The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1898-03-13
DEAD LETTERS MADE LIVE
REMARKABLE WORK BY A WOMAN
IN POSTOFFICE DEPARTMENT.

4 Branch of the Service That Owes
Its Existence to Feminine Superb
! Ority-New stories of the Dead Let
ter Office.
From the Youths Companion.
To the credit and glory Of womankind
let it be known that one of the most i'm
portant branches of the United States
postal service owes its existence and main
! tenance to feminine skill. Man has on
| several occasions attempted to take a
hand in this part of Uncle Sans business,
but has always failed, because of his lack
of that refined mental power, intuition
| The United States government is wholly
| dependent upon this feminine faculty for
| the performance of the difficult duty con-
nected with the dead letter office
| This duty, in which Uncle Sam serves a
| careless and untutured part of the public,
! consists in forwarding to their proper des-
| tinations the half million letters that are
| annually sent to the dead letter office at
| Washington, because postmasters cannot
| send them anywhere else, owing to the il
| legibility of the address or to its lack of
something apparently essential to deliv-
cry The task of supplying the missing
links and of deciphering the serawls is in
! trusted to Mrs. Patti Lyle Collins. who is
regarded as the greatest photographic ex-
pert in the world, She is pointed out to
| visitors as the blind reader''-so called
| because of her ability to perceive what
other mortals canot see.
| The visitor is interested in her work.
| but apt to look on other features of the
| dead letter office as more entertaining. for
| the average sight-Seer is little concerned
/, with intellectual qualities or subtle spec-
ulations. Accordingly he regards with Gu
! rloslty the large room crowded with
| desks and the hundred or more clerks.
men and women, busily engaged in receiy-
ing, sorting, opening, distributing, and re-
| mailing or otherwise disposing of the 90 =
700 dead letters that are each day sent in
from the post offices all over the country.
| These are the unclaimed letters: letters
| that nave been advertised and held for
| thirty days and, having nothing on the
outside to show whence they come. are
now sent to Washington. to be opened and
returned to the writer's. provided they are
not signed by Your loving Mary" or some
other equally indefinite parsonage, which
| unfortunately for Uncle Sans kind inten-
tons, is the rule rather than the excep-
ton. Three or four million letters from
loving Marys and faithful Johns are each
year uncerenoniously DESTROYED. involving
perchance, the fate of many yearning
heart.
Our visitor is likewise nightly interest
ed in the large storeroom containing the
vast amount of merchandise that has been
found in unclaimed packages; merchandise
OF all kinds and descriptions, from shoe
buttons to Bibles. 1t ticl1ies his fancy TO
learn that this motely store of CHEAP.
worldly goods-for they are all of inferior
quality, brass watches and the like-is
done up in bundles, valued approximately
at IS cents apiece, and sold at auction
about Christmas time, the five or six
thousand parcels of each year. netting the
government something like $1,000.
The dead letter office presents many
points of unusual interest and significance
10 the reflective mind. 1t furnishes for in
stance, striking example of the law of
the uniformity of sociological phenomena.
1t might be supposed that nothing is more
likely to vary widely than the number of
unclaimed letters annually sent to the
dead letter Office, for there is apparently.
no reason why there might not be 500 one
year and 100000 the next Yet the num-
Der is just about e0C0.090 every twelve
months. For a time the number increased
each year in about proportion to the in
crease of population; but thanks TO the
efforts of the postal authorities and the
admirable administration of this branch
Of the service by the present superintend-
ent, Mr.. Leibhardt, the number is now
held down TO constant figure.