Part 25

The credit of suggesting the first step toward the present system has generally been given to Colonel G. B. Armstrong, who in 1864 was Assistant Postmaster at Chicago. This is incorrect; Mr. W. A. Davis, a clerk of the St. Joseph, Mo., Post-Office, where the overland mail was made up, conceived the idea, in 1862, that if the letters and papers could be assorted on the cars between Quincy and St. Joseph, the overland mail could start promptly on time. He was given permission to carry out this idea, and there are vouchers on file in the Department at Washington showing that he was paid for that specific work. In 1864 Colonel Armstrong was authorized and encouraged by the Hon. Montgomery Blair, then Postmaster-General, to undertake the difficult task of arranging and introducing the service. On August 31, 1864, he wrote: "To-day I commenced the new distribution." Subsequently, Colonel Armstrong became the first General Railway Mail Superintendent, and held this office until ill-health compelled him to resign, in 1871. To Colonel George S. Bangs, of Illinois, and his successors, Theodore N. Vail, William B. Thompson, and John Jameson, is due the excellence of the present system. Colonel Bangs was a thoroughly equipped post-office man, energetic, courageous, and progressive. Brimful of ideas, he was ever on the lookout for improvement. Never satisfied with old ways, he was constantly striving to simplify and better the service. He forgot himself in his work, and died a martyr to his duty, leaving the Travelling Post-Office of to-day a monument to his memory. While to Colonel Armstrong is due the credit for the skeleton of the system, it was the genius of Colonel Bangs that clothed the bones with flesh, developed the sinew, put the blood in circulation, and breathed into its body the breath of life. Colonel Bangs found, in 1871, that everything was disjointed, disconnected, and sluggish. There was no attempt at "certainty, security, or celerity." It was a "go-as-you-please" condition of affairs. He grappled at once with it and brought order out of chaos. He introduced a system of emulation among the employees, rewarding those who displayed proficiency by promotion over the sluggish, and thus, in fact, was probably the father of what is now known as Civil Service Reform. In 1874 he discussed the propriety of establishing a fast and exclusive mail train between New York and Chicago, "this train" (quoting his report to the Postmaster-General) "to be under the control of the Department, so far as it is necessary for the purposes designed, and to run the distance in about twenty-four hours. It is conceded by railway officials that this can be done. The importance of a line like this cannot be overestimated. It would reduce the actual time of mail between the east and west from twelve to twenty-four hours. As it would necessarily be established upon one or more of the trunk lines, having an extended system of connections, its benefit would be in no case confined, but extended through all parts of the country alike."

This report met with the approval of Postmaster-General Jewell, who ordered Bangs to negotiate with the New York Central & Hudson River Railroad and the Lake Shore Railroad for a fast mail train, leaving New York at four o'clock in the morning, and arriving at Chicago in about twenty-four hours. It was the old story of making bricks without straw. The Post-Office Department had no appropriation to pay for such facilities, hence it had to depend at first on the public spirit of the railroad authorities. Commodore Vanderbilt, the president of the companies whose lines were to be used, had had dealings with the Department, and was perhaps not altogether sanguine as to the practical issue of the experiment, or in respect to the countenance it would receive from Congress; but Mr. William H. Vanderbilt, the vice-president, lent a willing ear to Mr. Bangs's proposition, and did his utmost to aid him in putting it into effect. There being no special appropriation available for the purpose in hand, "the devil was whipped around the stump" by Colonel Bangs stipulating that if Mr. Vanderbilt would have twenty cars built and the service performed, all matter originating at or coming into the New York Post-Office, which could reach its destination at the same time by this line, should be sent by this train, and that the railway companies could have the right to demand a weighing of the mail matter at will, all railroads being paid according to weight. When the details of the plan were communicated to Commodore Vanderbilt, he is reported to have said to his son: "If you want to do this, go ahead, but I know the Post-Office Department, and you will, too, within a year." Mr. Vanderbilt did "go ahead." He constructed and equipped the finest mail train ever seen on the planet, ran it for ten months, never missed a connection at Chicago, and was always on time at New York. He did not have to wait a year, however, for a realization of the sagacious old commodore's prophecy. Within three weeks, despite the indignant protest of Colonel Bangs, the mails of three States were ordered to be taken from this and given to another route. A grosser and more wanton breach of plighted faith it would be hard to find, and its results were far-reaching and disastrous.

