Post office
A post office is a public facility and a retailer that provides
Before the advent of
Name
The term "post-office"
The term "post office" usually refers to government postal facilities providing customer service. "General Post Office" is sometimes used for the national headquarters of a postal service, even if the building does not provide customer service. A postal facility that is used exclusively for processing mail is instead known as a sorting office or delivery office, which may have a large central area known as a sorting or postal hall. Integrated facilities combining mail processing with railway stations or airports are known as mail exchanges.
In
Private courier and delivery services often have offices as well, although these are usually not called "post offices", except in the case of Germany, which has fully privatised its national postal system.[citation needed]
As abbreviation PO is used, together with GPO for General Post Office and LPO for Licensed Post Office.
History
This section needs additional citations for verification. (April 2015) |
There is evidence of corps of royal couriers disseminating the decrees of Egyptian pharaohs as early as 2400 BCE, and it is possible that the service greatly precedes that date. Similarly, there may be ancient organised systems of post houses providing mounted courier service, although sources vary as to precisely who initiated the practice.[9]
In the
The
The
Rural parts of Canada in the 19th century utilised the way office system. Villagers could leave their letters at the way office which were then taken to the nearest post office, as well as pick up their mail from the way office.[10]
In parts of Europe, special postal censorship offices existed[when?] to intercept and censor mail. In France, such offices were known as cabinets noirs.
Unstaffed postal facilities
In many jurisdictions,
Notable post offices
Operational
- General Post Office, state postal system and telecommunications carrier of the United Kingdom until 1969
- Easter Uprising
- General Post Office (1864), erected on the site of the Black Hole of Calcutta
- General Post Office (1874) in Chennai, India
- General Post Office (1887) in Lahore, Pakistan
- Sri Lankan Post
- General Post Office (1903), headquarters of the Croatian post
- General Post Office (1976), the headquarters of Hongkong Post
- General Post Office (1913), the main post office of Mumbai, India, and one of the world's largest (120,000 sq ft or 11,000 m2)
- General Post Office Building (1922), former headquarters of the Chunghwa Post and present home of the Shanghai Postal Museum
- Privy Council of Canada
- WWII)
- James Farley Post Office (1912), America's largest operating post office, the main office for New York City. Bears the famous translation of Herodotus's description of the Persian postal system along its front facade: "Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds"
- The Edificio Central de Correos y Telégrafos building (1917), San José, Costa Rica. Contains the Costa Rican Philatelic Museum on the second floor
- intense fighting during the 1939 Nazi Germany invasion of Danzig
- Taiwan Post
- First Toronto Post Office (1833)
- Istanbul Main Post Office (1905), home of the Istanbul Postal Museum
Former
- Bandinelli Palace (1589), a former post office in Lviv in Ukraine
- Hotel Monaco, a four-star hotel
- Chief Post Office (1877), the former chief post office of New Zealand in Christchurch
- Central Post Office Building (1903), home of the Government of Sweden
- Buenos Aires Central Post Office (1908), now the Bicentennial Cultural Center
- The Fullerton (1919), a 5-star hotel in Singapore
- Magna Plaza, a shopping center at Amsterdam
- Old Main Post Office (1921), an enormous abandoned structure in Chicago
- Naples' 1943 uprising against the Nazis
- the Netherlands
Historic
- The General Post Office East (1825), former headquarters of the GPOin London, demolished in 1912
See also
- Postage stamp
- Dak bungalows, the former posthouses of the British Raj
- Freepost (also known as Business Reply Mail)
- "Going postal"
- Military mail
- Old U.S. Post Offices
- Penny Post
- Post office box
- Postal administration
- ZIP code
- History of United States postage rates
- Poste restante (also known as General Delivery)
- Universal Postal Union
- Wanted poster (Post Office Wall)
References
- ^ "Canada Postal Guide - Glossary". Canada Post. Archived from the original on January 18, 2006. Retrieved 2006-10-08.
- ^ United States Postal Service. "What's in a (Post Office) Name? Archived 2013-03-30 at the Wayback Machine" August 2008. Accessed 2 October 2013.
- ^ Webster, Noah. American Dictionary of the English Language, "post-house Archived 2013-10-04 at the Wayback Machine". Accessed 2 October 2013.
- ^ Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, "post office Archived 2013-10-04 at the Wayback Machine". 2013. Accessed 2 October 2013.
- ^ The British Postal Museum and Archive. "The Secret Room Archived 2012-08-31 at the Wayback Machine". 2011. Accessed 2 October 2013.
- ^ Harper (2013), "post Archived 2013-09-30 at the Wayback Machine". Accessed 2 October 2013.
- ^ "About Us". Retrieved 28 March 2021.
- ^ India Post. "About us". Retrieved 30 March 2023.
- Sargon II.
- ^ "A Chronology of Canadian Postal History". Canadian Museum of History.
- ^ "Derry store's postal kiosk a 1st in New England". Union Leader. December 11, 2011.