First Hpo

With the decline of railway service many smaller communities found themselves without RPO services. To maintain effective service to these communities the Post Office Department created the Highway Post Office (HPO) in 1941. The servuce started on Feb 10, 1941 with the first route being Washington, DC and Harrisonburg, VA.

The first trip cover below is from Trip 1 (Washington to Harrisonburg) with a late useage of the Q3 parcel post.

Russ,

I didn't think the HPO required a Parcel Post stamp for the service? Wasn't it a bit unusual to see this stamp on a HPO letter or do you think it was the only stamp the person had.

I think the person creating this cover just wanted to use a valid stamp with an appropriate subject matter in its design. The 3-cent Parcel Post Stamp depicts a Railway Post Office Clerk, so it was an appropriate design to use for such a cover representing the end of RPO's and the beginning of HPO's.

The fact that it is a Parcel Post Stamp is irrelevant, as the use of those stamps for Parcel Post only ended in 1913. As of July 1, 1913 the Parcel Post stamps were then declared valid for use as regular postage.

great cover Russ. I don't think I have one HPO in all the covers I have, very cool piece!

If you're interested in HPO/RPO covers, Buck-a-Cover has a whole array of them ... something like 300-400 and most are $1 apiece:

http://www.buckacover.com/covers/se...p?code=usrpo

With those words, wt1 you may have just sent me to the poorhouse.

I have done business with buckacover and they have an extensive selection of covers which indeed are a buck (one dollar) as well as a section of more expensive covers. Naturally the more expensive ones are the goodies!

I have shopped from them as well and been extremely satisfied. But I daren't go to the website again until I have a fat wallet because it is just so tempting.

very cool cover-- with the stamp that was the rate in 1941 so they picked that one for the rpo (as previously stated)

Great cover! I particularly like the parcel post stamp usage! I would love to add some more HPO covers to my collection. Of course, I would try to incorporate them into my route 66 or my Abraham Lincoln collections.

OMG! Thank you so much for that website! I'm so happy I could just...well I don't know but you get the idea! Now lighthouse is also going to get more of my $$ now for cover pages! lol

GORGEOUS cover also!