![]() ![]() It was flown by Jean-Pierre Blanchard and John Jeffries. Specific instances of a letter being delivered by air long predate the introduction of Airmail as a regularly scheduled service available to the general public.Īlthough homing pigeons had long been used to send messages (an activity known as pigeon mail), the first mail to be carried by an air vehicle was on January 7, 1785, on a hot air balloon flight from Dover to France near Calais. Study for The First Official Airmail Flight (1941), mural by Dorothea Mierisch at the post office in McLeansboro, Illinois Such "air-speeded" mail is different from nominal airmail in its branding, price, and priority of service. Thus even "regular" mail may make part of its journey on an aircraft. Today it is often the case that mail service is categorized and sold according to transit time alone, with mode of transport (land, sea, air) being decided on the back end in dynamic intermodal combinations. Since the official language of the Universal Postal Union is French, airmail items worldwide are often marked Par avion, literally: "by airplane".įor about the first half century of its existence, transportation of mail via aircraft was usually categorized and sold as a separate service (airmail) from surface mail. The Universal Postal Union adopted comprehensive rules for airmail at its 1929 Postal Union Congress in London. Airmail may be the only option for sending mail to some destinations, such as overseas, if the mail cannot wait the time it would take to arrive by ship, sometimes weeks. Airmail items typically arrive more quickly than surface mail, and usually cost more to send. You can relive a little piece of postal history by opting to use these decorative red and blue bordered envelopes and paper.A cover carried on a 1932 first flight in the north woods of Canada, with a cachet and franked with both a regular and an airmail stampĪirmail (or air mail) is a mail transport service branded and sold on the basis of at least one leg of its journey being by air. This classic Airmail style of stationary is now sold for decorative use rather than practical use. Although the transportation service known as Airmail is gone (it's been replaced with services like International Priority Airmail ™), the United States Postal Service trademarked the name Air Mail in In June 2006. The USPS has partnered with FedEx with the Global Express Guaranteed® which relies on FedEx Express® transportation to deliver packages worldwide. One could easily pick out international mail from a nation's internal mail due to the colored edges of the envelopes.Īirmail Today With the growth of eCommerce businesses, international shipping is at an all time high. This made it easier during mail separation. For example, envelopes from the US or the UK would have red and blue boarder, since these colors are in the nations' flags. ![]() U.S Airmail ended on October 10, 1975, when all domestic First Class mails were sent at the normal First Class rate.Īirmail Envelopes Airmail envelopeswere typically designed with a colored boarder depending on the country in which the letter came from. In 1971, Federal Express (or FedEx) designed a shipping system exclusively for shipping cargo by air. This forced the government to turn the service over to private companies once again. Long flights and poor weather caused 66 Army Air Corp plane crashes. Over the next five years, Army Air Corp pilots struggled to keep up with the high demand. Roosevelt took office he canceled the contracts with the three avionic companies and gave the job back to the Army Air Corps on February 19, 1934. This scandal was dubbed the Airmail fiasco by the press. After President Franklin D. Postmaster General Walter Brown was given the power to consolidate routes, and the majority of the nations airmail routes were given to only three privately held companies, which forced out any competition. Scandal eventually tarnished the program in 1933. The POD held the sole responsibility of the Airmail program for a number of years until private aviation companies took over in the late 20's. Airmail envelopes full#It wasn't until August 12, 1918, that the Post Office Department (POD) took full control and began using their own pilots. Lets take a look at how Airmail has helped shape mail delivery and the use of envelopes in our world today.Īirmail service in the U.S began on with the U.S Army piloting the airplanes (This wouldn't be the only time the U.S Army was involved in the program, but more on that later). This postal service has a rich history in America dating back to the 20's. Airmail Envelopes History - 1918 to the PresentĪirmail is a service provided when mail is transported through the air rather than by land or sea. ![]()
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