The Development of the Letterbox
In the pre-post box era, there was two main means of delivering a letter; senders can be necessitated to create their mail to your Receiving House, or would await the Bellman. The latter would patrol the streets, collecting post in the community. In order to distinguish himself, and make his presence known, the Bellman dons a uniform and sound familiar.
It was in 1852 the suggestion of road-side boxes finally became a reality, which has a trial proposed for the Channel Islands. Three cast-iron pillar boxes were attached to Jersey to understand the brand new system.
The success with the experiment generated an additional four being placed on Guernsey, one ofthese now forms part in the British Postal Museum & Archive collection. Letter boxes then began appearing on the mainland by 1853.
However, there was clearly confirmed no universal pillar box design in which we are currently familiar. Design and manufacture was in the discretion of local authorities, also it was at 1859 that attempts were created to standardise the structures.
Horizontal slits had become the favoured option over vertical ones, and had become 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 therapy lamp ended up being be for sale by 50 % sizes; a greater and wider size for highly populated areas, as well as a smaller version for elsewhere. However, the standardised pillar boxes failed to receive universal acclaim. It was contrary to the backdrop for these criticism how the Liverpool Special was more info formulated.
This prompted the Post Office (opened in 1861) to create another standard letter box in 1866. Again, this was not a huge success so, another design arrived 1879. This final design may be the one in which we have been familiar with today. It was 2 years before this how the iconic red colour of the post boxes became a standard feature.
Before on this occasion, preferred colour option was green to be able to blend in with the green British pastures. However, after having a barrage of complaints that 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 the population in particular, the introduction and refinement of letter boxes enhanced the ability for sending and receiving mail effortlessly. With the exception of oversized parcel delivery, everyone was afforded access to a delivery service nothing you've seen prior witnessed in Great Britain.