Aviation Innovation: Yesterday
& Today
The post office has always sought faster and
more efficient means to move the mail. To help speed the mail,
the post office often looked to newly developed types of transportation.
Through the 1800s, the Post Office Department used America's
waterways and railways to convey the mail. In 1900, the most
common way that mail traveled was by train. A little more
than a decade later, people vastly improved mail delivery
by employing the speed of the latest invention, the airplane.
The Wright Brothers made their famous first
flight in 1903. In the following years, the Post Office Department
decided to allow experimental flights to carry the mail. By
1918, a handful of soldiers and six Jenny airplanes left over
from World War I made up the first official airmail service.
To make mail by air a success, the Post Office worked to improve
the airplanes it used and the system of air routes, airfields,
beacons and radio network.
Even as airmail service expanded, people felt
unsure about sending their mail by airplane. One reason was
that airplanes were still relatively new, and some people
in America had yet to see one, let alone travel by airplane.
Another reason was that sending a letter by airmail cost 24
cents, but regular delivery required as little as a 3-cent
stamp. Would you be willing to pay that much more for speed?
Compare the amount of time it took for mail
to cross the United States in the first decades of the 20th
century. Consider that the first transcontinental (or coast-to-coast
flight was in 1911 and took 11 days to complete!
| Year |
Mode
of Transportation |
Coast to Coast
Travel Time |
| 1900 |
Mail by Train |
4 days -
( The airplane is not yet invented!) |
| 1918 |
Mail by Train |
3 days -
(The only airmail service available was between Washington,
D.C., Philadelphia, and New York. |
| 1926 |
Mail by Train |
3 days |
| |
Mail by airplane |
1 to 1 1/2 days |
Do you think it is important to improve the
speed of mail delivery? Why or why not? |
