1.) The Post Office once owned a horse stable?

In 1799, a lot of two acres opposite Havre de Grace, Maryland, was purchased for $220 as a site for a stable for the horses belonging to the Department.

2.) As late as 1872, a person convicted of robbing a mail carrier could be punished by death?

The death penalty for stealing mail was first imposed by an Act of Congress of February 20, 1792. That Act also included for the first time a fine for obstructing or retarding the passage of mail.

In 1794, Congress amended this law to impose the death penalty only in cases where an individual had robbed a mail carrier. Penalties for stealing mail were reduced to fines not exceeding $300 or imprisonment, depending on the circumstances.

In 1799, the penalty for the robbery of mail was changed to a public whipping of no more than 40 lashes and an imprisonment not exceeding ten years for first offenders. A second offense, however, was still punishable by death. In addition, the death penalty was imposed for anyone who wounded the person having custody of the mail or put the carrier's life in jeopardy by the use of dangerous weapons.

In 1810, the whipping penalty for first offences was removed, although the offender was still subject to up to ten years in prison. These provisions continued in force until an Act of Congress of June 8, 1872, reduced penalties for second time offenders and the wounding or endangering of carriers by the use of weapons to a life of imprisonment and hard labor.

3.)The world's first telegraph office was maintained and operated as a part of the Postal Service in the former Washington, D.C., City Post Office?

Samuel F. B. Morse, while assigned to the Post Office Department, opened the world's first public telegraph office on April 1, 1845, at the site of the former Post Office Department headquarters now known as the Tariff Building.

The office was located on the second floor of one of two brick buildings used by the Washington, D.C., City Post Office, facing east on 7th Street. The buildings were later torn down to enlarge the Department headquarters.

4.) The first telegraph message, "What hath God wrought?", was transmitted from the U.S. Capitol to Baltimore on May 24, 1844?

5.) In 1806, postal riders were given lanterns to enable them to travel at night?
 

Their instructions read ". . . the mail is not to stop except five minutes once in ten miles to breather the horse and twenty minutes for breakfast and supper, and thirty minutes for dinner."

6.) A Postmaster delivered mail to soldiers on foot during the Revolutionary War because he lacked the money to buy a horse?
 

Ebenezer Hazard, Postmaster of New York City and later a Postmaster General under the Continental Congress, wrote Congress in November 1776 that he was compelled to deliver mail to the Revolutionary troops on foot because he didn't have enough money to buy a horse.

7.) In 1827, one section of the New York City Post Office was reserved "exclusively for ladies?"

8.) The Post Office Department was one of the earliest consumer protection agencies of the federal government?

Among the earliest legislative protections for the public is the mail fraud statute of 1872.

9.) The Postal Service once transported an entire bank through the mails by Parcel Post?

In 1916, in order to save transportation costs, a merchant named W. H. Coltharp sent a bank in small packages through the mails by Parcel Post from Salt Lake City to Vernal, Utah.

Although the transportation of the 80,000 bricks over the 427-mile route (there was at the time no road from Salt Lake City to Vernal) caused some problems for postal authorities, not a single brick was lost.

When Postmaster General Albert S. Burleson learned of this incident, however, postal regulations were rewritten to prohibit such large mailings. His letter announcing these revisions, which was sent to Post Offices, ended by stating that "It is not the intent of the United States Postal Service that buildings should be shipped through the mail."

Even today, customers occasionally send their belongings by mail in order to save moving costs.

10.) The Post Office once played a part in the weather forecasting business?

At the request of the War Department in 1872, the Department ordered that Postmasters in various cities be supplied with weather forecasts by the Army Signal Corps, which were then posted in their offices for their patrons.
In addition, around the turn of the century, rural carriers delivered weather reports to thousands of farmers and rural residents in conjunction with the Agriculture Department.

For a short time, a few Post Offices even experimented with backstamping envelopes with weather predictions.

The Postal Service also played a role in the transmission of weather forecasts during the period of early airmail flights. The Department began installing radio stations in air fields beginning on August 20, 1920, and later, with the exception of Rawlings, Wyoming, all fields had stations on which plane movements depended on weather conditions obtained by radio. When airmail traffic permitted, other government departments used the radios for service messages instead of the telegraph. The Department of Agriculture transmitted weather forecasts and stock market reports over them.

