Show = < r AT THE POSTOFFICE Over Nine Thousand Letters Handled L Daily Some Curious and Interesting Facts and Figures A DEMOCRAT reporter called at the em ployes entrance to the postoffice this morning gave throe mystic taps whispered whis-pered the password through the keyhole and was admitted to that wonderful wilderness of pigeon holes mail bags etc that is peered at so curiously through the general delivery windows After wandering helplessly around for several minutes the reporter succeeded in arousing I arous-ing the attention and sympathy of Mr Ed White the bustling attache who distiibutes the incoming mail and makes up the free delivery reports One of the first things Mr White i did to satisfy the appetite of the news I gatherer was to hand him the following order just issued by Postmaster General lilas lOSTOFFICE DEPARTMENT OFFICE OF POSTMASTER GENERAL t WASHINGTON March 31st 85 Railway postal clerks who have become be-come efficient and valuable men against whom no just complaint of neglect inattention inat-tention or want of fidelity or efficiency can be brought and who have not turned their attention to political labors during their service will have no fear of being disturbed so long as they continue to render ren-der meritorious and faithful service WM F VILAS Postmaster Geneml This order only applies to railway clerks How do the rest of you fellows expect to fare Oh I dont know was the complacent compla-cent response I presume the same general rule will be observed in all branches of the department Of course there will be some removals We expect thatCan j Can you give me some idea of the amount of business done here 7 We receive about 4000 letters daily and send out about 5000 a total of 9000 handled every day How many clerks are required to distribute dis-tribute this mail 1 I distribute all that is received Mr Billings handles all that is sent out I suppose a good many blunders are made when addressing letters to Salt LakeYes Yes it is hard for outsiders to understand under-stand the street system here but they do better than I expected I noticed a letter the other day addressed to 35 west Fifth East street I sent it to 35 south and it proved to be the right place I have noticed some curious addresses sent out from this office Here are a couple that I copied and Mr White handed the following to the reporter To Berlin Cross Roads take me straight That town is in Ohio State There put me down and let me be Till Sadie Woodson calls for me Here is another Mid sage brush in Nevada State Where silver miners congregate There dwells one lIen Long a healthy pill Who works at the Manhattan mill For cash to raise his beer and hash And rouud in Austin cut a dash Where he will find this brief epistle And have a chance to wet his whistle If not for want of bail lies in the Lander county jail How is the free delivery system working work-ing 1Finely Finely The carriers last month de livered 19020 letters and 5825 newspapers newspa-pers They collected 21254 letters 1097 postal cards and 14090 newspapers Each one is required to make a daily statement of the number of letters collected and delieered from which a monthly statement is made Their business busi-ness tliis month will be much heavier t owing to the fact that about 300 more boxes have been given up Out of nearly 1000 boxes 600 are still retained One hundred more will probably be given up during the present month The general delivery business has dwindled down to almost nothing We have closed one window and there is very little mail to be distributed at the other I Say chimed in one of the carriers wish you would tell people to have mailboxes mail-boxes put up at their residences Half of them are not up when we call in the morning and consequently we have to keep their mail until we make the next trip A mail box only costs a dollar The carrier was assured that his complaint com-plaint would reach the public and Mr White continued liThe districts are about a mile long and contain about twentytwo blocks The Third district is aver two miles long embracing em-bracing the entire western portion of the city but that carrier is mounted The carriers make two daily trips except in the business part of town where three trips are made OReilley is the carrier for the central portion of the city and de livers about 350 letters daily The others average 200 daily The reporter was then shown the many ingenious arrangements for assorting the mails The clerk who distributes the in I coming mail has a row of pigeon holes iJ front of him and the letters for each or the seven carriers general delivery reg I istry department etc are separately deposited de-posited Each carrier also has an ingenious I in-genious contrivance by means of which he assorts his mail for convenient distri bution before starting out In an adjoin ing room is a semicircular table upon which are dumped the papers sent out of the city These papers lire fired with unerring aim into the gaping mouths of fortyfour mail bags and the rapidity with which Mr Billings disposes of the mountain before him is astonishing There is also a separate table for assort ing outgoing letters and every State and largo city in the Un ion is represented by a pigeon hole The letters for each point of destina tion are done up in a separate bundle and the name of the distributing clerk at I tached so that when n letter is miR pnt the blunder can be traced directly to the guilty party All letters received are also in packages and are accompanied by the name of the distributor White stated that the New York office sent its Memphis Mem-phis Tenn mail to Salt Lake regularly and under this sys tem of labelling the packages the blunder was traced directly to the source and reported The Union Pacific railway clerks also make frequent mis takes and the Salt Lake office reports as many as 125 letters missent to thistsity in I a single day Only the other evening twenty Ogden letters were sent down to this city All these blunders are readily I traced to the proper source under the admirable ad-mirable system now in vogue and are promptly reported to the inspector |