New Hampshire’s Part In National Air Mail Week -1938

PHOTO: In Laconia, the “First Aeromarine Mail Service in America,” flown by pilot Bob Fogg on Lake Winnipesaukee in 1925, was commemorated with a special cachet showing the outline of the lake and the airmail route during a nationwide promotion for air mail in 1938.

By Jane Rice
Weirs Times Contributing Writer

With the development of digital technology in recent years, and now with the onset of coronavirus, we are communicating by email and cell phone on a daily or hourly basis, but in 1938, air mail was the hot new means of communication, and to popularize the new, faster mail delivery, Postmaster General James Farley and President Franklin Roosevelt dreamed up a “National Air Mail Week” promotion for the week of May 15-21, 1938, with the goal of having every American mail one airmail letter during the week in order to “Receive Tomorrow’s Mail Today,” as the slogan went. Airline transportation of mail and passengers was just getting “off the ground,” and the government wanted to help the fledgling airlines fly through the Depression.

The first regularly scheduled airmail flight in the United States took place on May 15, 1918, with a flight from New York to Washington, via Philadelphia, and although it was not eminently successful, with several forced landings along the way, air mail did eventually become practical and by 1938 was a regular part of the U.S. Mail, and it was time to recognize the twentieth anniversary of that first flight.
Part of the public relations campaign was to have local towns and cities create their own special commemorative envelopes with a design known as a cachet, publicizing some local business or historical event, and an estimated 10,000 towns participated, recognizing everything from giant vegetables and crops to lighthouse and sailing ships, mountains and lakes, birthplaces of famous men and women, and much more. There were also generic designs that could simply have the name of the town and the postmaster inserted, but many towns and chambers of commerce made the effort to design a logo celebrating their town or city. Many pilots and postmasters also signed the envelopes, most of which were destined for the stamp albums or scrapbooks of the recipients. Cost to mail a letter by air was six cents, compared to three cents for a letter delivered by ground transportation, and a new six-cent “Eagle” airmail stamp was introduced, although any combination of stamps adding up to six cents was acceptable.
In Laconia, the “First Aeromarine Mail Service in America,” flown by pilot Bob Fogg on Lake Winnipesaukee in 1925, was commemorated with a special cachet showing the outline of the lake and the airmail route.

Bob Fogg, still operating the seaplane base at the Weirs, flew to Wolfeboro in the Winnipesaukee Air Service Sikorsky twin-engine amphibian, along with Laconia postmaster Michael Carrol, Weirs postmaster Joseph Lavertue, Mayor Edward Gallagher, Jim Irwin of the Lakes Region Associates, and Edward Lord of radio station WLNH. They were greeted in Wolfeboro by a delegation of local dignitaries including the postmaster, head selectman, Rotary Club, members of the press, Carpenter School students, and the Carroll Philatelic Club, which presented pilot Fogg with a floral bouquet.
At the same time, pilot Jack MacManus was picking up mail from northern towns, and all were met on their return to Laconia by a parade including “frontiersmen riding spirited steeds” led by Bolder Landry on a pure white horse, plus Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts, and private automobiles. Leaving the Laconia post office with 89 pounds of mail, they proceeded to Laconia’s first airport at the County Farm on North Main Street, where the high school band added to the festivities. Fogg, Winnipesaukee Air Service president Thomas E.P. Rice, and Jack Brown, all veteran pilots of World War I, along with pilot Floyd Miller and Evening Citizen aviation columnist E.A. Twombley, boarded the Sikorsky and flew the mail to Concord, accompanied in the air by Jack MacManus in the Waco biplane and Andy Cannon in a Stinson.

Although the national PR campaign lasted for a week, most letters were mailed on May 19. Hundreds of local pilots across the country were sworn in as government employees for the day, and they flew to each town to pick up the mail, making over 1700 flights, including 43 by women pilots and one by the first black pilots to carry airmail. There was only one plane crash, and no injuries, with that particular batch of airmail being rescued by automobile. In towns that didn’t yet have airports, fields or roads were used for a pickup. During the week, over 16 million letters and 9000 parcels were delivered by air.
Remember when you had to buy an airmail stamp, and an envelope with “Via Air Mail” or “Par Avion” printed on it, and red and blue borders to make it stand out from the crowd of ordinary white envelopes? Nowadays, everything except local mail goes by air as a matter of course, but back in the day, it was a big deal to send or receive “air mail.”
In New Hampshire, at least 45 different cachets are known, ranging from Ashuelot, “Home of the Virgin Forest” to Wolfeboro, featuring General James Wolfe. Other towns and slogans included Berlin, “The Paper City; Claremont, “New Hampshire’s Largest Town;” Colebrook, “The Sportsmen’s Paradise;” Concord, “The Capital City,” Moat Mountain and the Eastern Slope Ski Club, both in Conway; Derry, “A Friendly Town,” “where the first potatoes raised in the United States were planted;” Dover, “Oldest City in New Hampshire;” Durham, “Home of UNH;” Franklin, “Birthplace of Daniel Webster;” Gorham, “The Switzerland of America;” Greenland, “Weeks House-Oldest Brick House in New Hampshire;” Hampton recognized Eunice “Goody” Cole, convicted of witchcraft in 1638, who had her citizenship restored in 1938; Hanover, “Home of Dartmouth College;” Hinsdale, “The Toilet, Tissue and Towel Manufacturing Center of New England;” Keene, “The Heart of New England;” Lebanon, “The Town Beautiful;” Manchester, “Queen City of the Merrimack;” Meredith, “Latchkey to the White Mountains;” “Hills Against the Sky” in New London; Newport, “Birthplace of Sarah Josepha Hale;” Peterborough, “First Free Public Library in the United States Supported by Taxation;” Plymouth, “The Snow Bowl of New England,” and also “Gateway to the White Mountains;” Portsmouth, “The Finest Harbor in the World;” Rye, “A Haven by the Sea for 300 Years,” and Rye Beach, “Odiorne Point, First Settlement in the State;” Salem, “By the Waters of Canobie Lake;” Somersworth, “City of Industrial Opportunity;” Warner, “Mount Kearsarge Country;” Whitefield, “Heart of the White Mountains,” and Winchester, “Birthplace of Great Men.”
Additional participating towns with more generic slogans included East Jaffrey, Goffstown, Haverhill, Marlborough, Nashua, New Boston, Newton, Orford, Pelham, Sanbornville, Suncook, and Troy, with North Conway, Bartlett, Intervale, Kearsarge (North), and Redstone sharing the Eastern Slope Ski Club logo with Conway. There is no master list of all the participating towns, so others may yet come to light, and there are also cachets for airport dedications, air tours, and first flights that can be collected by those interested in New Hampshire aviation history.

Read more about Bob Fogg and his seaplane base at the Weirs in “Bob Fogg and New Hampshire’s Golden Age of Aviation: Flying Over Winnipesaukee and Beyond,” by Jane Rice, available in local bookstores, online, or from the author at foggbook@gmail.com. The book is 220 pages long and includes hundreds of black and white photos from the 1920s.

All photos provided by Jane Rice.