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1906. "Post Office, Worcester, Massachusetts." The highlight here (for Shorpy, at least) is the Sandwich Depot next door, and its sign beckoning the passing ghost pedestrians. 8x10 inch glass negative, Detroit Publishing Co. View full size.
In Baltimore in the late 40's and early 50's I remember the postmen boarding the 15 streetcars near the main post office on Calvert and Fayette en masse all during the day.
A partial empty 15 Overlea or 15 Woodlawn would soon be filled by men carrying sacks of mail and no tokens seemed to be needed, just the uniform and a mail sack either empty or full was the only thing required to ride.
I remember the men joking and taunting each other as if the streetcar was just an extension of their locker room. Although there were somewhat heated shouting matches at times I never did hear so much as a hell, a damn or even the big F word.
When I started at the Post Office in 1970 the old-timers who were near retirement used to tell me stories. They were just starting their careers when letter carriers like the one on the steps in the picture were ending theirs. One of the stories involved how mail was delivered back then, before carriers were issued trucks for each mail route.
The carrier on the steps is waiting for a streetcar; his route probably started some distance away from the office. Some other carriers had their routes start from the Post Office, working away from then back to the P.O. in a "horseshoe" or "loop". They used satchel carts, loaded them to capacity, and when the cart was empty, would go to a relay box (those green boxes that stood on corners) which was loaded with mail put there by a Post Office truck.
Letter carriers rode streetcars for free. Whether they carried streetcar tokens given to them by management is lost to the ages. The carrier in the picture would have got off the streetcar, started delivering his route, then worked the rest of it out of the same type relay boxes as the others. A streetcar ride back to the P.O. when done, deposit outgoing mail, turn in keys, then clock out.
That's a letter carrier, complete with satchel, poised on the front steps.
I grew up in Worcester. Although the federal courthouse that is now on this site is stunning, many beautiful old buildings in Worcester were torn down and replaced with ugly, nondescript ones. The building in the background with the horse and buggy in front is still there, thankfully.
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