On Saturday, the one government organization that continues to reach almost every American on a daily basis, regardless of the weather—rain, sleet, snow, or even the darkness—turns 250.
The postal service predates the United States itself, having been established in 1775 when Benjamin Franklin was designated postmaster general by the Second Continental Congress. It was started over a year prior to the colonies’ proclamation of independence from British rule.
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According to postal service historian and former local postmaster Stephen Allen Kochersperger, the nation might not have ever existed without the Postal Service.
The independent agency has a lengthy and complex history and is currently facing financial viability issues. From serving the 13 colonies, it has expanded to transport more mail than any other postal system globally, covering almost 169 million addresses and providing jobs for over 635,000 people.
The first postmaster in America
The appointment of a commander to lead the war against Britain and the appointment of a postmaster to supervise colonial communication were the two top goals of the Continental Congress when it convened in 1775.
Because Franklin had worked for North America in the British mail service, he was selected. His radical beliefs had contributed to his dismissal in 1774.
The Continental Army and colony leaders were connected by the early American mail service. By disseminating concepts of liberty and independence via letters, newspapers, and pamphlets, it also contributed to the unification of the disparate, divided colonies.
According to Kochersperger, people were reading and gaining an understanding of what it would be like to live in an independent nation.
Roads, migration, and settlers: An interconnected nation
Congress was given the authority to create post offices and mail routes when the U.S. Constitution was enacted, many of which followed already-existing Native American trails. Originally utilized by postal messengers on horseback, these post routes were later adapted for stagecoaches. Some became highways that are still in use today.
According to historians, this contributed to the spread of settlers into Native American territories and was linked to the uprooting of tribes.
Mail was transported by ship from New York to Central America and then to California as western migration increased. Usually, it took two to three months to deliver.
Adding a stamp on a new company model
Prior to the use of stamps, the recipient would often pay the postage in cash.
The post office was carrying a lot of mail for which it was never paid by the middle of the 19th century, according to Daniel Piazza, chief curator of philately at the Smithsonian National Postal Museum.
Because there was no house delivery, recipients were either ignorant of the letters or didn’t want them. Postmasters pay to have lists of people with a backlog of mail published in newspapers.
The first American postage stamps were released in 1847. The post office avoided having to chase down its money by making postage prepaid.
According to Piazza, the postal service still operates on the same fundamental business model that was established in 1847.
A postal forerunner: The Pony Express arrives and departs.
Despite its mythical status, the Pony Express was only in operation for roughly 18 months.
From April 3, 1860, through October 26, 1861, private carriers conducted a horse-drawn relay system that sent mail to St. Joseph, Missouri, the farthest westward railroad stop, frequently from San Francisco or Sacramento, California. Ten days were needed to complete the 1,800-mile (2,900-kilometer) excursion.
According to Piazza, the majority of correspondence was financial as a West Coast stock market developed. Companies had to transmit commodity prices and stock quotes throughout the nation.
According to Piazza, they are therefore prepared to spend astronomical sums of money to do it. The Pony Express was incredibly costly.
Although the cost of sending a letter in the United States was 10 cents in 1860, using Pony Express to send mail initially cost an extra $5, which is about $200 now. According to Piazza, the Civil War put an end to the service, and the invention of the telegraph rendered it obsolete.
Later, postal delivery was shortened from months to days by the transcontinental railroad.
Home mail delivery was streamlined by a war and unpleasant news.
Following preliminary testing, free mail delivery to residences started in earnest in 1863 in the biggest cities in the country.
Letters were typically the only way for a father, brother, husband, or son to communicate throughout the Civil War. As a precursor to mail-in ballots, the postal service allowed soldiers to vote by mail and send letters for free.
Every day, women waited in line at post offices for word. They occasionally received their own letters back, along with a note stating that a loved one had been murdered.
According to Kochersperger, there was a horrible scene that occurred at the post office virtually every day.
“Out of compassion, postal officials in Cleveland chose to deliver mail to people’s homes,” he stated. The concept caught on fast.
