There may be inscriptions on the reverse of some of the envelopes, giving information as to who designed them, but if I do not have the cover I do not have that information.Īt this point I have illustrated a few foreign Airmail envelopes as well as they are generally quite different from ours. While I own some of these covers, others I do not and either copied the images off of the Internet, or was sent them by other collectors. Please note that I am not a dealer and do not have items for sale. It is surprising how much of the printed envelope design one does not see in the images on the left. They are the same envelopes with the non-printed text and images removed, and the covers "cleaned" up. At the time, I had no idea there had been so many airmail envelope designs available to the public, and how attractive many of them are.Īll of the images portrayed show the original cover on the left, and a digitally reworked image on the right. I needed a break from my major collecting interests and concentrated on a side-line interest that involved event covers from the 1930s. I created this page due to my astonishment at the number of varieties of printed airmail envelopes used in the United States during the 1920s through the 1970s, and out of boredom. That is why many of these fantastic envelopes still exist. Those envelopes used by stamp collectors had additional cachets applied to them and are considered collectible. The reason most of the illustrations you will view are on philatelic covers is that people did not keep their ordinary mail. They were distinctive to aid the postal employees in sorting the air mail from the regular mail when it was received for processing. They do not realize that Air Mail was a somewhat new phenomenon and that these envelopes were largely created for the public to purchase. While that is true for the Special Flight envelopes, it is not the case for the majority of the envelopes. You can relive a little piece of postal history by opting to use these decorative red and blue bordered envelopes and paper.Many people are under the impression that the envelopes illustrated on these pages were created for stamp collectors and the making of covers. This classic Airmail style of stationary is now sold for decorative use rather than practical use. Although the transportation service known as Airmail is gone (it's been replaced with services like International Priority Airmail ™), the United States Postal Service trademarked the name Air Mail in In June 2006. The USPS has partnered with FedEx with the Global Express Guaranteed® which relies on FedEx Express® transportation to deliver packages worldwide. One could easily pick out international mail from a nation's internal mail due to the colored edges of the envelopes.Īirmail Today With the growth of eCommerce businesses, international shipping is at an all time high. This made it easier during mail separation. For example, envelopes from the US or the UK would have red and blue boarder, since these colors are in the nations' flags. U.S Airmail ended on October 10, 1975, when all domestic First Class mails were sent at the normal First Class rate.Īirmail Envelopes Airmail envelopeswere typically designed with a colored boarder depending on the country in which the letter came from. In 1971, Federal Express (or FedEx) designed a shipping system exclusively for shipping cargo by air. This forced the government to turn the service over to private companies once again. Long flights and poor weather caused 66 Army Air Corp plane crashes. Over the next five years, Army Air Corp pilots struggled to keep up with the high demand. Roosevelt took office he canceled the contracts with the three avionic companies and gave the job back to the Army Air Corps on February 19, 1934. This scandal was dubbed the Airmail fiasco by the press. After President Franklin D. Postmaster General Walter Brown was given the power to consolidate routes, and the majority of the nations airmail routes were given to only three privately held companies, which forced out any competition. Scandal eventually tarnished the program in 1933. The POD held the sole responsibility of the Airmail program for a number of years until private aviation companies took over in the late 20's. It wasn't until August 12, 1918, that the Post Office Department (POD) took full control and began using their own pilots. Lets take a look at how Airmail has helped shape mail delivery and the use of envelopes in our world today.Īirmail service in the U.S began on with the U.S Army piloting the airplanes (This wouldn't be the only time the U.S Army was involved in the program, but more on that later). This postal service has a rich history in America dating back to the 20's. Airmail Envelopes History - 1918 to the PresentĪirmail is a service provided when mail is transported through the air rather than by land or sea.
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