13 Comments

This is fascinating stuff.

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It sure is...I spent hours looking at the postmasters on the Museum site. In this time period they were almost royalty. Grand houses, portraits...they were the Bill Gates of their time. We take mail for granted but back then it was a new service. I didn't realize this. Nice to have a place (substack) to share. You can't really engage your family on these strange journeys through time. No eye rols at SubStack. Thank you.

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I have a friend in Manchester in the UK. And I was in his house one day and asked him who the woman in the picture was on his wall. He sighed and said it was his favourite Aunty who had been ostracised from the family when he was a boy for having an affair with the Postmaster. I guess that was around the late 60s. It was such a scandal around Manchester because Postmaster was such a prestigious position. Different times in so many ways!

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Every time I get one of your posts I feel as though it Is part of my efforts to make you a part of my family that I choose

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You gave me the idea to start this. I went abt 4 months everyday and it is so much fun to put these investigations up. It is free and gets about 400 views which amazes me so many people care about the history of books and libraries.

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Yeah, I was wondering if you were going to run out of gas. (Which is OK.)

I like libraries and old maps and all that stuff.

elm

a reader at heart

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My work has a hiring freeze and I had to add an extra class (new course development) so my forays into old things got detoured.

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It wasn't meant to be derogatory, it just seems like a great deal of work, if you're doing it daily.

elm

burnout is no fun

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It took a huge amount of effort to write a letter back then.

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