History
Much support for the introduction of a nationwide rural mail delivery service came from the The National Grange of the Order of Patrons of Husbandry, the nation's oldest agricultural organization. Fayette County in southeastern Indiana may be the birthplace of Rural Free Delivery. Milton Trusler, a leading farmer in the county, began advocating the idea in 1880; as the president of the Indiana Grange, he spoke to farmers statewide frequently over the following sixteen years. Formerly, residents of rural areas had to either travel to a distant post office to pick up their mail, or else pay for delivery by a private carrier. Postmaster General John Wanamaker was ardently in favor of Rural Free Delivery (RFD), as it was originally called, along with many thousands of Americans living in rural communities who wanted to send and receive mail inexpensively. However, the adoption of a nationwide RFD system had many opponents. Some were simply opposed to the cost of the service. Private express carriers thought inexpensive rural mail delivery would eliminate their business, and many town merchants worried the service would reduce farm families' weekly visits to town to obtain goods and merchandise.
The Post Office Department first experimented with the idea of rural mail delivery on October 1, 1891 to determine the viability of RFD. They began with five routes covering ten miles, 33 years after free delivery in cities had begun. The first routes to receive RFD during its experimental phase were in Jefferson County, West Virginia, near Charles Town, Halltown, and Uvilla.
After five years of controversy, RFD finally became an official service in 1896 under President Grover Cleveland. That year, 82 rural routes were put into operation. A massive undertaking, nationwide RFD service took several years to implement, and remains the "biggest and most expensive endeavor" ever instituted by the U.S. postal service.
The service has grown steadily. By 1901, the mileage had increased to over 100,000; the cost was $1,750,321 and over 37,000 carriers were employed. In 1910 the mileage was 993,068; cost $36,915,000; carriers 40,997. In 1913 came the introduction of parcel post delivery, which caused another boom in rural deliveries. Parcel post service allowed the distribution of national newspapers and magazines, and was responsible for millions of dollars of sales in mail-order merchandise to customers in rural areas. In 1930 there were 43,278 rural routes serving about 6,875,321 families—that is about 25,471,735 persons. The cost was $106,338,341. In 1916, the Rural Post "Good" Roads Act authorized federal funds for rural post roads.
Today, as in years past, the rural delivery service uses a network of rural routes traveled by carriers to deliver and pick up mail to and from roadside mailboxes. Formerly, an address for mail to a rural delivery address included both the rural route number and the box number, for example "RR 5, Box 10." With the implementation of the 911 emergency system in many areas, it has become necessary to discontinue the old rural route numbers in those areas in favor of house numbers and road names as used on city routes. This change enabled emergency services to more quickly locate a rural residence.
Read more about this topic: Rural Delivery Service
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