This train was a marvel of completeness and efficiency. It was manned by picked men, and the only complaint ever made against it was that it ran so fast that the clerks had not time to sort the mails for the post-offices between New York and Poughkeepsie. To obviate this, Colonel Bangs requested the postmaster at New York to have two hundred mail-bags dyed red, which should contain the mail for those offices nearest together, so that the crew in the train could distribute them first. There was no complaint after that. But when the dyer's bill was sent by the postmaster to the Department, it was disallowed by a clerk of the Second Assistant Postmaster-General, who, in a letter announcing the fact, said that there was no necessity for the outlay if the postal clerks did their duty. Bangs, who had just arrived at the post-office from a day and night's ride on his favorite train, was lying on a sofa half asleep in the postmaster's private office, as that official was opening his mail. When he came to that letter he handed it to Bangs. He was wide-awake in an instant. "Mr. Postmaster," said he, "do you know the man who signed this letter? He is a wheezy priest, a fool, and a Baptist, at that. Give me the letter." The bill was allowed as soon as Bangs reached the Department. He was wrong, however, in crediting the subordinate to the Baptist faith. He was an ornament of another persuasion.

So carefully had the project been considered and adapted that the service on the Central, from the start, moved with the precision of clock-work, and was an immediate success. It is proper to say that word of what was going on between the Department and the Vanderbilt system reached the Hon. Thomas A. Scott, President of the Pennsylvania Railroad, and he at once made up his mind that the corporation under his management could not afford to be behind its great rival. One Saturday morning he telegraphed to J. D. Layng (now General Manager of the West Shore and President of the C. C. C. & I.), then General Manager of the Pennsylvania lines west of Pittsburg, to know if by the following Monday week, the date on which the train was to start, four postal cars could be built and the first one be in Chicago ready to start on its eastern trip. The answer came back, "Yes." The order was given to the Allegheny shops on Saturday afternoon, and on the following Saturday the first of the cars, complete and equipped for mail service, started for Chicago, and began its east-bound trip on Monday morning. The second and third cars were finished on Monday night, and the fourth--thus fully equipping the line--on Tuesday.

Thus had been established two splendid fast trains, and the outlook was bright for the future, when Congress, in spite of the efforts of the Post-Office Department, passed an Act reducing the already inadequate compensation to the trunk lines, for the carrying of the mails. This action brought official notice from Messrs. Vanderbilt and Scott of the discontinuance of the fast mail trains between New York City and Chicago, and that service ended.

Colonel Bangs was greatly mortified at this result, but he stood his ground and remained at his post until the close of the year. Then, worn out with never-ending toil, and disheartened by the action of Congress, he tendered his resignation and insisted on its acceptance. Parted from the Post-Office, President Grant, knowing his worth and wishing to recognize his services, appointed him Assistant Treasurer of the United States at Chicago. He lived to perform the duties of this office only a few months, as death overtook him suddenly, while on a visit to Washington on official business, December, 1876. His work, however, was not permitted to drop. He had left in the service three assistants, Theodore N. Vail, William B. Thompson--afterward Second Assistant Postmaster-General--and John Jameson, who were fully imbued with the ideas of their late chief and were fully loyal to them. They, in the order named, became his successors, and never permitted opportunities to escape wherein there was a possible benefit to the service to be secured. Although the fast mail service was suspended for lack of support from Congress, its usefulness and practicability had been so thoroughly demonstrated that an appropriation of $150,000 was made in March, 1877, for its resumption on the trunk lines. This victory was not reached without untiring efforts on the part of Mr. Vail, and by generous support in both houses of Congress; in the Senate by the Hon. Hannibal Hamlin and James G. Blaine, of Maine, and in the House of Representatives by such broad and liberal statesmen as Mr. Waddell, of North Carolina, Mr. Randall, of Pennsylvania, and Mr. Cox, of New York.

Since then, Messrs. Thompson and Jameson have watched the progress of the work with jealous eyes, and have succeeded in extending it practically to the whole country. The present service is due not alone to the liberality of Congress, because the appropriations have been parsimonious, but to the generosity of the railways, which have performed a valuable work for a price which in many cases does not pay the expense of the necessary additional labor involved.

The Railway Mail Service at the close of the fiscal year ending June 30, 1888, gave employment to 5,094 clerks. Matter was distributed on 126,310 miles of railway, and on 17,402 miles additional closed pouches were carried. There were also operated 41 inland steam-boat lines on which postal clerks were employed. The postal clerks travelled (in crews) 122,031,104 miles by railway, and 1,767,649 miles by steam-boats. They distributed 6,528,772,060 pieces of ordinary mail matter, and handled 16,001,059 registered packages and cases, and 1,103,083 through registered pouches and inner registered sacks. The service is in charge of one General Superintendent, who has his headquarters at Washington, and it is divided into eleven divisions with a superintendent in charge of each.