11.) Rural carriers once picked up groceries for customers along their routes?
 

Rural carriers have been known to take orders for various goods for the customers on their routes along with their other duties, including requests for such items as eggs, yeast cakes, tea, coffee, spices, and other foods. Carriers also purchased articles of clothing and collected and returned laundry.

In addition, in conjunction with the Agriculture Department, rural carriers have conducted pig and livestock surveys during this century. Carriers collected questionnaire cards filled out by a representative group of local farmers, who tallied their number of hogs and the amount of stock food raised on were useful to farmers across the country in determining the prevailing market conditions.

12.) The Post Office Department has aided the Government in transferring gold worth several billions of dollars within the last 100 years?
 

One of the earliest recorded gold shipments by the Postal Service was made in August 1892, when a special mail train loaded with $20 million in gold coin was transported from San Francisco to New York. The entire shipment, including the boxes in which the gold was packed, weighed over 80,000 pounds.

In 1914, according to an article in The New York Times, the Treasury Department also shipped roughly 10 million dollars worth of gold coin from Philadelphia to New York City through the mails. The shipment was guarded by both federal officers and the police.

In 1934, the Post Office Department shipped a large quantity of gold from the U.S. Mint in San Francisco to the U.S. Mint in Denver. The "mail" was guarded by a detachment of regular Army soldiers.

The most prolific period of the transfer of bullion, however, was brought about by the completion of the depository at Fort Knox, Kentucky, in 1937.
In the latter year, over five and a half billion dollars worth of gold was transferred from New York and Philadelphia to this depository, involving 215 railway mail cars and 38 special trains.

From January 25, 1940, to January 23, 1941, shipments of bullion were sent from the New York Assay Office to Fort Knox. The gold, estimated at over nine billion dollars, weighed about 9,000 tons and was shipped in 337 carloads comprising 45 special trains. Its safety was insured by postal inspectors, Secret Service agents, police officials, and Army units. The Post Office Department received over $1,600,000 in postage, insurance, and surcharge fees for this transport of gold.

Between 1937 and 1941, some 550 railroad cars carried $15.5 billion in gold between New York and Fort Knox.

13.) Many Postmasters once charged local patrons for postage on a monthly basis?

14.) The Postmaster General was not an official member of the President's Cabinet until 1829, when Andrew Jackson invited Postmaster General Walter T. Barry to serve in this capacity?

15.) Letters not picked up at Post Offices were at one time advertised in local newspapers by Postmasters?

If not called for after a certain period of time, the letters were returned or destroyed.

16.) From 1847 to 1857, adhesive postage stamps in the United States were not perforated?

17.) The Pony Express was not originally operated by the Post Office Department?

From April 1860 to July 1861, the Pony Express operated as a private enterprise. After July 1, 1861, it was operated under contract as a mail route until discontinued in October 1861 upon the completion of the transcontinental telegraph line.

18.) Russell, Majors, & Waddell, the company which inaugurated the Pony Express, lost an estimated half million dollars in the venture?

19.) The fastest delivery time for the Pony Express was in March 1861, when the inaugural address of President Lincoln was carried in seven days and 17 hours from the East Coast to California?

20.) The government issued postage currency from 1862 to 1876 because of a shortage of hard money occasioned by the Civil War?

As a result of a coin shortage caused by the suspension of specie payments by banks during the Civil War, on July 17, 1862 (12 Stat. 592), Congress enacted legislation providing that after August 1, 1862, postage stamps were to be received in payment for government debts in amounts less than $5 and were redeemable in demand notes (paper money).

Subsequently, large quantities of postage stamps were bought in Post Offices, causing the Department considerable difficulty in its normal distribution of stamps.

Stamps, however, were found to be ill-adapted for circulation, leading to the issuance of postage currency beginning on August 21, 1862, bearing facsimiles of current stamps. This currency was issued in 5-, 10-, 25-, and 50-cent notes.

Postage currency was used until 1876, although the use of the postage stamp in the design of the notes was eliminated by an Act of Congress of March 3, 1863 (12 Stat. 711).

21.) The money order system was developed primarily to provide a safe means for Union soldiers and their families to exchange money through the mails during the Civil War?

22.) Uniform postage rates regardless of distance were not effective in this country until July 1, 1863?

