petition to the Continental Congress, September 29, 1774, in the collection of the

National Postal Museum, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.4 Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774–1789 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1905), 2:57.5 The George Washington Papers at the Library of Congress, 1741–1799: Series 2 Letterbooks, George

Washington to John Jay, July 18, 1788; Library of Congress, Manuscript Division[http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/gwhtml/gwhome.html] (February 25, 2003).

6 Ebenezer Hazard to Jeremy Belknap, September 27, 1789, in Collections of the Massachusetts HistoricalSociety, Vol. III, Fifth Series (Boston: Massachusetts Historical Society, 1877), 192.

7 Ebenezer Hazard to the Continental Congress, November 14, 1776, in American Archives, Series 5,Volume 3, 681 (New York: Johnson Reprint Corporation, 1972) (originally by Peter Force,Washington, 1853).

8 Ebenezer Hazard to Rev. John Witherspoon, November 14, 1776, in Ibid., 681–682.9 Benjamin Franklin was born on January 17, 1706, according to the current, Gregorian calendar. He

was born on January 6, 1705, under the old, Julian calendar.10 Carl Van Doren, Benjamin Franklin (New York: The Viking Press, 1957), 782.11 Benjamin P. Thomas, “Lincoln the Postmaster,” Bulletin of the Abraham Lincoln Association

(Springfield, IL), No. 31, June 1933, 7–8. 12 Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America, The Henry Reeve Text as Revised by Francis Bowen, Now

Further Corrected and Edited with Introduction, Editorial Notes, and Bibliographies by Phillips Bradley (NewYork: Alfred A. Knopf, 1993), 1:317.

13 U.S. Post Office Department, History of the Railway Mail Service; A Chapter in the History of Postal Affairsin the United States (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1885), 28.

14 Ibid., 41.15 Public Statutes at Large of the United States of America from the Organization of the Government in 1789, to

March 3, 1845, Volume V (Boston, MA: Charles C. Little and James Brown, 1850), 738. 16 U.S. Post Office Department, Proposals for Carrying the Mail in Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont,

Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut (Washington, DC: C. Alexander, Printer, 1853), 164-166.17 Annual Report of the Postmaster General, 1859, 16.18 Ibid., 1860, 2.19 Circa 1930 U.S. Post Office Department memorandum, files, USPS Historian.20 Marshall Cushing, The Story of Our Post Office (Boston: A.M. Thayer & Co., Publishers, 1893), 40–41.21 Congressional Record -- House (80th Congress, 2nd Session), June 3, 1948, Vol. 94, Part 6, 7104.22 Annual Report of the Postmaster General, 1862, 32.23 U.S. Post Office Department, Supervision of City Delivery Service (Washington: Government Printing

Office, 1930), 8. 24 Committee Chairman Edwin A. Neiss to Postmaster General Will H. Hays, Aug. 24, 1921, vertical

files, USPS Corporate Library. 25 Annual Report of the Postmaster General, 1891, 84.26 Ibid., 86.27 Ibid., 1892, 11–12.28 Ibid., 1902, 129.29 Ibid., 1897, 112–114.30 Ibid., 1901, 122.31 Ibid., 1902, 101.32 Ibid., 1929, 26. 33 Rita Lloyd Moroney, “Above and Beyond,” The Encyclopedia of Aviation and Space Sciences (Chicago:

New Horizons Publishers, Inc., 1967), 77.34 William C. Hopson to Second Assistant Postmaster General, April 11, 1921, Air Mail Service

Personnel Files, Record Group 28, National Archives and Records Administration.35 Hopson to Duard B. Colyer, Air Mail Service, September 4, 1920, Air Mail Service Personnel Files,

Record Group 28, National Archives and Records Administration. 36 D. B. Colyer, News Letter. Week Ending September 26, 1925, Air Mail Service, Omaha, Nebraska,

September 26, 1925, Record Group 28, National Archives and Records Administration.37 Hopson to Colyer, May 1, 1925, Air Mail Service Personnel Files, Record Group 28, National

Archives and Records Administration. 38 Annual Report of the Postmaster General, 1873, XXVI–XXVII. 39 U.S. House. Hearings, Committee on Appropriations. Subcommittee on Departments of Treasury

and Post Office and Executive Office of the President. 90th Congress, 1st session, 27 February 1967(Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1967), 5.

40 Ibid., 27.41 Murray Comarow, “Truly Reforming the Postal Service,” Mail: The Journal of Communication

Distribution 9 (March 1997), 33.42 USPS News Link, Oct. 30, 2001, files, USPS Historian.43 Orders of the Postmaster General, 3:210, May 1, 1837, Records of the Post Office Department, Record

Group 28, National Archives and Records Administration.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The United States Postal Service: An American History is published by Government Relations, United States Postal Service, 475 L’Enfant Plaza, SW, Washington, DC, 20260-3500, under the direction of Ralph A. Moden, Senior Vice President.

All photographs are from the United States Postal Service, except where noted.

The Postal Service thanks all who contributed to this publication, especially Daniel Afzal, Megaera Ausman, Judith A. de Torok,Thad E. Dilley, Mark H. Eckert, Eve Edwards, Maurice L. Harrington, Azeezaly S. Jaffer, Jon A. Leonard, Jennifer M. Lynch,Gerald T. Merna, James K. Meyer, Frank Papandrea, PhotoAssist, Paula E. Rabkin, Frank R. Scheer, Frank Schultz-Depalo,

Melody A. Selvage, Aloha South, Renah A. Walker, and Toni Young. The pioneering research of Margaret C. Boardman, Ph.D.,and the work of the late Rita Lloyd Moroney were important to this publication.

The following are registered trademarks of the United States Postal Service: Airmail, Confirm, Eagle Logo, Express Mail,First-Class Mail, Parcel Post, PC Postage, Planet Code, Priority Mail, Redress, U.S. Mail and Eagle Logo, United States Post

Office, United States Postal Service, U.S. Postal Service, USPS, USPS eBillPay, ZIP+4, United States Postal Service Pro Cycling Team.

The following are trademarks of the United States Postal Service: Collection Box (shape of round-top), DeliveryConfirmation, Letter Carrier’s Uniform (appearance of), Mr. ZIP, Pony Express, Postmaster General, Post Office, Postal

Service, Rural Free Delivery, Signature Confirmation, Stamps Online, Standard Mail, US Mail, ZIP Code.

Cover PhotosBack, left: early 1900s, courtesy of National Postal Museum, Smithsonian InstitutionBack, middle: circa 1918, courtesy of Bernice Pauahi Bishop MuseumBack, right: circa 1940s, courtesy of National Postal Museum, Smithsonian InstitutionFront, left: circa 1890s, courtesy of National Postal Museum, Smithsonian InstitutionFront, right: 2001

Pub

licat

ion

100,

Sep

tem

ber

2003

Documents

An American History - Quinequine.org/USPS-pub100.pdf · An American History 1775 – 2002 3 O n July 26, 1775, members of the Second Continental Congress, meeting in Philadelphia,