Four-Wheeled Rural Free Delivery wagon

Rural Free Delivery (RFD), which began as an experiment in a few West Virginia towns on October 1, 1896, quickly became one of the Post Office Department’s most popular services. There was no denying that the service was here to stay and in 1902 it became an official service covering over 186,000 miles.

Unlike their city counterparts, RFD carriers were responsible for providing their own transportation. For the first carriers, this meant some variation of a horse-drawn vehicle. Wagons such as this could cost as much as $100. Carriers used their own horses and paid for their feed and care. By 1910, when G.C. Graves built this one-horse, one-man wagon, RFD service reached rural Americans along almost one million miles of county roads across the continental United States.

Place: Indiana

Rural Free Delivery mail wagons came in a variety of colors, including red, green, blue, cream and white.

Museum ID: 1984.0676.1