Jasper Republican, Volume 2, Number 2, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 September 1875 — The Dead-Letter Office. [ARTICLE]

The Dead-Letter Office.

About one letter in 180 that are written goes to the Dead-Letter Office. Hence 1-180 of the expense of the service should be charged to the office, which Would he about $1,200,000 per year. There are ninety-five clerks employed in. the Dead* Letter Office proper, at an aggregate sal ary of $94,000, but of course this does not include the cost of transportation, stationery, nor the labor of handling the 4,000,000 of dead letters that arc sent annually from the different postoffices in the country to Washington, and the more than half of them that are returned to the writers. Frequently, after being sent to several different postoffices, and being returned each time with information regarding the writer, the letter, with its valuable, or in valuable,* it may be, contents, finally reaches its nomadic writer. Letters have been known to travel around a year or more in this way. When' the writer is found the receipt is returned with his signature; the fact is recorded on the books with the other record. Often it happens that neither the wnter nor the person to whom a letter containing money is addressed can be found, and in this case, after a reasonable search, the letter is numj bered and filed, and the money is deposited in the United States Treasury to the account of the Dead-Letter Office, from which it can be reclaimed by She sender any time within four years, providing satisfactory evidence can be shown that the claimant is entitled to the same. After four years an act of Congress only can restore it to its original possessor. The same is done with checks, drafts, bills of exchange, commercial paper of this character, although these are more easily traceable because of the signatures, indorsements, etc. Very frequently large sums of money are found tphave strayed into this “pound” for vagrants, almost always because of the carelessness of the sender. The other day a eheck for £IO,OOO was found in a partially-directed envelope The drawer of the check was easily known from his signature and the letterhead used, and he has receipted for his valuable inclosure, it to to be hoped, by this time. Several months ago a check for $25,000, drawn to bearer, came to light when an unstamped envelope was opened, but the owner was easily found. '■ The largest piece of commercial paper ever known to come into the Dead-Letter Office was a bill of exchange from a San Francisco bank on a Chicago bank for about $3,000,000. This was in 1878, and it will be noticed that the value of the dead letters that year was somewhat larger than it ever was before.— Waeh. flfir, Qhiago Inter-Ocean,. - r . i -i?. yw The proudest people are invariably those who have the least to be proud of. ■ VW ■-* r - ’ One of the most tedious things in life is. waiting for a rich old aunt to drop off.