YOUR POSTAL SERVICE (1949)

Heat. Heat. biggest retail business in the world today is the United States Post Office, devoted exclusively to the service of its owners, the American public. Though 90% of its income is derived from the sale of stamps, the post office is also the largest savings bank in the country and the largest agency for the transfer of money. It takes in more than 1.5 billion annually. Postal business is transacted through some 47,000 post offices, contract stations, and branches in 42,000 US communities. In big city post offices, where the daily volume of mail is tremendous, operations are directed by able executives like New York's postmaster Albert Goldman, whose working force numbers more than 35,000 men and women. Today, postal employees must cope with an everinccreasing avalanche of male, which in the past decade has quadrupled in volume. During the last year, the biggest and busiest in postal history, more than 40 billion letters, parcels, and other pieces of mail were processed for delivery. To speed the mail on its way, the post office makes use of many of the streamlined methods private industry has developed for increasing efficiency. In New York, bundles of letters are shot underground through a network of pneumatic tubes which connect the main post offices in Manhattan and Brooklyn with 21 major postal stations throughout the city. Though the task of clearing letter mail is great, even more formidable is the problem of parcel post, which accounts for nearly 2/3 of the 9 billion pounds of mail handled by postal employees each year. In the past year alone, the gross weight of parcel post handled has increased 21%. And today, with express and freight rates at an all-time high, more and more people are shipping merchandise by mail. In conducting its nationwide business, the post office uses almost every known means of transportation. Of prime importance to the postal service are the nation's railroads, which carry 90% of all mail. The railway mail service, established 84 years ago, sorts and distributes the mail as it moves from city to city. In operation on US railroads today are more than 3,000 railway post offices. Manned by over 25,000 full-time clerks and another 10,000 who work part-time, they save hours on the delivery and collection of mail on route. Speeding mail delivery for post offices not located on railroads is the new highway post office service established only a few years ago. Today 32 postal vehicles, motorized versions of the railway mail cars are already rolling over US highways and many additional routes are being planned. Constantly being expanded is the air mail service. First introduced in 1918, under contracts with commercial airlines, air mail is today regularly flown between 520 US cities and to nearly every country in the world as well. In 1947, the Post Office Department inaugurated in Los Angeles the first helicopter air mail service. Though established mainly to affect the prompt transfer of mail from the municipal airport to Los Angeles Terminal Post Office, the helicopter service also distributes mail in bulk to the city's outlying districts. Contributing to the unprecedented load the post office is carrying is the volume of mail being sent out by the various departments and agencies of the federal government and by congressmen making use of their franking privileges. All of this is delivered free of charge. In addition, the flow of letters and parcel post overseas has increased tenfold since the pre-war years of a decade ago, due in large part to shipments of food and clothing for the relief of Europe's destitute peoples. Hampering mail deliveries is the acute lack of post office space due to curtailment of construction and public buildings since before the war and the slow disintegration of equipment much of which has not been renewed in years. Most mail trucks are antiquated and require constant repair. Earnestly seeking solutions to these problems is the man who is most familiar with them, the only postmaster general ever appointed from the ranks, Jesse M. Donaldson. His chief concern is his department's growing annual deficit. >> One reason for the steadily mounting postal deficit is a penny postal card. It costs us 2 1/2 cents and it couldn't be duplicated commercially for less than four. 95% of the postal cards are used by advertising firms. They buy them by the billions. Sooner or later, Congress will have to make a determination as to whether the post office is to be operated as a service agency or as a business institution which will bring revenues and expenses as close together as possible. That the post office department functions as smoothly as it does is due in no small measure to the watchfulness of the postal inspectors whose job is to check post office operations, auditing accounts, and making efficiency surveys so that inspectors may check up on employees as they perform their duties. Most of the larger post offices have enclosed passages provided with viewing slits high above the workroom. A little publicized force of only 815 men operating quietly under their chief James J. Duran, the inspectors are responsible for tracking down all criminals who misuse or tamper with the males. Among the cases handled by the postal inspectors was one involving Emerson Daker, a baggage man on a Midwestern railroad who began by rifling parcel post packages which he took from unlocked pouches. Later, with a key which he fashioned at home, he gained