Download or read book Neither Snow Nor Rain written by Devin Leonard and published by Open Road + Grove/Atlantic. This book was released on 2016-05-03 with total page 381 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “[The] book makes you care what happens to its main protagonist, the U.S. Postal Service itself. And, as such, it leaves you at the end in suspense.” —USA Today Founded by Benjamin Franklin, the United States Postal Service was the information network that bound far-flung Americans together, and yet, it is slowly vanishing. Critics say it is slow and archaic. Mail volume is down. The workforce is shrinking. Post offices are closing. In Neither Snow Nor Rain, journalist Devin Leonard tackles the fascinating, centuries-long history of the USPS, from the first letter carriers through Franklin’s days, when postmasters worked out of their homes and post roads cut new paths through the wilderness. Under Andrew Jackson, the post office was molded into a vast patronage machine, and by the 1870s, over seventy percent of federal employees were postal workers. As the country boomed, USPS aggressively developed new technology, from mobile post offices on railroads and airmail service to mechanical sorting machines and optical character readers. Neither Snow Nor Rain is a rich, multifaceted history, full of remarkable characters, from the stamp-collecting FDR, to the revolutionaries who challenged USPS’s monopoly on mail, to the renegade union members who brought the system—and the country—to a halt in the 1970s. “Delectably readable . . . Leonard’s account offers surprises on almost every other page . . . [and] delivers both the triumphs and travails with clarity, wit and heart.” —Chicago Tribune

Download or read book How the Post Office Created America written by Winifred Gallagher and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2016-06-28 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A masterful history of a long underappreciated institution, How the Post Office Created America examines the surprising role of the postal service in our nation’s political, social, economic, and physical development. The founders established the post office before they had even signed the Declaration of Independence, and for a very long time, it was the U.S. government’s largest and most important endeavor—indeed, it was the government for most citizens. This was no conventional mail network but the central nervous system of the new body politic, designed to bind thirteen quarrelsome colonies into the United States by delivering news about public affairs to every citizen—a radical idea that appalled Europe’s great powers. America’s uniquely democratic post powerfully shaped its lively, argumentative culture of uncensored ideas and opinions and made it the world’s information and communications superpower with astonishing speed. Winifred Gallagher presents the history of the post office as America’s own story, told from a fresh perspective over more than two centuries. The mandate to deliver the mail—then “the media”—imposed the federal footprint on vast, often contested parts of the continent and transformed a wilderness into a social landscape of post roads and villages centered on post offices. The post was the catalyst of the nation’s transportation grid, from the stagecoach lines to the airlines, and the lifeline of the great migration from the Atlantic to the Pacific. It enabled America to shift from an agrarian to an industrial economy and to develop the publishing industry, the consumer culture, and the political party system. Still one of the country’s two major civilian employers, the post was the first to hire women, African Americans, and other minorities for positions in public life. Starved by two world wars and the Great Depression, confronted with the country’s increasingly anti-institutional mind-set, and struggling with its doubled mail volume, the post stumbled badly in the turbulent 1960s. Distracted by the ensuing modernization of its traditional services, however, it failed to transition from paper mail to email, which prescient observers saw as its logical next step. Now the post office is at a crossroads. Before deciding its future, Americans should understand what this grand yet overlooked institution has accomplished since 1775 and consider what it should and could contribute in the twenty-first century. Gallagher argues that now, more than ever before, the imperiled post office deserves this effort, because just as the founders anticipated, it created forward-looking, communication-oriented, idea-driven America.

Download or read book The Persian Wars written by Herodotus and published by DigiCat. This book was released on 2023-11-19 with total page 245 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Herodotus, the great Greek historian, wrote this famous history of warfare between the Greeks and the Persians in a delightful style. Herodotus portrays the dispute as one between the forces of slavery on the one hand and freedom on the other. This work covers the rise of the Persian influence and a history of the Persian empire, a description and history of Egypt, and a long digression on the landscape and traditions of Scythia. Because of the comprehensiveness of this work, it was considered the founding work of history in Western literature. A must-have for history enthusiasts.

