Chapter XV: Section 379: “No allowance for furniture will be made to any post

office when the net proceeds do not amount to $20 per year.”

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Act of 1825, Section 39, and Act of 1863, Section 41, says the carriers of the “United States City Dispatch Post” in New York, and other city dispatch posts, wherever established, are authorized to charge and collect 3 cents on each letter deposited in any part of the city, and delivered at another.

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Act of 1825, Section 38, states a deputy postmaster will not open, nor suffer to be opened, any packet of newspapers, not addressed to his office, under a penalty of $50. A penalty of $20 was to be imposed on any person not authorized to open mails, who shall open any packet of newspapers not directed to himself.

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Regulations 324 and 325 says that the franking privilege travels with the person possessing it and can be exercised in but one place at the same time, and prohibited deputy postmasters or other privileged persons from leaving their frank behind them upon envelopes to cover public or private correspondence in their absence.

Queer Collection in Holiday Mail

Some years ago, the Cincinnati, Ohio, post office, gave an account of the queer combinations and collections of articles found loose in the mails at the Christmas season owing to the carelessness of senders. These articles vary from value to worthlessness, utility to uselessness. Money, jewelry, articles of dress, dainty ribbons to choice silk patters, tableware, and even to “corn shellers.” Many of the articles named were doubtless in combinations and sent to one address, but being carelessly wrapped or addressed, they could not be assembled for identification or identified singly for delivery in the great majority of cases. The list is given for the benefit of readers who delight in curious things. These articles were held for a week for possible identification and then sent to the Dead Letter Office. No attempt has been made at classification as more interest is excited by taking them as they come. Some of the combination must have been very amusing. List is as follows:

A cabinet photograph, pair rubber sleeves, 2 silver quarter-dollars, sewing machine shuttle, piece of white swiss goods, 2 dimes, a brass key, package common tea spoons, 5 cents and 8 childs’ cards from Beamsville, Ont., for Mrs. J. Carl, Tallahassee, Ala., and sent to the postmaster of that place for delivery. Two unstamped letters, one to Mrs. Rebecca Washington, the other to Wm. Cummings; 65 cents, plated butter knife, gold plated lead pencil, silver quarter, 2 combination tools, 2 pen knives, lot photographs, pension affidavit of Jasper Acres, pair knit stockings, 6 books, false mustaches, pearl pen holder, box of pills, patent corn sheller, 2 electrotype plates of “Sellers Cough Syrup,” yellow and purple knit hoods. Christmas cards, studs, 2 small drills, peacock feather, fountain pen, ladies brooch, butter knife, felt soles, letter in match box addressed to postmaster Berlin, sugarspoon, celluloid, ring, sleeve buttons, 25 cents, hair switch, open letter to J. Lyon, Red, Ky., Ind., which was delivered to him.

Two pen knives, dime, box violin strings, ladies fashion bazaar, bottle “Fruit Laxative,” plain gold ring, ear rings, breast pin, and thimble (snide), paper needles, book “Bad Boy’s diary,” pencil, large pen knife, 70 cents, unstamped letter to Adelaide Long, iron hook, toy knitting machine, 2 tops of sleeve buttons, hair chain, lot crayons, chalk, letter to P. O. Wickley, Augusta, Me., unstamped, containing 70 cents in stamps, child’s book “The Proud Little Lady,” magic lantern, watch chain, masonic charm, ½-dozen teaspoons, paper needles, childs mits, comforter and doll, 2 harmonicons, Bible, child’s gingham dress, 2 sticks of candy. A wallet containing a gold double eagle, $20 bill, 9 $5 bills, 3 $10 bills, found by F. A. Montague, in a pouch from Lewisburg, Tenn., and returned to postmaster of that town to be delivered upon receipt to the sender.

Gold plated pencil, unaddressed envelope, containing pair of lisle thread gloves, black and white stamped ribbon, uninclosed letter containing $1 marked from “Joe to Gus,” two-cent piece, gold and jet pencil holder, butter knife, tidy, white apron, pair baby socks, blank check book, dominoes, black cord and tassel, red worsted shawl, tidy. Wooden box, lot of candy, assortment of rubber sheep. Letter from R. MacFeeley, Washington, D. C., to Capt. A. M. Corliss, without envelope, one cent, German picture cards, meerschaum cigar holder, woman’s head design. Three plain rings, four watch charms, compass, horseshoe cigar cutter, two lanterns, pearl handled table knife, billiard ball, silver quarter sewed in some knit work, whisk broom, a false tooth, two black ties, three New Year cards, hair switch, curry comb, vanity case, stuffed Aunt Dinah, game “Old Maid,” box Mason’s blacking with brush, fiddle strings.

