Buzz
Typically, the mail most individuals receive includes utility bills, unsolicited advertisements, and the occasional celebratory card. Sending money through the mail is often avoided due to fears of theft.
However, some individuals have pushed the boundaries by mailing extraordinary items. Below is a list of 10 of the most bizarre, valuable, or outright controversial objects that have traveled via postal services.
10. The Hope Diamond
If you possessed one of the world’s most precious diamonds, how would you ensure its safe transport? Presumably, with great care.
Previous custodians of the Hope Diamond treated it with surprising nonchalance. For instance, Evalyn Walsh McLean once adorned her dog’s collar with the magnificent blue gem. She even allowed wounded soldiers at Walter Reed Hospital to pass the diamond around to lift their morale. However, the riskiest journey the Hope Diamond ever undertook was via the US Postal Service.
Following McLean’s passing in 1947, the Hope Diamond was acquired by renowned jeweler Harry Winston. He utilized the iconic gem to attract clientele. In 1958, he agreed to donate the diamond to the Smithsonian Institution. To deliver it, he opted for the postal service.
The postage fee totaled a mere $2.44. While Winston wasn’t entirely reckless, he did secure a $1 million insurance policy for the diamond. Postal worker James G. Todd hand-delivered the Hope Diamond, wrapped in a plain brown package, to the Smithsonian’s director, all under the watchful eyes of the press.
9. Henry ‘Box’ Brown
Henry Brown entered the world in 1815 as a slave in Virginia. He earned his distinctive middle name, “Box,” at the age of 33 after ingeniously freeing himself from bondage.
Brown had married another enslaved individual, and together they had three children. Tragically, his wife and children were sold to a harsher owner and taken far away. Brown stood helplessly on the street as his family was led away with ropes around their necks. Devastated by the separation, he resolved to flee.
He contacted abolitionists in the North, and together they devised an unconventional plan for his escape. Brown would be concealed in a wooden crate and shipped to a free state.
To secure a day off work, Brown deliberately injured his hand. He was then confined in a crate measuring 0.9 meters (3 ft) in length, 0.8 meters (2.7 ft) in depth, and 0.6 meters (2 ft) in width, with only minimal provisions of biscuits and water. The box was marked as “Dry Goods.”
For 27 grueling hours, Brown endured a journey by train, wagon, and steamboat until he reached his destination. When the abolitionist committee opened Henry “Box” Brown’s crate, he emerged with the words, “How do you do, gentlemen?” Brown had successfully escaped enslavement via the postal system.
8. Suffragettes
The postal system has also served as a means of transportation for others. In the early 1900s, a vigorous campaign was underway in Britain to secure women’s right to vote. Suffragettes organized demonstrations and employed every tactic to spotlight their cause nationally.
In 1909, two suffragettes exploited an obscure regulation permitting “human letters” to be sent through the mail. Miss Solomon and Miss McLellan were mailed to 10 Downing Street to confront the prime minister.
The suffragettes headed to the post office, paid the required fee, and were handed over to a telegram courier who guided them to Downing Street. One suffragette carried a placard promoting an upcoming protest, while the other held the delivery receipt.
Since the package was addressed to the prime minister, he was expected to personally accept it. However, the butler denied the women access to Prime Minister Asquith, despite their insistence that the delivery had already been paid for. The suffragettes were sent back to the post office, and the courier had to justify his inability to complete the delivery.
7. Pushing Boundaries
Some individuals are compelled to test the limits of every rule they encounter. A team of researchers decided to explore the boundaries of the US Postal Service’s policies and documented their findings in the Annals of Improbable Research, the publication behind the Ig Nobel Prizes for quirky scientific endeavors. The magazine’s goal is to entertain and provoke thought.
The items mailed included valuables, sentimental objects, cumbersome items, pointless curiosities, suspicious packages, and outright repulsive things. Examples ranged from a $20 bill encased in plastic to a helium balloon and even a box of deceased fish and seaweed. Each item was adequately stamped, and the time taken for delivery was meticulously recorded.
The research revealed that the postal service displayed remarkable leniency. When a human molar was mailed in a transparent plastic container, postal staff repackaged it in a cushioned envelope and attached a note stating, “Please note that human remains are generally prohibited from postal transport, but we presumed this item held sentimental significance and made an exception for you.”
Sixty-four percent of the unusual items successfully reached their intended destinations. After postal employees dealt with items classified as “disgusting,” the researchers personally thanked them with a box of chocolates for their efforts.
6. Children
While we’ve seen individuals mailed for political causes or to escape dire circumstances, there have also been more mundane reasons for sending humans as parcels. The introduction of the Parcel Post Service in 1913 transformed package delivery in the US. Before this, people had to personally transport their packages to major towns for mailing.
From then on, any post office would handle your package as long as it didn’t exceed 5 kilograms (11 lb). That very year, Mr. and Mrs. Jesse Beauge from Ohio mailed their 5-kilogram (10 lb) baby to his grandmother’s house for just 15 cents. They even took the extra step of insuring the child for $50.