Download or read book Deliver Me written by Terry Flippo and published by . This book was released on 2018-09-23 with total page 92 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: You see them driving down your street and walking through your neighborhood, but how well do you know your lettercarrier? Deliver Me! takes you behind the scenes for an hilarious look at the lives of these ubiquitous civil servants. Whether it's dealing with dogs, unruly customers, or the puzzling demands of management, it's all in a day's work for these everyday heroes!

Download or read book The Lost Package written by Richard Ho and published by Roaring Brook Press. This book was released on 2021-03-02 with total page 23 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Chicago Public Library Best of the Best Children's Book of 2021 A Kirkus Best Picture Book of 2021 From author Richard Ho and illustrator Jessica Lanan, the heartwarming story of a package that gets lost, then found, and an in-depth behind-the-scenes look at what happens at the post office. Like other packages, this one began as an empty box. It was packed with great care, sealed tight, and given a personal touch. Like other packages, it left the post office with hope. But unlike most packages, before it got to its destination... it got lost. Follow one package that loses its way and discover a friendship tale that proves distance can't always keep us apart.

Download or read book Undelivered written by Philip F. Rubio and published by UNC Press Books. This book was released on 2020-03-25 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For eight days in March 1970, over 200,000 postal workers staged an illegal "wildcat" strike--the largest in United States history--for better wages and working conditions. Picket lines started in New York and spread across the country like wildfire. Strikers defied court injunctions, threats of termination, and their own union leaders. In the negotiated aftermath, the U.S. Post Office became the U.S. Postal Service, and postal workers received full collective bargaining rights and wage increases, all the while continuing to fight for greater democracy within their unions. Using archives, periodicals, and oral histories, Philip Rubio shows how this strike, born of frustration and rising expectations and emerging as part of a larger 1960s-1970s global rank-and-file labor upsurge, transformed the post office and postal unions. It also led to fifty years of clashes between postal unions and management over wages, speedup, privatization, automation, and service. Rubio revives the 1970 strike story and connects it to today's postal financial crisis that threatens the future of a vital 245-year-old public communications institution and its labor unions.

Download or read book The Last Mailman Neither Rain Nor Sleet Nor Zombies written by Kevin J. Burke and published by Permuted Press. This book was released on 2011-10-15 with total page 275 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Four-year degree in business. Trained in hand-to-hand combat. Works well with zombies. This is the resume of the last mailman on Earth. It is the near future, and the modern world we knew has been overrun and destroyed by reanimated corpses who hunt humans for food. Mankind has retreated to small pockets of civilization and practically surrendered to the walking dead. But one man routinely leaves behind the safety and comfort to find the people and things we’ve long abandoned. He battles the elements. He battles his own brewing insanity. But mostly, he battles zombies.

Download or read book Appointed Rounds written by Michael McFee and published by . This book was released on 2018-02 with total page 277 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Michael McFee's new book takes its title from the unofficial motto of the US Postal Service: "Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds." All of us have appointed rounds in our lives-essential things we are given to do and must try to complete, whatever the inner or outer weather, whenever the time of day or night, however we may approach those duties. This lively and wide-ranging collection of fifty essays-many of them pointed, a page or so, in the playful manner of Robert Francis and The Satirical Rogue on Poetry, and others rolling on for much longer-addresses McFee's appointed rounds, subjects he has been thinking and caring about for decades: books, his native Western North Carolina mountains, writing, reading, editing, teaching, and, as the title suggests, the daily mail. It includes pieces on "My Inner Hillbilly" and Appalachia, on "Authors' Photos" and "Blurbs" and other parts of the physical book, on "My New Yorker" and contemporary literary culture, on "Poets as Novelists" and "Marginalia" and being a writer, on a teacher's "Gradebook" and "The Blackboard," and on authorial matters like "Voice," "Audience," and "Immortality." The prose explorations in Appointed Rounds, like McFee's poems, are meant as appreciations, paying close attention to things that have mattered to him (and many others), savoring their details while exploring their larger design, and saving his versions of them even as they may change or fade or disappear altogether.

