The Telegraph-courier. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1888-1946, 1909-04-08
Post Office Clerks Must Have a
knowledge Of Many Things
TO Be Successful
THE DUTIES ARE MANIFOLD
Clerks Must be Able to Answer Humid
reds of Questions in no Way
Connected With Postal Service
and They Make Good

1t you have ever CHANGED to stand
for few minutes at one of the general
delivery windows at the post office per
haps you happened to overhear some
of the questions that are put to the
clerks in charge. You will then get
some idea of what is expected of these
young men and will understand that
their jobs are probably the most exas-
perating in the whole postal service,
and to hold down the position they
must be endowed with more patience
than is accredited to the job.
It is a. place where there is a con
tinuous nervous strain, yet through it
all the clerk must maintain his com
posture, for Uncle Sam demands that
all these questions oe answered with
civility and every effort made to salts
fly the inquiring public. Of course
he cannot tell anything which is out
of the line of his regular work and
should he at any time become bureau
of information IN a private way he is
spotted and off goes his head, for the
service is one where the employees are
not to give out information concern
ing the doings Of anyone and telling
where certain person has moved from
this city is a. violation of the law of
the department.
The clerks who are at the general
delivery windows most Of the time are
also men who distribute all the letters,
newspapers, postals, etc., which come
to the local office: that is, they throw
the mail matter to the boxes of the
carriers in the day time. Think Of
the names and addresses that these
young men must have in mind in order
to handle the mail expeditiously
In some of the larger cities there is
la special clerk who has nothing to do
but sell stamps and special matter
However, in Kenosha the clerks are
required to attend to that end of the
work also.
1t is necessary that they keep ac-
count of stamps, postal cards, news
paper wrappers, and everything else in
this line that is handled by the depart
ment. They must also be bureau Of
information as to postage rates to
every country in the world and be able
to tell at once what the requirements
will be to send letter, package or
card to wherever it is addressed.
Tbo o+o1
be at the tongues end of the clerk
and also the schedule Of trains must
be known to him for it is he who has
to answer all the questions which are
will leave the city after it is dropped
into the office, and he is also asked at
what time it will arrive at it's desti-
nation and whether it will arrive
there in time to be delivered that day,
week or month.
There is another task devolving
on the stamp clerk that is a pains
taking one. This comes in the sale of
stamped paper. Did it ever occur to
you that the government requires an
absolute record of the sale of it's pro-
ducts? They must be accounted for in
the quantities they are sold. One can
go to the postoffice and make the pur-
chase Of one stamped envelope It
costs him three cents. Should he buy
two he would get them for five cents,
and if in larger quantities the prices
are reduced until when it comes to a
thousand they are sold at only a trife
over the cost of the stamps on them
The clerk must have in his mind all
these stamped articles in the denomina
tions they are issued and the quaint
ties Of from one to enc thousand.