The Development of the Letterbox

The Development of the Letterbox

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The Development of the Letterbox
In the pre-post box era, there have been two main strategies to delivering a letter; senders can be necessitated to take their mail with a Receiving House, or would await the Bellman. The latter would patrol the streets, collecting post in the community. In order to distinguish himself, and to make his presence known, the Bellman might wear a uniform and sounds familiar.
It is at 1852 that the suggestion of road-side boxes finally became a reality, using a trial proposed for that Channel Islands. Three cast-iron pillar boxes were set up on Jersey to try out the new system.
The success with the experiment led to yet another four being installed on Guernsey, one ofthese now forms part of the British Postal Museum & Archive collection. Letter boxes then began appearing around the mainland since 1853.
However, there is to date no universal pillar box design in which we're currently familiar. Design and manufacture was on the discretion of local authorities, and yes it was in 1859 that attempts were designed to standardise the structures.
Horizontal slits took over as the favoured option over vertical ones, and became the norm in letterbox design. Further improvements upon the initial included the addition with the protruding cap to shield the contents from your elements.
As of 1859, the lamp ended up being be for sale by 50 % sizes; a larger and wider size for highly populated areas, and a smaller version for elsewhere. However, the standardised pillar boxes did not receive universal acclaim. It was against the backdrop of such criticism that this Liverpool Special was formulated.
This prompted the Post Office (opened in 1861) to generate another standard letter box in 1866. Again, this is not just a huge success and thus, a further design came in 1879. This final design could be the one that we are accustomed to today. It was two more info years just before this that the iconic red colour with the post boxes became a standard feature.
Before this time around, the preferred colour option was green as a way to blend in using the green British pastures. However, from a barrage of complaints the structures were to challenging to locate because of their camouflage, it turned out agreed that bright red was the best choice. The programme of re-painting lasted for approximately a decade.
For people at large, the introduction and refinement of letter boxes enhanced the capability for sending and receiving mail easily. With the exception of oversized parcel delivery, individuals were afforded access to a delivery service never before witnessed in Great Britain.