U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service

Appendix D. Important Dates 1775 First Postmaster General under Continental Congress 1789 First Postmaster General under Constitution 1794 Post Office Act 1829 Postmaster General became cabinet post 1838 Congress declared all railroads post routes 1847 Postage stamps 1860 Pony Express 1863 City delivery service 1864 Money orders 1896 Rural free delivery service 1902 First omnibus public buildings law 1910 Policy to build post offices near railroad stations 1911 Postal savings 1913 Public Buildings Act 1913 Public Buildings Commission established to standardize public building construction 1918 Airmail 1926 Public Buildings Act (Keys-Elliot Act) 1931 Federal Employment Stabilization Act required advance planning by Federal construction agencies 1933 National Industrial Recovery Act established Public Works Administration 1933 Public Works of Art Project 1934 Treasury Department's Section of Painting and Sculpture (later called Section of Fine Arts) 1935 Emergency Relief Appropriation Act established Works Progress Administration (later called Works Projects Administration) 1938 Ramspeck-O'Mahoney Act put all postmasters within Civil Service and limited their political activity 1939 Federal public buildings program transferred to the Federal Works Agency 1948 Parcel post air service 1949 Public Buildings Act of 1949 empowered the Commissioner of Public Buildings to employ private architectural firms in public buildings projects 1950 One-day service in residential areas 1954 Postal Service becomes responsible for all exclusively post office projects while GSA retains multi-user projects combining different Federal functions (i.e. courthouse, agency offices, and post office in one building) 1955 Certified mail service 1963 Zip codes 1969 Patronage factor eliminated in appointments of postmasters 1969 First postage stamp canceled on the moon 1970 Postal Reorganization Act converted the Post Office Department to the U.S. Postal Service, an independent agency within the Executive Branch (Postmaster General left the President's cabinet in 1971) 1971 National Service Standards

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