It’s not surprising to learn that there was trouble delivering the mail from the beginnings of the General Post Office in the 1700’s. What is surprising is that the ‘new’ U.S. Congress considered this a high priority on its agenda, and in 1777 created the position of Inspector of Dead Letters. In today’s politically correct parlance, these facilities have been renamed Mail Recovery Centers (MRC).
 
What constitutes a ‘dead’ letter? Basically, dead letters are any piece of ‘mystery’ mail with an address that confounds U.S. postal clerks. This includes misdirected letters that has all of the right information necessary for delivery, but for some reason was sidetracked either because they weren’t handled correctly by postal employees or had been abandoned at the designated post office. It also includes prank mail and something known as ‘Blind Readings’ …addresses that were so called because to the average postal worker the address would appear as though it was read blindfolded; and prank mail.
 
A red, leather-bound scrapbook entitled “Blind Reading” – containing the challenging-to-the-eye addressed envelopes – was assembled after 1883. It contains twenty-one clippings from the front of envelopes postmarked between 1883 and 1884 and is on display at the National Postal Museum.
 
An 1852 article on the DLO in Washington, D.C., describes a room in the General Post Office where “a body of grave, calm men…deals with these mortuary remains. They sort the letters and consign most to the flames after removing money, jewelry, or other items of value.” Still the Dead Letter Office is not the letter ‘morgue’ that its name implies. Instead, it is like a lively CSI unit, investigating the ‘forensics’ of mail gone astray.
 
Misguided missives are not simply relegated to the circular file in the DLO. Instead, a group of trained ‘dead letter detectives’ work to identify the correct destinations so that the mail may ultimately reach its intended recipient. In addition to ethics and reasoning skills, clerks are ‘armed’ with knowledge of languages and geography. They also rely on a wide range of printed references, including books listing U.S. cities, common U.S. street names, and institutions of higher learning about the world.
 
Mail ‘died’ by the thousands in the late 19th Century. It was not uncommon for the Dead Letter Office to handle as many as 23,000 pieces of misdirected mail daily! Unfortunately, only about 40% of these letters ultimately get to the proper destination.
 
Opening mail that is not addressed to you is a Federal crime, But the Dead Letter Office had the authority to open letters to determine the recipient. Clerks are prohibited from reading any more of the communications than absolutely necessary to determine where the letters should go.
 
Beyond that, the contents of letters are considered sacred.