23.) Some Postmasters made and used their own stamps, called "Postmasters Provisionals," several years before the introduction of adhesive postage stamps by the United States Government in 1847?

24.) Postage stamps were used in a private City Despatch Post inaugurated by Alexander M. Greig and Henry T. Thomas in New York City on February 1, 1842, five years before Congress authorized postage stamps?

25.) Over the years, Postmasters in larger offices have, in effect, had cats on their payrolls to protect the mail by keeping their offices free of mice and rodents, compensating the felines with food and shelter?

26.) The Post Office Department operated the telephone and telegraph systems of the United States from July 31, 1918, to July 31, 1919?

Under a Proclamation of July 22, 1918, President Woodrow Wilson took control of all telephone and telegraph services within the jurisdiction of United States, including all equipment and supplies.

According to the proclamation, the "supervision, possession, control, and operation" of these systems was to be exercised by Postmaster General Albert S. Burleson. The telephone and telegraph systems, however, were returned to private owners by an order of Postmaster General Burleson dated July 11, 1919, effective on August 1, 1919.

27.) Benjamin Franklin, while serving as Deputy Postmaster General for the British, reversed his franking signature from "Free B. Franklin" to "B. Free Franklin?"

Although historians generally believed this signature was a commentary on the growing independence of the colonies from the Crown, it appeared on Franklin's correspondence as early as 1766.

28.) The Postal Savings System, inaugurated by the Post Office Department in 1911, was at one time the largest single savings "bank" in the United States?

29.)Horse-drawn carriages were used to deliver mail in Philadelphia as late as January 31, 1955?

The 24 horse-drawn vehicles used along the narrow streets in Philadelphia in that year, rented from a private firm in the city, were replaced by a fleet of light trucks on February 1, 1955.

30.) The Pony Express originally charged $5 per letter?

Rates were later reduced to $2 per letter; later, under the Post Office Department, mail was carried for only $1 per letter.

31.) In 1813, when Postmaster General Gideon Granger was ending his long term in office, he had built up such a substantial mail profit that President Jefferson considered using it to help pay off the national debt?

The profit was $110,000!

32.) One of the most important byproducts of Rural Free Delivery was its stimulation to the development of the system of roads and highways in America?

In one county, for instance, farmers themselves paid $2,600 to grade and gravel a road in order to qualify for rural delivery.

33.) A dog sled was used to carry mail in Alaska until 1963, when it was replaced by an airplane?

34.) Patronage was not effectively eliminated in the hiring and promotion of Postmasters and rural carriers until the signing of the Postal Reorganization Act in August 1970?

35.) During the early 1900s, Postmaster General Frank Hitchcock ordered that all collection boxes be painted red, but the resulting confusion with fire boxes and equipment caused the order to be rescinded and the boxes painted olive green as before?

36.) The Post Office Department once received surplus motor vehicles from the War Department?

A provision for this transfer was enacted by Congress on July 2, 1918, and the Department began receiving these vehicles by November of that year.

37.) Postage rates have been raised on three occasions to subsidize war efforts of the United States Government?

Various rate increases were in effect in 1815 and 1816 because of the War of 1812; from 1917 to 1919 as a result of World War I (plus a tax on parcel post packages from 1918 to 1922), and from 1944 to 1947 incident to World War II.

38.) When the million-dollar Hope Diamond was donated to the United States by world-renowned jewel merchant Harry Winston, it was mailed from New York City to the Nation's Capital in an ordinary brown paper parcel?

The package was delivered on November 10, 1958, to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. It was insured for a million dollars.

In addition, in 1979, the then-largest uncut diamond in the world, called the Sedafu, weighing 620 carats and valued at $50,000, was sent by registered mail in this country.

In October 1987, an extremely rare red diamond worth several million dollars was sent to the Smithsonian Institution in an uninsured cardboard box. The postage for the package, sent by registered mail, was $11.58.

39.) The female head of a Post Office is always called a Postmaster, never a postmistress?

40.) On July 20, 1969, Astronaut Neil A. Armstrong cancelled the first piece of mail carried to the moon with a postmark which read "Moon Landing, U.S.A.?"

41.) Roswell Beardsley served as Postmaster of the North Lansing, New York, Post Office for over 74 years?

He was appointed on June 28, 1828, and remained in the position until his death in January 1903, serving under 20 Presidents and 34 Postmasters General.

