Letter Writers Alliance

BackStory Radio: You've Got Mail

"You've got no mail; you've got no country!" Words from the BackStory radio program You've Got Mail: A History of the Post Office. From abolishionist propaganda mail to the pneumatic post office with its 60 miles of tubes beneath major American cities, this podcast is entertaining and educational. For example, did you know that lipstick was a problem for V-Mail? This podcast will tell you why and tell you what V-Mail is too! How about Camel Mail? Camel Mail? Camel Mail.

This is a great program and certainly worth a listen. The History Guys did a great job with this overview. Thanks to Allison for bringing it to our attention!

Did you listen? What did you think? Let us know in the comments, or, better yet, send the History Guys some mail. Their address is:

BackStory
c/o Virginia Foundation for the Humanities
145 Ednam Drive
Charlottesville, VA 22903-4629

 

"This I Believe"...Thank You Letters

If you're a regular reader of this blog, you've probably noticed that I listen to National Public Radio on a pretty regular schedule. Recently, the This I Believe essay on the Bob Edwards Weekend show was all about the importance and satisfaction of writing thank you letters. I think we can all agree with the sentiments expressed by Michelle Lee. Give it a listen. Add your own notes about thank yous in the comments.

And thank you for reading,

Donovan

BBC Limited Series: The Peoples Post

Sharp-eyed {and eared} member Alice S. alerted me to a fantastic series going on right now at BBC 4. It's a 15-part program called The Peoples Post which will only be available for a limited time. There's aditional information from the British Postal Museum and Archive as well as on their blog, where the image above is from.

Happy Postal Listening,

Message in a Bottle

While I've never been walking on the shore and found the proverbial glass bottle, stoppered and sea-worn; I have been the lucky recipient of a few mailed messages in the bottle. It's funny what the P.O. will sometimes mail through and sometimes return, but it's totally worth it when an experiment pays off.

If you, like me, adore the romance of the message in the bottle, here's a great BBC documentary by Nina Perry about them. If you feel you want to send one yourself, but would like a little help, Margaret at Paper Pastries has you covered. Remember, if you do send a mail experiment and want to share it with us, put it up on the L.W.A. Flickr group!

P.S. Thanks to David for the link to the documentary!