, 1892-04-03
THE POSTAL SERVICE.
How the Cheyenne Public Sends
and Receives Mail.
Work in the Postal Department is
No Snap.
A General Review of POst0flce
Work.

plete OF any in the world. Among the
hundreds of thousands Of postofhces in
this country there is not one that is not
under the direct control of the depart
meut. Any mistake or deficiency will
be promptly reported and traced TO its
proper source.
II a letter is plainly directed there is
hardly a chance that it will fail to reach
its destination, SO exact and comprehen-
slye is the system. No pains have been
spared by the government since the time
BENJAMIN Franklin rode by wagon and
horseback inspecting the p~ostofices of
the thirteen original states to make III
system as nearly perfect as possible.
Concerning the railway mail service in
particular NAM articles have been writ
ten, reporters of various newspapers hsv-
Ing received opportunity to inform them
selves through the courtesy of the officers
in charge. The main part of the postal
work Is done by the army of railway mail
clerks in the employ OF Uncle Sam. Each
car has a erk-in-charge and a second
man, sometimes one or more helpers.
The bulk of the letter mail is distributed
by the clerk-ln charge, he being the one
best suited to that important work from
his knowledge and experience in the SER
vice.
Each package of letters is accompanied
by a slip on which is stamped the name
of the clerk who made out the package.
also its destination and its date of dispatch.
If, when the package is opened by the
the clerk or postmaster who receives it,
any mistakes are found such mistakes
are noted on the slip accompanying the
letters and are called checks" a man
who wishes to preserve his standing as a
competent clerk will avoid causing many
checks to be placed against him. Alter
each trip the clerk is required to make
out a report, inclosing the slips on which
errors found may have been checked,
and transmit the whole to the superintend-
emit of the sixth division. Chicago, Ill.
The clerks who are responsible for the
errors are then notified by the su~perintend-
cnt's Office OF the checks against them.
If they can give a competent excus
for the errors the checks are taken off,
otherwise they must remain. To illus
trate: A clerk. B. on the fast mail from
Odgen to Cheyenne. places a letter in a
package going east that should have gone
north via the Orln junction and Chey
enne route. H, the clerk receiving the
package at CHEYENNE, going east, finds
this letter, and taking the slip from the
package, notes the error upon 1t and
places it among the others that will COM
pose part Of his trip report, In the mean
time, putting the letter 10 the go back
to return by next mail and be forwarded
to it's proper destination. Such is a part
of the modw operandi in vogue for
correcting errors. As in all other associ-
atoms of men bound together by the
influence of s work in common, the
utmost good fellowship prevails and 1t is
not often that errors are checked, though
they must be corrected by returning the
mail to its proper destination. IF you
don't check me, | won't check YOU" is
the principle which often prevails.
But very few errors are committed BY
the clerks and postofices IN comparison to
the large number made by the public.
Letters are received every day in the
CHEYENNE office directed to places where
no Office exists, or to an Office tor instance
in Wyoming which the sender believes to
be in Nebraska or Colorado and addresses
accordingly. A few days ago a paper was
received directed to Coldwater, Wvo.
There is no such office in Wyoming, the
nearest to that name being "Chupwater."
A good many letters are put in the
Office with insufficient postage or no pos
.taRe at all; still others are stamped but
not addressed; others yet have received
postage and address, but the'address may
be so carelessly written that Solomon him
self would be unable to determine whether
they we're directed to the Bermuda
islands or the North Pole. Many letters
come to parties living in Cheyenne d.
rected simply to Cheyenne without street
or number. II the parties to whom the
letters are addressed have only recently
settled In the city or if there be others In
town of the same name there is a chance
of the letters being misplaced, In fact
nine-tenths eft the errors committed art
the fault of the public.
The railway postal clerks who max,
their headquarters in Cheyenne are al
follows: Robert Lafontaine. L. R. Tyson
W. s. Earhart, R. H. Beare, W. G
Bruce. j. Fl. Mallalino, Hugh Fulton
Fl. NJ. Sherman, G. 1. Smith, w. San
derson, N. G. Drummond, Alex Lawson
l. L. Bowman, Z. w. Field, Rober
O'Brien, c. G. Upton, F. A. M. Stuart
P. McCloskey. F. E. Mcmillan, A. B
Brown. A. Hirsc6, Joseph Graham, R
f. Mccullough. j. f. Ringler, o. R
Bryan. @. NJ. Perkins, Geo. H. Foster
G. G. Shaefer, j. E. Malone, John Nor