By the end of the 19th century, about two-thirds of Americans were still living in rural areas, despite the popularity of city home delivery. Around 1900, rural free delivery, or RFD, started to grow quickly due to the high demand.
Postal innovations: Making use of Army pilots and aircraft
The first regularly scheduled air mail service in the country started on May 15, 1918, although approved air mail flights started in 1911. The first routes used Army pilots and aircraft and ran between New York, Philadelphia, and Washington, D.C.
Air mail was soon taken over by the post office, which operated for nine years before switching to nascent commercial airline firms, several of which are still prominent airlines today.
Flights were so risky in the beginning that some pilots called themselves the Suicide Club. The National Postal Museum reports that 32 pilots were killed, including four whose aircraft caught fire while in flight. There were no commercial aviation systems, navigational tools or radios, and pilots relied on landmarks to find their way.
These pilots were flying in open cockpits and all kinds of weather. Kochersperger stated that it was quite dangerous.
FDR’s New Deal brings the nation new post offices
Part of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal plan to address the Great Depression was to put people to work on federal construction projects. That included roughly 2,000 new post offices.
A portion of each building’s budget was reserved for artwork, such as murals. Hundreds of post offices still house original art from the era.
During World War II, the 6888th Central Postal Battalion, or , an all-Black and all-female unit of the Women’s Army Corps, went overseas to tackle a massive backlog of undelivered mail for troops in Europe, many of whom had been reassigned.
The unit’s motto was, No mail, low morale. It cleared the backlog in three months.
A population boom and five digits transform mail service
After World War II, the economy boomed and so did the population.
The post office needed a faster way to sort massive amounts of mail. It could no longer do so by hand.
On July 1, 1963, each post office was given a five-digit ZIP code.
Previously, clerks had to memorize thousands of points of address information so they could sort the mail, Kochersperger said. With the ZIP code, you didn t have to memorize anything.
The public was skeptical at first, balking at more numbers. So, the post office came up with a friendly cartoon character named Mr. ZIP, who helped convince people their mail would arrive faster.
It took some getting used to, but it worked.
Today, can you imagine life without a ZIP code? Kochersperger asked.
A mail workers strike led to restructuring and bargaining rights
In 1970, a strike was called over low wages by leaders of the National Association of Letter Carriers union in New York and quickly broadened in scope.
After about 200,000 workers joined the first U.S. postal strike, President Richard Nixon called up the National Guard to help sort mail. But it was a disaster after two days, Kochersperger said.
The strike led to the Postal Reorganization Act of 1970, which authorized collective bargaining rights for postal workers. It also transformed the taxpayer-supported Post Office Department into the United States Postal Service, a financially self-sustaining and independent agency within the executive branch.
The postmaster general would work for a board of governors instead of reporting to the president. The U.S. Postal Service would set its own rates, control its finances and decide post office locations.
How anthrax attacks reshaped the postal service
Weeks after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, four threatening letters contaminated with anthrax were sent through the mail, including to two U.S. senators. Two workers at a mail distribution center in Washington, D.C., died after breathing in the spores.
Three other people were killed, and more than a dozen were sickened. Following , authorities concluded the person who mailed the anthrax had taken his own life in 2008 and the case was closed, but new precautions were added to protect workers.
It changed the whole way that we sorted mail at that time, Kochersperger said.
Years later, postal workers would be designated essential workers during and don protective gear again.
What’s next for the USPS?
The advent of the internet and private companies like Amazon has taken a bite out of mail volume, threatening . A 10-year modernization effort was launched to keep up with the times.
Reaction has been mixed, but , the agency’s newly appointed postmaster general, says some improvements have been made.
Steiner, a former FedEx board member, wants to help keep the service self-sustaining. He has said he opposes privatization, an idea raised by President Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk, and believes the agency has a bright future as an independent entity.
There is much to build upon in the years ahead, he said.
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Haigh reported from Hartford, Conn.
