Rural Free Delivery – Mail To The Country Homes

PHOTO: A 1905 mail vehicle.

by Robert Hanaford Smith, Sr.
Weirs Times Contributing Writer

The first mailing address that I remember knowing about, assigned to the place where I lived, had no street number, no street mentioned, and a town listed on it that wasn’t the town to which the mail was delivered. It did have an R.F.D. number on it, #1, and the name of an adjoining town plus the state was identified. In fact, someone could send a letter to my parents, or even one in my name, without indicating it was in care of my parents, but with the name of the adjoining town, and it would be delivered to the mail box in front of our home.
The method of delivery was Rural Free Delivery, with a route number of one, the adjoining town being Ashland, and the state being New Hampshire. Zip Codes were unheard of, and the town our mail was actually delivered to was New Hampton, The Postal Department of the government, when it added rural deliveries designed a route where the mail was delivered from the Ashland Post Office to rural homes in both Ashland and New Hampton.
These days, over one hundred years after the advent of Rural Free Delivery, we are used to having the mail delivered to our homes, even if we live far from town, but it was not always so. Rural residents, if they wanted their mail, had to travel to the closest post office to pick up their mail rather than having a home delivery.

An article in the October 1900 issue of the Inter-State Journal, covering New Hampshire and Vermont with stories of public interest, told what was involved with the first R.F.D. route started in West Lebanon, New Hampshire less than two months earlier on September 1st of 1900.
The Postmaster in West Lebanon was Mr. Horace French and the young man chosen to carry the mail was Mr. Thomas S. Sinclair. The 1900 magazine article not only detailed the mailman’s responsibilities and route doings, it also explained the benefits of rural deliveries and the added impact it had on the beneficiaries.
The mail carrier, in this situation Thomas Sinclair, didn’t begin his daily work until shortly before one o’clock in the afternoon. He had to sort the mail that had arrived overnight for those on his route and the mail that arrived that day from the north which arrived at about noon. Each family on the rural route had a small box at the Post Office arranged in the order in which their mail would be delivered and Mr. Sinclair put each families mail into their box at the office, first dealing with the earlier mail and then adding that which came in at noon. Packing the mail for delivery involved arranging the newspapers in the order that they would be delivered in separate bundles before doing the same with the letters, and being careful in attempting to avoid any mistakes in the process.

Probably all of us who receive mail today have at some time experienced the annoyance of receiving someone else’s mail in our mailbox. In 1900 Mr. Sinclair had to count each piece of mail he delivered as required by the United States government. The mail was placed in a “strong leather shoulder pouch, similar to that used by city mail-carriers, and Tom Sinclair set out on his route.
In those beginning days of rural free delivery the carriers were not required to wear uniforms, but it was recommended that they do so with the large letter “R” on each sleeve to show that they weren’t city carriers. A cap with a badge reading “ U.S. MAIL. RURAL FREE DELIVERY” was also worn. Before starting out Thomas would buckle on his revolver for protection. He also made sure that he had with him stamps, postal cards, and stamped envelopes.
The carrier rode in his horse and buggy for a mile before he delivered any mail because rural deliveries were not allowed within one mile of the Post Office. And yes, he traveled his route with a horse and buggy as automobiles were not ready to be used for that purpose.
There was concern about the safety of the mail if it was to just be dropped off by the carrier each day. The delivery was free in that no additional charge was made besides the postage, but the individual families were required to purchase a box, or boxes, to have their mail deposited into, of course, placed on a sturdy post. A wooden box without any lock was used for newspapers, but letters were placed in a metal box with a lock opened with a key.
As is the expectation with today’s rural deliveries, the rural carrier was supposed to be able to deliver the mail without leaving his vehicle. The postmaster at Concord, NH, Mr. Henry Robinson, was credited with inventing the wooden mail box. The metal one was called the Corbin Letter Box. My guess is that in those first days and weeks of the rural free delivery that someone in many of the households was present to greet the carrier, Mr. Sinclair, when he arrived with the mail. If no one was there he would blow a whistle to let the family know that mail had arrived. No provision had been made for Mr. Sinclair to know if letters had been left out for him to pick up, so different families devised different ways to leave a signal for him. He might find a piece of a horse blanket or a rag doll or something else attached to the box as a signal. That changed when Sinclair purchased with his own money a small American flag for each of the families on his route which was to be placed over the mail box if they had mail to go.
The United States Postal Service began experimenting with a rural free delivery plan in the late 1800’s. The first such route in New Hampshire began service in October of 1898 out of the Pittsfield Post Office. Petersboro, Concord, and North Chichester followed in 1899. Plymouth joined West Lebanon in beginning rural deliveries in September of 1900 with Manchester, Contoocook and Nashua following before that year ended.
Thomas Sinclair’s salary was $500 dollars a year, but he was allowed to supplement his income by carrying passengers and freight and selling farm goods on his route. He traveled more than the minimum mileage of 20 miles a day required for a rural route by doing 28 miles while serving at least the 100 families needed for a rural route.
An added benefit along the R.F.D. # 1 West Lebanon mail route was described by the Inter-State Journal: “Houses that have not seen a coat of paint in years are now being painted; fields that never had a fence are now being enclosed; over five miles of highway has been raked free from stones, great boulders which menaced the safety of travelers have been removed; bridges repaired- and all this in less than two months of the service, and the good work is still going on.”
So it is.