Feeding the Cats

It is perhaps not generally known that cats are kept and fed at the public expense in some of the larger post offices of the country. Some years ago (and it may still be the custom) an appropriation of from $80 to $100 was annually made for this purpose for the benefit of the New York post office, and $30 to $40, spent for like service at the Philadelphia office. In an article in the _Philadelphia Record_ it was stated that a man in that city had a contract for keeping these feline employes of the office in provisions, and it was also mentioned that there are about 1,000 of these useful domestic animals in the employ of the Post Office Department and they are paid for their services by food and shelter. It is estimated that about $1,000 per annum is expended in this way at the principal post offices and large public buildings of the country.

Ferrets are also often employed for this purpose in the great public buildings in Washington when the rodents get too numerous and damage to papers and files likely to occur. The common practice of eating lunches in these government buildings tends to the spread of this annoying condition and the cats in the public service are held to be a useful and necessary convenience in hunting down and interfering with the nibbling propensities of this pest to domestic as well as public economy.

A Couple of Distinguished Canines

Mention is made in another article of the employment of cats in post offices as “mousers,” and they doubtless contribute their share towards public benefit. The dog, man’s most faithful friend, so eulogized in song and story, has also, it seems, his part in public interest and concern. For many years the postal clerks of the country paid great attention to “Owney” an adventurous terrier dog who attached himself to the Railway Service and whose exploits as a traveler and companion on many postal trips and runs made him a familiar and welcome acquaintance wherever he established his temporary domicile. His faithfulness, friendship and fellowship, in his way of showing it, was the topic of discourse when he made his occasional visits and his praises were told in many a newspaper story and he wore the numerous decorations and medals with which he was bedecked, the gift of admiring friends, with all the dignity and grace becoming a dog so honored and esteemed.

“Owney” had an humble imitator and counterpart in canine sagacity and wisdom in a dog at Mount Carmel, Pa., whose watchful guardianship of the office mail and general fidelity won him such deserved recognition at home as a remarkable example of what a dog can be taught to do, that his fame spread abroad, was brought to public attention at Washington and the post office people awarded him special recognition in the shape of a handsome collar, raised by subscription. He got his name in the newspapers, but whether all this honor and glory turned his head and his attention elsewhere, or some evil-minded person, jealous of the costly collar he wore, appropriated it and the dog also, is not known, but after being thus honored and decorated and set apart from the rest of the canine fraternity, this famous dog suddenly disappeared and was never heard of again.

Soldier’s Sister a Mail Carrier

President Wilson has issued an executive order allowing the Postmaster General to appoint as temporary rural mail carrier, during the absence of the regular carrier on military duty, the person on whom the support of the dependents of the regular carrier devolves, without regard to civil service requirements, if the substitute is found competent. The first appointment under the order is that of Miss Edith Strand, of Princeton, Ill., whose brother was called into the military service, leaving her to care for the family.

Notice

In a pamphlet giving a brief history of the postal service, compiled by Mr. Stanley I. Slack during the administration of Postmaster General Charles Emory Smith from which a few general facts are taken relating to our early postal history, appears a statement that use had been made of the following works--Journal kept by Hugh Finlay, 1773-74, Brooklyn, 1867. Joyce “History of the British Post Office; The Early History of the Colonial Post Office by Mary E. Wooley; Leech and Nicholson’s History of the Post Office Department, Washington, 1879, and the contributions of the Postal History of the United States by C. W. Ernst of Boston in Vols. XX, 1895, and XXI, 1896; Journal of the Postal Union.” As none of these authorities have been consulted in the publication of this work, or access had to any of them for such purpose, this explanation is made so that if anything from the above mentioned publications appears herein, drawn from Mr. Slack’s pamphlet, the necessary acknowledgment might hereby be made and due credit given.

INDEX TO ITEMS OF INTEREST

Annual readjustment salaries, 93
Claims for stamps lost by burglary, 95
Credit marks for rural carriers, 97
Cost, country-wide extension rural delivery, 97
Difference in dispatch parcel post matter, 93
Department force at Washington reduced, 97
Eligibles, fourth-class postmasters, 93
Expenditure rural delivery by periods, 98
First Postmaster General to sit at Capital, 94
Gain to Department in fractions of a cent, 94
Increase rural carriers’ pay, 96
Longest mail route, 93
Longest star route, 93
Loss to Government by low money order rate, 95
Mails first carried on steamboats, 98
Number of counties having rural service, 93
Names of postmasters mentioned in 1857, 95
Number of postmasters affected by order of President, 96
Per capita expenditure for postage, 94
Patronage 100 years ago, 94
Period of greatest activity, rural service, 99
Post routes, rural delivery maps, 95
Postal employes in public service, 97
Paper baling machines, 99
Postal curiosities in National Museum, 99
Postmasters by classes, 93
Postage stamp sale, 1916, 94
Railroads declared post routes, 98
Rural carriers separated from service, 1915-1916, 96
Rates of postage, 1816 to 1853, 96
Revision of rural service, 98
Shortest postal route, 93
Salary increases, rural carriers, 99
Saving money by motor repairs, 98
Sale postage stamps, 1916, 94
Total railroad mileage, 1830, 96
Window delivery service, 97
When the Department was moved to Washington, 94

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Transcriber’s note:

--Obvious errors were corrected.