Local Post Offices That No Longer Exist !!

Yes that was a cool postal history link!

Here's another from my collection, this is an 1899 cover from STOP Arkansas. This P.O. opened in 1884 and closed in 1904. While doing research for the POSTAL HISTORY OF WASHINGTON COUNTY ARKANSAS book I went down to the dirt crossroads where this office was once located and talked to some of the folks farming there. The story they told was that the name was based on the fact that it was literally the "stop" on the mail route between Rosedale in Crawford County and the larger town of Evansville in Washington County. The rest of the route was (and still is) pretty much wilderness.

That Stop, Arkansas cover is certainly interesting. A bit more research on Stop, Arkansas:



It's also interesting to look on what the sender may have been ordering based on this period ad from the addressee named on the cover:

great all around cover tmaring ! the postmark and one of my favorite U.S. stamps on cover !!

Yes I have a couple different examples from Odell also. But the one I wanted to show off goes back to the spellings of "Boonsborough" changing to "Boonsboro". Here's an older 1869 cover from the same place, but with a manuscript postmark... and the postmaster is using the shortened form! I'm guessing that in local use the short version was commonplace already even before the postal rules took effect!



You may doubt that the cancel says Boonsboro... but I'm been through every page of the Arkansas post office list and there's nothing else that even comes close.

The 1870 Census shows Ann M. Parks, age 24, as residing in a hotel in Kansas City, MO (presumably a "servant"/housekeeper):

Wow Wt1, you are the research king! I still wonder about that manuscript Boonsboro cancel from time to time. It was sold to me as Boonsboro, and I was skeptical for some time, but finally had to admit that there was nothing else even remotely close.

But you may appreciate this... the short version of a long story. I purchased five early stampless folded letters from a dealer back east with postmarks of various places around Madison County Arkansas from 1838 to 1858. They were expensive by my standards, but included an unique and unreported 1838 example of SEVIERVILLE Ark... a very short lived and early office.

Much to my surprise they were all of a single correspondence! It was not that the people had moved, it was simply that the post office that served them had moved or been renamed! The letters are to the parents back in East Tennessee, from a young couple, 16 and 14, who had traveled to settle in the Arkansas with other extended-family members. In the 1838 letter they announce the birth of their first son, James Madison Wood. The other letters follow the next 20 years of hardships, all very interesting.

I got a bit curious about these folks and so I drove over to the county historical society and showed them to the lady there. She was completely amazed! Turns out that the Wood farm was the property right next door to her own family farm! And... she had the newsletter on her desk for a reunion for descendants of James Madison Wood, born in War Eagle Arkansas 1838. The descendants of that man are a tight knit group, very much history conscious, and they were absolutely blown away by the discovery of primary resource genealogical data! I made some high resolution scans and give the family full-size reproductions, of which they were very welcoming. And then finally one of the older Woods, a great grandson of James Madison, asked if I would sell the originals... and what was I supposed to say? I'm a collector... and this is a really really rare postmark... but I had had them for over a year, and wrung most of the enjoyment out of owning them that there was. So of course I agreed, because where else should these letters be? And I was not concerned about their safety, I think they were well aware of the responsibilities of curating archival materials. But I kept the high resolution scans!

You did a good thing, tmaring!

On the subject of DPOs... here is a chart I created specifically for the post offices of Washington County Arkansas. Such a chart would be different for other areas but it illustrates the basic idea of the growth in the number of concurrent post offices right up to the point when motorcars and trains began to rise and transportation became faster and cheaper. The peak was 1902 to 1905, corresponding with the peak of the so-called "postcard period" in philately. Then the inevitable decline, a period of relative stability between the wars, then the modern decline. I have not updated it lately, but we've lost a couple more post offices in the county since this was published, so we're now back to the same number we had before the civil war!

Another cool short-timer. 1888-1902. Tolu Arkansas. There's nothing at all there now... not even a crossroads.

Prescott MA - submerged under the Quabbin Reservoir in 1938

As a Massachusetts resident, I've always been fascinated with the story of the towns flooded in 1938 to make way for the Quabbin Reservoir (Dana, Enfield, Prescott and Greenwich). Makes for some fascinating reading,

Here's a "before and after" map showing the former towns that were taken for the Quabbin Reservoir:

My 'Last Day Cover' from Calf Creek, Texas (1915-1954)


Sarversville, PA (1849-1906)... Backstamped by Slate Lick, PA (1830-1906)... Both are retired.
My family came from Slate Lick, so I have plenty of those.

Leesburg,PA (1894-1904) Only 10 years in service!

Back to Boonsboro, briefly. Here's a list of Post Offices ending in "boro" or "borough" in Arkansas, and I agree, not many choices or good matches:

Boonsboro, Washington County (1893-1901)
Boonsborough, Washington County (1843/1893)
Coleboro, Little River County (1895-1912)
Coleborough, Little River County (1882-1894)
Goldsborough, Poinsett County (1852/1861)
Greensboro, Craighead County (1892-1906)
Greensborough, Craighead County (1850/1892)
Hillsboro, Union County (1885-1926)
Hillsborough, Union County (1846/1885)
Jonesboro, Craighead County (1894-Date)
Jonesborough, Cross County (1859-1894)
Murfreesboro, Pike County (1886-Date)
Murfreesborough, Pike County (1851/1886)
Rosboro, Pike County (1907-1955)
Simsboro, Crittenden County (1916-1928)

from Jim Forte's Postal History website. Wonder if the founders of Boonsboro originally headed west from Boonesborough, Kentucky?

Unfortunately this cover isn't mine, I merely found it while surfing the internet. Nonetheless, it does make for a good example of a DPO that closed years ago, but at the northernmost point in the US.



Since this post office no longer exists, I wonder what post office currently holds the distinction of being the northernmost post office in the US? Does anyone know for sure?