Download or read book We Are Still Tornadoes written by Michael Kun and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2016-11 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Growing up across the street from each other, Scott and Cath have been best friends their entire lives. Cath would help Scott with his English homework, he would make her mix tapes (it's the 80's after all), and any fight they had would be forgotten over TV and cookies. But now they've graduated high school and Cath is off to college while Scott is at home pursuing his musical dreams. During their first year apart, Scott and Cath's letters help them understand heartache, annoying roommates, family drama and the pressure to figure out what to do with the rest of their lives. And through it all, they realize that the only person they want to turn to is each other. But does that mean they should be more than friends? The only thing that's clear is that change is an inescapable part of growing up. And the friends who help us navigate it share an unshakable bond. This funny yet deeply moving book--set to an awesome 80's soundtrack--captures all the beautiful confusion and emotional intensity we find on the verge of adulthood...and first love"--

Download or read book Snail Mail written by Samantha Berger and published by Running Press Kids. This book was released on 2018-05-01 with total page 32 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A long, long time ago, before email and texting, the mail was delivered in a much slower way-it was called Snail Mail (because some thought it was delivered by a snail). Although it took much longer, everyone agreed that letters were a little more special when they were delivered by Snail Mail. They might be handwritten. They might include a drawing. They might even contain a surprise inside! One such letter was sent by a Girl to the Boy she loved, and it was up to four special snails to deliver her card across the country. The snails trek across the country-through desert heat and dangerous blizzards, across mountains and plains, through cities and forests-and along the way, they find that taking time to slow down and look around makes the journey all the more beautiful. Snail Mail's playful and educational story encourages kids to have slow living, and to approach life with determination and wonder. Julia Patton's rich illustrations showcase America's diverse terrain and national monuments from coast to coast. Kids and parents alike will delight in this celebration of America's beauty and the power of a simple handwritten letter.

Download or read book Seven Little Postmen written by Margaret Wise Brown and published by Golden Books. This book was released on 2002-06-11 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This lively poem by Margaret Wise Brown, author of Goodnight Moon, and Edith Thacher Hurd tells the tale of one little boy’s letter. What happens after he drops it into the mailbox? How does it get to his grandma’s house? Children will enjoy this classic Little Golden Book about the seven little postmen who got the mail through. Originally published in 1952, this beloved classic has charming illustrations by Tibor Gergely.

Download or read book Calico Dorsey written by Susan Lendroth and published by Tricycle Press. This book was released on 2010-09-28 with total page 34 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Neither rain, nor snow, nor gloom of night kept this poch from his appointed rounds! Back in the 1880s, when the Old West boomed with the rush for gold and silver, the miners of Calico, California, needed a mail carrier they could count on. And they found him in a Border collie named Dorsey. Based on the true story of the most celebrated canine mail carrier in U.S. history, Calico Dorsey tells the tale of a winsome stray who found both a home and a calling on the mining trails of the Old West. An Author's Note includes a photograph of the real-life Dorsey, as well as historical information about the dog and the mining town he called home.

Download or read book Going Postal written by Terry Pratchett and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2009-10-13 with total page 422 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “[Pratchett’s] books are almost always better than they have to be, and Going Postal is no exception, full of nimble wordplay, devious plotting and outrageous situations, but always grounded in an astute understanding of human nature.” — San Francisco Chronicle The 33rd installment in acclaimed New York Times bestselling author Sir Terry Pratchett's Discworld series, a splendid send-up of government, the postal system, and everything that lies in between. Suddenly, condemned arch-swindler Moist von Lipwig found himself with a noose around his neck and dropping through a trapdoor into . . . a government job? By all rights, Moist should be meeting his maker rather than being offered a position as Postmaster by Lord Vetinari, supreme ruler of Ankh-Morpork. Getting the moribund Postal Service up and running again, however, may prove an impossible task, what with literally mountains of decades-old undelivered mail clogging every nook and cranny of the broken-down post office. Worse still, Moist could swear the mail is talking to him. Worst of all, it means taking on the gargantuan, greedy Grand Trunk clacks communication monopoly and its bloodthirsty piratical headman. But if the bold and undoable are what's called for, Moist's the man for the job—to move the mail, continue breathing, get the girl, and specially deliver that invaluable commodity that every being, human or otherwise requires: hope. The Discworld novels can be read in any order but Going Postal is the first book in the Moist von Lipwig series.