John N. VanZandt served as Postmaster of the Blawenburg, New Jersey, Post Office for over 69 years. He was appointed April 23, 1866, and served until his death on July 16, 1935.

42.) David J. Travenner reached the age of 100 while serving as the Postmaster of the Philomont, Virginia, Post Office?

He was 99 years old at the time of a press release dated May 23, 1923, and his successor was not appointed until January 5, 1925.

43.) Lake Jackson, Texas, named two streets going in opposite directions "This Way" and "That Way?"

Apparently, the townspeople liked the names as they now have other streets called Circle Way, Any Way, Parking Way, and Center Way.

44.) In 1961, Florida and Texas mothers irately returned hundreds of Patrick Henry stamps they had bought for wedding announcements, because the stamps bore the inscription "Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death?"

45.) At Leola, Pennsylvania, when a new Post Office was being built in 1962, the Postmaster requested a hitching post be installed because of heavy horse and wagon traffic?

P.S. It's still there, and the horse and buggy traffic is still heavy!

46.) 2,781 letter carriers were bitten by dogs in Fiscal Year 1988?

These bites can cause death as well as serious, crippling injuries, and are never funny to either the Postal Service or the carrier involved. Less serious animal attacks, however, have been recorded by one carrier who was bitten by a goose and by another who landed in the hospital after being bitten by a bantam rooster. As usual, however, a Texan carrier probably holds a record for the "tallest" animal story, after claiming he was chased from a house five times by a bunny rabbit a child received for Easter.

47.) Not too long ago, a substitute mail carrier in Vermont received a box of baby chicks to deliver on his first day of work, and because the addressee was not home when he tried to deliver this package, the carrier, mindful that the "mail must go through," took each of the twenty-four baby chicks out of the crate and stuffed them, one at a time, through the envelope slot in the addressee's door?

48.) The Barefoot Mailmen of Florida trudged barefoot on burning sands to deliver mail between Miami and Palm Beach from 1886 to 1890?

49.) The Jackass Mail Line was a pack-mule mail service between San Antonio and San Diego in 1857, and it was so dubbed because San Francisco and Los Angeles editors were unhappy that San Diego was the terminus of the first overland mail?

50.) A Camel Corps, using real camels, operated briefly in 1857 to carry army supplies and military mail between army posts and the tiny settlements of the American desert?

51.) In the mid-1800s, when postage stamps were introduced in the United States, they were often called labels?

52.) It was a mail courier who blazed the first trail between New York and Boston?

53.) It was a mail coach which brought into existence the old Boston-New York-Philadelphia-Baltimore turnpike, the first great American highway?

54.) The Post Office Department was responsible for the first night trains on railroads?

55.) In the early days, the use of the franking privilege to send letters free was more valuable to Postmasters than the receipts from their offices?

56.) During one Christmas period, a temporary substitute driver, told by a postal supervisor at the Washington, D.C., Main Post Office to "take this truck to New York," meaning the New York Avenue Truck Terminal in Washington, D.C, mistakenly drove in the direction of New York City?

He proceeded to New York City over the Jersey Turnpike, and would have reached New York City had he not run out of gas and money for toll charges.

57.) The Post Office Department, in conjunction with the War and Navy Departments, operated a service called "V-Mail" for the transmission of letters on microfilm to and from servicemen overseas during World War II?

The service was inaugurated on June 15, 1942, in order to reduce the weight and bulk of military mail and thereby create more space for vital military material, and to provide safer and faster dispatch and handling of mail for military personnel overseas.
V-Mail sheets were a combination letter and envelope supplied on distinctive and uniform stationary, and were accorded preferential and expeditious sorting and transportation. They were microfilmed and later reproduced onto 4x5-inch photographs at various V-Mail stations set up in both this country and overseas. Over a billion letters were sent and received from soldiers overseas from June 1942 to November 1, 1945, when the service was discontinued.

58.) In the 1880s, a dog named Dorsey was trained to carry the mail unaccompanied on a route through the hills separating the mining towns of Calico and East Calico in San Bernardino County, California?

59.)Mail and supplies are hauled by mules eight miles down a winding trail into the Grand Canyon?

The route leads to the Supai Post Office in the Havasupai Indian village, where members of the tribe still receive most of life's essentials by mail.