United States Post Office Department

The Post Office Department is the former name of the United States Postal Service when it was a Cabinet department. It was headed by the United States Postmaster General.

United States Post Office Department
Agency overview
Formed	February 20, 1792
Dissolved	July 1, 1971
Superseding agency	United States Postal Service
Agency executive	United States Postmaster General

The Postal Service Act signed by President George Washington on February 20, 1792 established the Department. Postmaster General John McLean was the first to call it the Post Office Department rather than just the "Post Office." The organization became more important in the government when President Andrew Jackson asked his Postmaster General, William T. Barry, to sit as a member of the Cabinet.

During the Civil War, postal services in the Confederacy were provided by the Confederate States of America Post Office Department, headed by Postmaster General John Henninger Reagan.

The Postal Reorganization Act signed by President Richard Nixon on August 12, 1970, replaced the cabinet-level Post Office Department with the independent United States Postal Service. The Act took effect on July 1, 1971.

United States Post Office Department Media

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  First national postal road map, created in 1796 by Assistant Postmaster General Abraham Bradley

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  Map of the United States : exhibiting the post-roads, the situations, connexions & distances of the post-offices, stage roads, counties & principal rivers; Scale [ca. 1:1,940,000]; [5th ed.] Philadelphia : Made and sold by Caldcleugh and Thomas, [1804] Relief shown pictorially.

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  First U.S. postage stamps, authorized by Congress March 3, 1847. Earliest known use of the 5¢ Franklin is July 7, 1847, and the 10¢ Washington is July 2, 1847.

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  Mineral Wells, Texas, post office, built between 1911 and 1913

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  Mail truck loaded with gold leaving the New York City Assay Office in 1941