Post Offices on Wheels

When one-fifth of the people of the U. S. want to know where there's a covey of quail, or a good trout hole, who's had a baby, what fresh cow is for sale, or how the road is down river way--they ask the.R. F. D. carrier. He or she (there are 323 shes among 32,988 U. S. rural mail-carriers) also has a good idea of who is going to vote for whom in an election year, and can do a lot toward getting folks to vote this way or that. One of Postmaster General Farley's main reasons for getting back from politicking around the country was to address 1,550 members of the National Rural Letter Carriers Association, together with their 1,400 ladies, their 1,300 juniors, who convened last week in Washington.

But politics had only a self-conscious interest for the country mailmen. As Civil Servants they were more interested in swapping notes on how to give "Service with a Smile" (their Association's motto) ; in swapping routes (a man from Maine exchanging with an Arizonian if their local postmasters approved); in boasting about the number of boxes they visit (Mrs. Annie Massey, 53, of Bay Springs, Miss. on one stretch of her 50 mi., 165-box route, has to travel 17 miles and cross: eleven bridges in an area of one squre mile); in marveling at the streamlined never-stick R. F. D. box displayed at the convention by Farmer Adney Coleman of Evergreen, Ala., which looked as if it really wouldn't jam up and be a nuisance in bad weather.

Boss Farley said: 1) That rural lif must be made attractive; the farm-to-city trend is a national menace. And 2) "There is no more attractive ornament to a country home than an artistic, well-preserved mail receptacle."

President Raymond H. Combs of Churchville, N. Y., who looks like a slim but prosperous banker, made an even moi professional speech. Said he: "We're the only ones in the organization that provide complete postal service. They count on us for . . . their stamps . . . give us their packages . . . send money orders through us." In fact, he said, the smiling servants of the R. F. D. ought to be called, not "letter carriers" but "post offices on wheels."

It was the first time in 17 years the P. O. on W. had convened in Washington (next year it's Portland, Ore.) and the expensive Mayflower Hotel unbent to make the event a social success. Rates were cut to $2.17 per night and 1,560 of its rooms were occupied. Its parlors and lobbies were filled not only with those who dressed like President Combs but with carriers in shirt sleeves, without neckties. The bars did little business, conversation was quiet, and the Washington Herald said admiringly of the crowd: "It was interested and curious, but unawed."

One day they had a boat ride on the Potomac, with famed old-time Pitcher Walter ("Big Train") Johnson autographing 300 gift baseballs for the Juniors. They had their own pretty-girl singers and band. They planted a hickory tree near the Washington Monument in soil from every State, Mrs. H. G. Courtney of Norwalk, Iowa, wielding the spade ably assisted by President Combs. They sang Hail, Hail, the Gang's All Here, using "heck"' to fill out the line, "What the -- do we care!" Unlike city and town carriers, they did not agitate for a 40-hr. week, because a P. O. on W. gets $1,800 a year for a 30-mi. route but only $20 more per year for every added mile.--* For a lot of them 40 hours would mean longer routes and more P. O. on W. would have to be laid off. On the whole most of them like life as it is.

--*In five years, 7,365 rural routes have been merged with others, for a P. O. saving of $8,450,000 a year. Meanwhile, R. F. D. has been extended 19,500,000 yearly route-miles.

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