Download or read book Bad Weather DC Super Friends written by Frank Berrios and published by Golden Books. This book was released on 2014-07-22 with total page 26 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When Mr. Freeze creates a machine that gives him the power to control storms, it’s up to Batman, Superman, and the rest of the Super Friends to put a stop to the weather-wielding foe! Neither snow nor rain nor villain’s might will stop the DC Super Friends from getting the job done! This DC Super Friends Little Golden Book is a must-have for boys ages 2 to 5!

Download or read book First Class written by Christopher W. Shaw and published by City Lights Books. This book was released on 2021-11-09 with total page 267 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Investigating the essential role that the postal system plays in American democracy and how the corporate sector has attempted to destroy it. "With First Class: The U.S. Postal Service, Democracy, and the Corporate Threat, Christopher Shaw makes a brilliant case for polishing the USPS up and letting it shine in the 21st century."—John Nichols, national affairs correspondent for The Nation and author of Coronavirus Criminals and Pandemic Profiteers: Accountability for Those Who Caused the Crisis "First Class is essential reading for all postal workers and for our allies who seek to defend and strengthen our public Postal Service."—Mark Dimondstein, President, American Postal Workers Union, AFL-CIO The fight over the future of the U.S. Postal Service is on. For years, corporate interests and political ideologues have pushed to remake the USPS, turning it from a public institution into a private business—and now, with mail-in voting playing a key role in local, state, and federal elections, the attacks have escalated. Leadership at the USPS has been handed over to special interests whose plan for the future includes higher postage costs, slower delivery times, and fewer post offices, policies that will inevitably weaken this invaluable public service and source of employment. Despite the general shift to digital communication, the vast majority of the American people—and small businesses—still rely heavily on the U.S. postal system, and many are rallying to defend it. First Class brings readers to the front lines of the struggle, explaining the various forces at work for and against a strong postal system, and presenting reasonable ideas for strengthening and expanding its capacity, services, and workforce. Emphasizing the essential role the USPS has played ever since Benjamin Franklin served as our first Postmaster General, author Christopher Shaw warns of the consequences for the country—and for our democracy—if we don’t win this fight. Praise for First Class: Piece by piece, an essential national infrastructure is being dismantled without our consent. Shaw makes an eloquent case for why the post office is worth saving and why, for the sake of American democracy, it must be saved."—Steve Hutkins, founder/editor of Save the Post Office and Professor of English at New York University "The USPS is essential for a democratic American society; thank goodness we have this new book from Christopher W. Shaw explaining why."—Danny Caine, author of Save the USPS and owner of the Raven Book Store, Lawrence, KS "Shaw's excellent analysis of the Postal Service and its vital role in American Democracy couldn't be more timely. … First Class should serve as a clarion call for Americans to halt the dismantling and to, instead, preserve and enhance the institution that can bind the nation together."—Ruth Y. Goldway, Retired Chair and Commissioner, U.S. Postal Regulatory Commission, responsible for the Forever Stamps "In a time of community fracture and corporate predation, Shaw argues, a first-class post office of the future can bring communities together and offer exploitation-free banking and other services."—Robert Weissman, president of Public Citizen

Download or read book Tom Clancy s The Division New York Collapse written by Alex Irvine and published by Chronicle Books. This book was released on 2016-03-08 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: New York Collapse is an in-world fictionalized companion to one of the biggest video game releases of 2016: Tom Clancy's The Division from Ubisoft. Within this discarded survivalist field guide, written before the collapse, lies a mystery—a handwritten account of a woman struggling to discover why New York City fell. The keys to unlocking the survivor's full story are hidden within seven removable artifacts, ranging from a full-city map to a used transit card. Retrace her steps through a destroyed urban landscape and decipher her clues to reveal the key secrets at the heart of this highly anticipated game.

Download or read book A Cup of Sun written by Joan Walsh Anglund and published by . This book was released on 1967 with total page 72 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A book of poems written by the author.