1900 Studebaker Mail Wagon
edited by David Barth, 10 January 2009.
Courtesy The Forney Museum of Transportation at 4303 Brighton Blvd., Denver,
Colorado. Photos were taken in January 2009.
In 1896, the Post Office Department started the Rural Free Delivery (RFD) system so that people living on farms could get
their mail every day, as people living in town already did. Before RFD, it could take two weeks or more before a farmer
could get to town to pick up mail waiting at the Post Office.
Mail carriers were soon traveling along country road in wagons that were built especially built for them. The driver sat
cozily inside, guiding the horses with reins that went though the open window. When the windows were closed in cold
weather, the reins ran through two small slots at the bottom of the window.
