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Home > Reference > More on Mailbox Color

May 26, 2009

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More on Mailbox Color

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Surprisingly, one of the more popular articles (as far as number of times read) here at N Scale Limited has been, Mailbox Color for Your Era. So, when I happened upon both modern and pre-1955 mailboxes standing side by side on the streets of Burlington, VT, I knew I needed to get a few photos for our Reference section. Unfortunately, the lighting was incredibly bad, but still usable.

Notice the size difference between the mailboxes and the concrete slab used beneath them to level them. I would estimate the olive box to stand approximately five feet tall . It has the raised lettering, “US MAIL” in the arched portion and in smaller letters, “RELAY MAIL” beneath it.

I saw several of these around the town, and I noticed that in all cases, the mailboxes were turned 90 degrees to the modern boxes.

I am not certain in these boxes are still in use or if the “Relay Mail” markings are for a specific, modern-day purpose that just happens to match the vintage color scheme.  Either way, it’s interesting to see a real-life example in olive drab.

If anyone has any additional information on these or their use, I would appreciate the feedback.

Modern and Pre-1955 mailboxesUS mailbox, Pre-1955 color scheme

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About the Author

— Co-founder of N Scale Limited, Frank has been building models since childhood and modeling in N scale since 2oo3. He is the former author of the blog, N Scale Modeling. Frank has a passion for big city modeling, the 1940s and the Pennsylvania Railroad.
  • http://www.model-railroad-hobbyist.com/blog/kcsphil1 Philip H.

    Frank,
    My understanding is that the Relay Mail boxes are the mechanism by which USPS district or orute drivers deliver additional mail to local carriers during the day. So say carrier X is assigned to 16 square blocks in Washington D.C. Carrier X leaves the local Post Office that AM with a truck full of mail to deliver. as she drives around those 16 square blocks picking up and dropping off, the P.O. is still receiving things that need to be delivered, and she is accumulating things that need to go forward. So the route drivers go to her relay mail boxes and drop off stuff to add to her deliveries, and she in turn drops off stuff that needs further action before she gets doen with her rounds.

    Or something like that.

  • Frank Giacobbe

    Interesting. So perhaps the photos I’ve taken aren’t of a vintage mailbox at all. Either way, I would image that the pre-1955 boxes would be of the same color so from that standpoint, I’m still glad I took the photo.

    Thanks for the information, Phillip.

  • Chaya7

    I was born in 1956 and remember the red and blue mailboxes well. However, there were also PLENTY of olive-drab mailboxes around into the 60′s. They were for regular mail, because we would put our letters in them.

    Now, I was living in the far west of the country, where change was slow back then. But I do clearly remember that the change didn’t happen everywhere at once.

  • Jdaviswhby

    Thank you for the information. I grew up durning the 1940′s and remembered them as Olive Drab. Last night I spent two hours on and off different sites. Today I specified Google and found the well documented information that I needed.

  • Jdaviswhby

    Thank you for the information. I grew up durning the 1940′s and remembered them as Olive Drab. Last night I spent two hours on and off different sites. Today I specified Google and found the well documented information that I needed.

  • roberttt

    Phillip H. has it right. The relay boxes are drop-off/pick-up points for mail. I’ve seen USPS trucks leave mail in them and mail carriers get mail out of them. The mail carrier that picks mail up is usually without a vehicle. Always thought of it as a way to keep them from having to carry too much mail around.

  • Randrfield

    We saw a green mailbox on an old movie we were watching and got curious about the color of US mailboxes. Thank you for this site; we learned a lot.

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