The majority of people who travel on railways (and how many Americans are there who do not?) have paid passing attention to the railway mail cars as they have stood at the station preparatory to the starting of the train, and have glanced through the open doors with more or less curiosity at the scene of energy and bustle witnessed within. At such a moment, no matter how great the curiosity, it is not feasible to investigate closely, for the workers must not be hampered by the prying public, however praiseworthy the motive. To supply this pardonable desire to know how it is done, I invite my readers to accompany me in spirit on a visit to the Grand Central Station, to witness the preparations for the departure of train No. 11, known in railway parlance as "the New York and Chicago Fast Mail," which leaves New York every night at nine o'clock.

It must not be supposed that everything has been left until the last moment, and that the mail matter has been tumbled into the cars on the eve of departure, to be handled as best it may in the short run to Albany; for under such conditions the task would be an impossibility even to an army of trained hands. Work has been in progress since four o'clock in the afternoon, and it has been steady, hard labor every minute of the time. The five cars have been backed down to the tracks opposite Forty-fifth Street, and have been so placed that they are convenient of access to the big lumbering mail wagons which are familiar sights in the streets of the metropolis. The crew of nineteen men, skilled in the handling of mail matter, and thorough experts in the geography of the country, reported to the chief clerk and took up their stations in the various cars at the hour named. At the same time the wagons began arriving from the General Post-Office with their tons of matter which had "originated" in New York, and were soon transferring their loads to the cars, where agile hands were in waiting to receive them. Since the removal of the deadly stoves from the railway trains the occupants of the postal cars have suffered to no small extent owing to the lack of heat. These cars are provided with steam-heating apparatus which is worked from the engine, but they are occupied for five hours before the engine comes near them, and in cold weather the hands of the men employed in distributing letters become numb with cold. This is a matter which should receive prompt attention.

Before we deal with the mail matter, let us look at the cars and the men who occupy them. The train, as it leaves New York, is made up of five cars which are placed immediately behind the engine, and are followed by express and baggage cars and one passenger coach. The car next to the engine is devoted entirely to letter mail, and the four following it to papers and packages. The letter car is fifty feet in length, while those for the newspaper mail are ten feet longer. All are uniform in width, nine feet eight inches, and are six feet nine inches high in the clear. When newly built, before long and hard service had told on their appearance, their outsides were white in color, with cream-tinted borderings and gilt ornamentations, and were highly varnished. Midway on the outside, and below; the windows of each car, is a large oval gilt-finished frame within which is painted the name of the car, with the words, "United States Post Office" above and below. The cars used by the New York Central are named for the Governors of the State and the members of President Garfield's cabinet. Along the upper edge and centre are painted in large gilt letters the words, "The Fast Mail Train," while on a line with these letters at the other end, in a square, are the words, in like lettering, "New York Central" and "Lake Shore." The frieze and minute trimmings around the windows are of gilt finish. The body of the car also contains other ornamentation, including the coat-of-arms of the United States. The running gear is of the most approved pattern. The platforms are enclosed by swinging doors which, when opened, afford a protected passage between the cars. This arrangement no doubt suggested the modern improvement now known as the vestibuled train. The letter car is provided with a "mail catcher," which is placed at a small door through which mail pouches are snatched from conveniently placed posts at wayside stations where stops are not made. Each car is divided into three sections, all fitted up alike with conveniences for the service to be performed. The letter car, however, is somewhat differently arranged from the others, to meet the requirements of that particular branch of the work.

In the first section of the letter car are received the pouches from the General Post-Office, which when opened are found to contain letters done up in packages of about a hundred, marked for Michigan, Indiana, New York, Ohio, Western Pennsylvania, Montana, Dakota, and California. When this mass of matter has been emptied out of the pouches and, in the vernacular of the service, "dumped up" preparatory to distribution, the section is clear for the registered mail which is worked in it. Before this is accomplished, however, much work is done; in fact, a sort of rough distribution is made. All packages which are directed to one office are distributed into pouches, which are afterward stored away until the towns are reached. The other packages are carried into the letter department for distribution, where a rack, similar to those seen in almost every post-office, although space is thoroughly economized, is used for the purpose. To give a slight idea of the work done in this section, it may be mentioned that the distribution for New York State alone requires 325 boxes. Still there is plenty of space, otherwise the third section of the car would not be used, as it is, for the distribution of Montana and Dakota newspapers. How closely everything is packed, and all available space utilized, may be imagined when it is stated that for this newspaper mail ninety-five pouches are hung in the section, and that there is still sufficient room for the storage of pouches locked up and ready for delivery, and also for the sealed registered mail. A separation of the California mail is also made in this car, so that when it reaches Chicago the pouches into which the matter is placed are transferred without delay, thus saving twenty-four hours on the time to the Pacific Coast, not by any means an unimportant accomplishment.