access to the first class letter mail. Over a period of months, Baker managed to steal currency from several hundred pieces. On the basis of complaints reaching the post office department, the inspectors were able to plot the routes over which the stolen mail had been carried. They soon narrowed their investigation to one baggage car, Emerson Dakers. To get the evidence they needed, the inspectors prepared 15 test letters containing currency and recorded the serial numbers of the bills. The test letters were placed in a special pouch which the inspectors kept under continuous observation except for the time it was in the baggage car with Daker. When the special pouch reached its destination, the inspectors found that eight of the 15 test letters had disappeared. They knew it was time to head for Daker's house without delay. An amateur thief, Daker had taken few precautions to cover his tracks. When he was caught with the marked bills and with plenty of other stolen stuff as well, he promptly confessed. Like many others before him, both amateur and professional, Daker found out that anyone who starts tampering with the males is letting himself in for trouble. Postal inspectors are often called upon to handle cases involving misuse of the males. Sometimes these are a matter not merely of routine thievery or fraud, but of crimes which lead to tragic consequences. >> Oh, hello, Mr. D. Hello. >> It's pretty heavy, Mrs. Johnson. Must be another wedding gift. >> Thank you. I'll manage. Let's see what's in it. >> All right, dear. We went over the wreckage of the car. This is all that's left of the bomb. Pieces of pipe, twine, wire, probably a mousetrap, fragment of a battery. How's Mrs. Johnson getting along? >> She's coming along. I had a talk with her. They'd been married only about a month and were very happy together. Her people didn't object to the marriage. Neither did his. >> After they made sure there was no reason for anyone in either family to wish for Johnson's death, the inspectors began a routine check on the couple's past associations. in Providence, Rhode Island. Their interest was aroused by a former employer who Mrs. Johnson had said was once in love with her. She worked for me for 5 years. She was very efficient. Nice girl, too. Oh, I wrote her a few times after she left, but not since she's been married. Meanwhile, they began a painstaking investigation to find out where the parts of the bomb came from. Our laboratory has confirmed that this was one of our C7 dry cell batteries. We sell them to three stores in Rhode Island. The inspectors got valuable clues from the wide awake clerk who delivered the package to Mrs. Johnson. Must have weighed about 9 or 10 lb and I'm pretty sure it was postmarked Potucket, Rhode Island. From the information obtained by their exhaustive investigation, the inspectors constructed a dummy package on the chance that one of the receiving clerks in Potucket might remember the person who mailed the bomb. He was about 40. He had grain temples, porn glasses. He was in here about 3 weeks ago. We don't handle many parcels this heavy. That's why I remember him. Of the three stores in Rhode Island selling Acme batteries, one was found to be in Providence, down the street from Bradshaw's office. >> The last shipment I got was back in September. 12 of them. I only have these three left. I don't know who bought the rest of them. No strangers, just people right around here. >> Canvasing other hardware stores, the inspectors discovered that Bradshaw had recently bought iron pipe in one and dynamite in another, ostensibly to clear away stumps on his farm. With the evidence piling up, the clerk at the Port Tucket substation finally put the clincher on the case. >> Is this the man? >> Yes, sir. That's the man. >> Their case all but wrapped up. The postal inspectors working in close harmony with the state police had their man arrested. >> Here he is, inspector. >> Sit down. Bradshaw. We have a few questions we'd like to ask you. Though relatively few people ever come in contact with the postal inspectors, everyone in the US is benefited in one way or another by the day-to-day work of the post office department. To most Americans, the living symbol of the postal service is the neighborhood letter carrier who walks the same streets and serves the same families year after year who knows his community and is a friend to all who live in it. >> Good morning, Mrs. Willis. >> Good morning. >> Here's another letter from that soldier son of yours. >> Oh, thank you. During his day, the letter carrier may walk as much as 10 miles making deliveries and picking up mail. Counterpart of the urban postmen are the rural carriers. They serve more than 30 million people daily, delivering and collecting mail, selling stamps and money orders, and accepting articles to be registered, insured, or sent COD. Like the city postman, the rural carrier knows the people in his community intimately and serves them well. >> Noisy critters, ain't they? >> Yeah. Can I expect a couple of more shipments? Keep an eye out for them, Ben. >> You can count on me. >> Today, the postal service plays an integral part in the lives of Americans of every age and station. For the United States Post Office, as it has since it was founded 173 years ago, still provides the one means of communication which reaches into every corner of the land. facilitating the exchange of news and ideas which has helped to make America great. Time marches on