When the weight limit was increased to 23 kilograms (50 lb), a pair of parents came up with a clever plan. May Pierstorff’s parents wished to send her to her grandmother’s but found the price of a train ticket too steep. They affixed the necessary stamps to May’s coat, and the 22-kilogram (48.5 lb), five-year-old was transported in the mail compartment of a train to her grandmother.
In 1914, the postmaster general banned the practice of mailing people through the postal service.
5. Potatoes
Choosing the right words for a birthday card or milestone celebration can be challenging. You aim to convey something heartfelt and original, but generic, mass-produced cards often fall short. Why not express your sentiments with a potato instead?
Interestingly, several companies across various countries offer the service of mailing a potato to your chosen recipient for a fee. Some inscribe your message directly onto the potato’s skin, add postage, and send it as is. Others provide more intricate options, decorating and wrapping the potato before dispatch. You can even opt for googly eyes to be added.
Given the competitive nature of the potato-sending industry, companies continuously seek innovative ideas. One business prints a facial image directly onto the potato. If you plan to eat it, peeling might be required—unless you’re feeling particularly adventurous.
4. A Cat
When envisioning mail delivery, most picture carriers walking door-to-door to deliver letters. However, in the 1890s, New York introduced a more advanced system. A network of pneumatic tubes enabled mail to be propelled across the city at high speed.
The initial items transported included documents and a Bible. However, the operators sought more excitement. The next item sent through the tubes was a live tortoiseshell cat. A postal worker documented the event as follows:
How the cat survived being propelled at incredible speeds from Station P in the Produce Exchange Building, navigating multiple turns before reaching Broadway and Park Row, is beyond me. Yet, it did. The cat appeared momentarily stunned but soon began to run and was swiftly captured and placed in a prepared basket.
When additional branches of the pneumatic system were launched, a canister containing a goldfish bowl with live fish was sent through. Remarkably, the fish arrived unharmed and seemingly undisturbed by their journey.
3. W. Reginald Bray
W. Reginald Bray epitomized the quintessential English eccentric. He devoted his life to pursuing his peculiar interests. As an autograph collector, he gathered 15,000 signatures, earning the title “The Autograph King.” However, he is most renowned for his experiments pushing the boundaries of the British Royal Mail. In 1898, he acquired a copy of the postal regulations and began testing their limits.
He found immense joy in addressing seemingly absurd items to see if they would be delivered. The mailbox outside his home received everything from partially smoked cigars and frying pans to a rabbit’s skull.
While many items were addressed to Bray himself, he also challenged the post office’s creativity by using cryptic addresses like “The Resident, London,” or “The proprietor of the most remarkable hotel in the world on the road between Santa Cruz and Santa Jose, California.”
Fortunately, his dog, clearly labeled with his home address, was safely delivered through the postal system. On one foggy evening, Bray even mailed himself to the location he was trying to find.
2. A Bank
In the 1910s, Vernal, Utah, was a small town with just a few hundred residents, but it was poised for growth. Local banker William H. Coltharp believed the town needed a durable brick bank to symbolize its future prosperity.
The challenge was that the nearest brick manufacturer was over 274 kilometers (170 mi) away, and transporting the bricks to Vernal would cost four times more than the bricks themselves. Coltharp discovered that using the new Parcel Service would drastically reduce the expense. Consequently, 15,000 bricks were packaged and mailed.
To comply with the 23-kilogram (50 lb) weight limit per package, the bricks were divided into crates. Up to 40 crates, totaling a ton, were shipped daily from the brick factory. The postal workers handling the heavy deliveries wanted to drop them directly at the bank site, but the Vernal postmaster insisted they pass through the post office first.
As the post office filled with enough bricks to construct an entire bank, the postmaster regretted his strict adherence to the rules. Coltharp’s bank still stands today. A new postal regulation was introduced to prevent similar attempts in the future, limiting individuals to sending no more than 91 kilograms (200 lb) to the same recipient in a single day.
1. Cullinan Diamond
The Cullinan Diamond holds the record as the largest gem-quality diamond ever discovered, weighing 3,100 carats—approximately 0.6 kilograms (1.3 lb). Found in South Africa, it was purchased for the substantial sum of £150,000 as a gift for King Edward VII.
The journey from South Africa to England was long, and transporting such a priceless item posed a significant challenge. To deter potential thieves, elaborate security measures were publicized. Detectives and bodyguards were tasked with escorting the diamond from the mine to the ship bound for London. Even inside the captain’s safe, the gem remained under constant guard.
In reality, this was an elaborate deception. The heavily guarded box was a decoy. The genuine Cullinan Diamond was placed in a simple cardboard box with three shillings’ worth of postage and mailed to England.
However, the Cullinan Diamond’s unusual journey didn’t end there. When it was sent to Amsterdam for cutting and polishing, another decoy was transported on a Royal Navy ship, while the actual diamond traveled in the gem cutter’s coat pocket. The stones derived from the Cullinan now adorn the British crown jewels.
