Who’s Got Mail? by Linda Barrett Osborne

Who’s Got Mail? is a friendly introduction to the long history of an everyday convenience.

Who’s Got Mail? The History of Mail in America by Linda Barrett Osborne. Abrams, 2023, 240 pages.

Reading Level: Middle Grades, ages 8-10

Recommended for: ages 8-15

This chatty history begins with the jaw-dropping fact that several babies and small children were sent through the mail at the turn of the 20^th century. It was cheaper than a train ticket! The post office soon put an end to the practice, or else postal facilities would now include waystation nurseries. There are still plenty of interesting facts to share. “Post Office history is America’s history,” for the service—famously begun by Benjamin Franklin, who served as the first postmaster general—goes back 250 years. Our founding fathers recognized the need for a unified mail system to disseminate news and information and unite the east coast with westward expansion. From its founding, the purpose was to reach every U.S. citizen, no matter how remote. That’s why mail is still delivered by mule train to the Havasupai tribe at the bottom of the Grand Canyon, six days a week.

What two Americans have their own individual ZIP codes? And what does the ZIP acronym stand for? What’s a “star route”? What was the first commemorative stamp? I would have liked a little more information about stamps, and perhaps a little less about the first minorities (and women) to process and deliver mail. That said, it’s good to know that the Post Office offered some of the first opportunities for marginalized groups to obtain respectable jobs, and is one of the chief employers of minorities today.

The big question: In this age of instant communication by text and social media, will the Post Office become obsolete? I still look forward to the daily mail delivery, with its catalogues and magazines and checks and bills, and I imagine most Americans do as well.  Fortunately, it looks like the USPS (reorganized from the United States Post Office department in the 1970s) will continue for foreseeable future, one government service that Americans still trust. This book will help us appreciate it more.

Overall Rating: 3.75 (out of 5)

• Worldview/moral value: 3.5
• Artistic/literary value: 4

Read more about our ratings here.

Also at Redeemed Reader:

• Resource: Speaking of receiving magazines through the mail, have you seen our very own Redeemed Reader Quarterly? It’s packed with articles, interviews, booklists and fun stuff geared to a different theme each issue. Hayley writes about her trip to the print shop to see our STEM issue roll off the presses! The Quarterly is free to our Golden Key subscribers—check it out!
• Reviews: David Macaulay is masterful at explaining everyday phenomena that we take for granted, as in The Way Things Work and The Way Things Work Now. Also see The Eye: How It Works for an even more amazing phenomenon.

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