William Bradford was the then deputy postmaster, but, having proved negligent respecting his official accounts, was removed, and Benjamin Franklin was appointed in his stead. Colonel Spottswood was the postmaster-general, at whose instigation Bradford was removed.
Now commenced a new and important era in the postal department of our country, bearing date 1737. It was at that period, however, a very unimportant matter, but in time has become a gigantic institution. We look back to that period now with more interest, for two reasons: one is, to contrast it with the present, and the other, because the name of Benjamin Franklin is identified with the first great move in our postal history.
Franklin assumed the deputy-postmastership in 1737. The only pecuniary available result from it, however, was that it afforded him better facilities for procuring news for his paper, and for its distribution. This paper was originally entitled “The Universal Instructor in all Arts and Sciences, and Pennsylvania Gazette,” and had reached its thirty-ninth number when its proprietor sold out to Franklin and Meredith. October 2, 1729, was the date of No. 40, edited by B. Franklin. It was reduced in name to “Pennsylvania Gazette.” The increase and emoluments of his paper were still further aided by the diminishing patronage received by his rival Bradford, the displaced postmaster, who had while in office forbidden his post-riders to distribute any papers but his own. Franklin, speaking of this ungenerous conduct on the part of Bradford, said, “I thought so meanly of the practice on his part, that when I afterwards came into the situation I took care never to imitate it.” He also says, in his Life, “Thus Bradford suffered greatly from his neglect in due accounting; and I mention this fact as a lesson to those young men who may be employed in managing affairs for others, that they should always render accounts and make remittances with great clearness and punctuality, &c.”
Perhaps there is no portion of our postal history more interesting than that which characterized its early dawn. It presents a sort of political and financial struggle between trade, commerce, and a government. Franklin, however, settled the question by making it both a national and commercial feature. It is also interesting to note the difference between the movements of the public mail in those old colonial days, when its bags, at most but a few score pounds in weight, were almost universally carried on horseback, and in these times, when it is speeded in tons by steam!
Perhaps there was not another man in the colonies better adapted for the postmastership than Franklin. He had been, up to that period, an active business-man. He was a printer, editor, compositor, publisher, bookseller, and stationer,—in fact, a modern Faust in the first, and a Mathew Carey in the latter.
The postal services of the colonies now began to assume a somewhat business form, and, although some of these services were not immediately connected with the department, they were nevertheless highly advantageous to the community: as, for instance, letters arriving from beyond sea were usually delivered on board the ship into the hands of the persons to whom they were addressed; families expecting letters would send a messenger on board for the purpose of receiving letters. Those that were not called for before the sailing of the vessel were taken to the “Coffee-House,” where everybody could make inquiry for them; thus showing that the post-office did not seem to claim a right to distribute them, as now. Persons coming from adjacent settlements called at the “Coffee-House,” and carried away not only their own letters, but all those belonging to their neighborhood. These were called “neighborly posts.”
As the trade of the colonies extended, the system of letter-delivery began to vary; and thus the “neighborly post” system resolved itself into that of the “post-rider.”
Perhaps Boston deserves the credit of the first formation of a foreign postal system; for in 1639 the General Court of Massachusetts issued the following decree:—
“It is ordered that notice be given that Richard Fairbanks his house in Boston is the place appointed for all letters which are brought from beyond the seas, or are to be sent thither to be left with him; and he is to take care that they are to be delivered or sent accordingly to the directions; and he is allowed for every letter a penny; and he must answer all miscarriages through his own neglect in this kind.”
In Philadelphia, the Old Coffee-House system prevailed for many years.