There have been received in this car before it moves out of the Grand Central Station between 1,000 and 1,500 packages of letters and, in addition, forty or fifty sacks of Dakota and Montana papers. To handle this mass of correspondence there are six men in addition to the chief clerk, or superintendent. This official is not assigned to any particular duty, but he supervises the general work and lends aid where it is most required. The second clerk handles letters for Ohio, Dakota, and Montana; the third clerk takes charge of those for New York State; the fourth, Illinois; the fifth opens all pouches labelled, "New York and Chicago Railway Post-Office," distributes their contents, and afterward works on Dakota and Montana papers; the sixth, Michigan State letters, and the seventh, California letter mail. The salaries of these men, intrusted with so much responsibility and of whom so much is expected, range from $900 per annum for the lowest grade to $1,300 per annum for the superintendent.

The second, or "Illinois Car," is devoted, as are the others which follow it, to the newspaper and periodical mail. In it are handled papers for Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, New York, Oregon, and Wyoming. Two clerks and two assistants man this car. The first assistant, who "faces up" papers ready to be distributed, draws mails from stalls to case, and removes boxes as fast as they are filled, has gained the sobriquet of the "Illinois derrick," owing to the heavy nature of his duties. The second, who lends what aid he can in the heavy work on the run between New York and Albany, has become known on the train as "the short stop." The third section of the car is used for storing the bags of assorted matter.

The third car is used for storing through mail for San Francisco, Omaha, and points west of Chicago. In it are also carried stamped envelopes from the manufacturer at Hartford, Conn., to postmasters in the West. This car is frequently fully loaded with matter from the New York office when the journey is begun, and it is then found necessary to add a similar car to the train on its arrival at Albany for the accommodation of matter taken on by the way and bound for the same destination.

The Michigan paper car is the fourth. In it are handled papers for Michigan, Iowa, and the mixed Western States. In the first section are piled the Iowa pouches and those for points out of Utica, which have been distributed in the centre section, and in the third section the distribution for Michigan, Nebraska, and Minnesota, as well as for points reached from Buffalo, is made. Two men perform the work of the car, one of whom has already handled the registered mail and Indiana letters in the first car.

The fifth, or California paper car, is the last mail coach on the train, as it is made up when leaving the Grand Central Station. Besides the papers for the Golden State the car carries through registered pouches to Chicago and the West, which have been made up in the New York office, and, as a usual thing, a large lot of stamped envelopes for postmasters in the West. The California letter man from the first car looks after the papers for the same State, and has an eye to the safety of the car. On reaching Albany another car is added to the train, making six in all from that point. This last addition comes from Boston, brings the morning mail from Bangor, Me., and is manned by four men.

The run to Chicago for post-office purposes is divided into three divisions: from New York to Syracuse, from Syracuse to Cleveland, and from Cleveland to Chicago. Each division has its own crew, so that the men leaving New York are relieved at Syracuse by others, and these in turn at Cleveland. The New York crew go to work, as has been said, at 4 P.M., and if the train is on time at Syracuse, as it usually is, they arrive there at 5.35 A.M., after thirteen and a half hours of as hard work as men are called upon to do. The same evening at 8.40 they relieve the east-bound crew, and are in New York again at six o'clock on the following morning. Half an hour later they are to be found on the top floor of the General Post-Office building, comfortably ensconced in bunks and in a large and airy room, provided as a dormitory for their use by the postmaster of New York at the time of the inauguration of the fast mail service. Each crew makes three round trips and is then laid off for six days, but its members are all this time subject to extra duty, which they are called upon to perform with unpleasant frequency, particularly in holiday times.

After leaving New York, the first stop the train makes is at Poughkeepsie, but no mail is taken on there. At Albany the second halt is made, and there twenty minutes are spent in taking on the mail from New England and northeastern New York. At Palatine Bridge there is a brief stop, and after that comes Utica, where the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western, the Ontario & Western, and the Rome, Watertown & Ogdensburg roads exchange mail matter. At Syracuse more mails come, this time from the Oswego, Binghamton & Syracuse, and the Auburn & Rochester branch of the New York Central. Here also comes welcome relief for the crew which left New York. Those who follow have much to keep them busy, but the heaviest part of the work has been already performed.