When I got home from work on Thursday I walked across the street to talk to my neighbor. While talking to her I looked down the street at the Cluster Box Unit where my mailbox is and noticed something different. (I looked it up, it is actually called a Cluster Box Unit or CBU)

For some time there had been a couple broken doors in our CBU. On Thursday a new CBU was delivered and installed.

After talking to my neighbor I went down to pick up my mail. I thought that they would have just transferred the locks from the old unit. I tried my key in every single lock without any luck.

I then called the Post Office and found out that they would be setting up the Cluster Box and distributing keys on Friday. They said that if I was home they would deliver the key to me, or I could pick it up at the Post Office on Saturday.

This of course got me thinking about the mail system and I remembered some really cool pictures in an old book I have.

The book is Stories about Sally by Eleanor Thomas, and is full of pictures of Sally’s surroundings. It covers a range of subjects of what goes on behind the scenes. Where does food come from, different types of transportation, how are we protected, the mail system and many more subjects. With a quick search I found that it was part of a series of Social Studies text books.

The book has a copyright date of 1949, so I thought we would take a trip back more than 60 years and find out a little bit about the mail system at that time.

You may remember my post about Baking Bread where I shared pictures from the book.

Here we have an iconic mailbox. The color is a little different as I usually picture them as being blue.

A young boy is mailing a Christmas card.

Here is the mail man picking up the mail from the mailbox and putting it in his collection bag.

The mail man transfers the mail from his collection bag into larger bags that are then taken to the post office.

At the post office the mail is manually sorted and either retained for local delivery or placed in bags to be sent on to other places.

I really like the detail in this picture. Do you see the time clock on the wall? Do you notice that the employees are wearing ties?

At that time a lot of mail was sorted on trains as they sped across the country. In this picture you can see a bag of mail being snagged as they pass a station. The incoming mail would be sorted and added to other bags that would be dropped off at stations along the route of the train.

If you needed to get a letter or item to someone quickly you could send it by airmail.

I looked up the postage rates for 1949.

Postcard Rate: 1¢
Domestic Letter Rate: 3¢ per oz.
Air Mail Rate: 6¢ per oz.

This would be about 10, 30 and 60 cents if adjusted for inflation, so it would still be less than what we pay for postage today.

I hope you enjoyed this little look at how the mail system worked 60 years ago.

Oh, I almost forgot. You may be wondering if I got my mail key yet. I was able to get to the post office a little before six this evening. However, the post office closed at 5:30 and the lobby doors were locked. This did not stop me though. I pulled out my phone and call the post office and they let me in so I could get my keys 🙂

I was hoping that my copy of BAR would be in the mail, as I have heard that several of my friends already received theirs. No luck, it must take longer to make it all the way out here.

Steven