Day Eleven - Coming Home!

BYE-BYE NEW YORK CITY!

This morning I checked out of my hotel, said good-bye to all my friends at MSM, and headed for the Post Office. I have really enjoyed my adventures in NYC, but I am starting to get a little home sick. I will be happy to see all my friends in Mrs. Bower's Grade 5 class again!



ME AT THE NYC POST OFFICE

The United States Post Office in New York City is located at 33rd St. and 8th Avenue. I was fascinated to learn that the USPS handles more than 43% of the world's mail. Its nearest competitor is Japan with only 6%. The post office depends exclusively on postage and fees rather than tax payer revenue for its operations. It operates a $5.5 billion transportation network that includes more than 200,000 vehicles and contract space on approximately 15,000 commercial flights daily. The postal service is listed by Fortune Magazine as 29th on a list of the world's largest companies, working with an annual budget of nearly 1% of the United States economy. The post office delivers more in one day than FedEx does in a whole year, and more in three days than UPS does in a whole year!

 

Fun NYC Factoid:

Contrary to popular belief, the United States Post Office has no official motto. However, a number of postal buildings contain inscriptions, the most familiar of which appear on postal buildings in New York City and Washington D.C.:

"Neither snow nor rain nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds."

This inscription was supplied by William Mitchell Kendall, of the firm of McKim, Mead & White -  the architects who designed the New York General Post Office. Kendall said the sentence appears in the works of Herodotus and describes the expeditions of the Greeks against the Persians under Cyrus, about 500 B.C. The Persians operated a system of mounted postal couriers, and the sentence describes the fidelity with which their work was done.