White Pine news. [volume] (East Ely, Nev.) 1920-1923, 1923-02-25

in the United States worse than this
county-but there is not
There Is no mail service worse than
that in this county, for everywhere
that there are star routes the service
Is as bad as it car possibly be. II 1t
were in White Pine county alone it
would be q mere detail at Washing
ton amounting to a gesture. The
trouble Is with the whole system.
The p~ostoffice administrators con-
ception of its duty 10 the country Is
based upon a false premise tho exact
opposite to what it should be. 1t as
sumes hat the urabn population OF
the nation IS the essential II and
that the urban industries are the
basic one of the country. 1t fcrgets
that it is The rural population and
the rural industries that form the
groundwork of the prosperity and
existence of the nation. Upon that
false assumption it proceeds to map
out its postal activities and gives the
city folk the best it has in the way
Of service-which, truly, is not CIV
ing a great deal-and to treat the
rural Inhabitants as if they were a
fifth wheel or an outcast to be nal
treated, misused and gotten rid of
by methods of neglect and persecu-
ton until they are willing to pack
up and leave the country.
It always will be true that country
mail delivery will not be seif-sustain-
ing financially. Yet it is even more
true that upon its prompt communi-
cation with the producers of the
country the prosperity of every city
depends. No country settlement il
Illustrates the point better than that
of Shoshone. 1t is a ranehing dis
trict averaging from fifty to sixty
five miles from Ely, and there is no
store within forty miles where mer-
chandise may be purchased. The
people must come to town in person
for their larger purchases and their
smaller one they must buy by mail
and have the items shipped to them
by parcel post. In this manner they
obtain everything that they wear and
eat, other than what they raise of
the latter, by writing to Ely and
other cities more distant. In a pre-
vious issue of the News the length
of time that this takes was gone into
in detail. it being anywhere from a
week to two weeks for a place stu
ated like the settlement in question
Instead of the mail going direct from
Ely and reaching every settlement in
Spring valley the same day, as 1t
easily could do by starting at one end
and driving to the other, Shoshone is
treated as an offshoot and the mail
on a three-day service is left by the
roadside in a box to be picked up and
carried to that Office on a two-day
service. The two stages are sup
posed to meet on the way out but In
bound mail must be carried on to
Baker and back again in reaching its
destination at Ely. II Is this condi-
ton, aggravated by a sno blockade,
preventing travel from the country
in person, that ails Ely today.
Details OF such a system are con-
fusing and need not be gone into ex-
tensiyely. 1t would take a Phila-
delphia lawyer to explain their inter-
woven meanderings in White Pine
county, but there is one general state
ment applicable to all, which is that
there is not a star route in this or
any other county known where there
Is not that same sort of break In the
schedule of delivery-starting out
with a ~three-day delivery. lying over
at some country postoffice enroute
and completion Of the delivery by a
two days n week service and some
times by a once a week service.
The News is willing to keep up the
fight. regardless of the odds, against
this seandalously deficient service,
and in so doing realizes that such eff
forts are seldom appreciated. It's
Shoshone correspondent is one who
appreciates them and his cooperation
in kind is more than welcome. No
doubt there are others in silent SYM
pathy. but 1t must be confessed that
their cooperation would be more po-
tent were in given voice.