YMCA

The London draper, temperance advocate and devout Christian George Williams was appalled at the degradation of workingmen in London and began a work among his fellow drapery employees. A go-getter in business, too, he rapidly advanced to partnership in his firm (a drapery house) and used his own substantial wealth to support evangelical causes.

Si George Williams

Williams was motivated to form the Young Men's Christian Association (YMCA) by the terrible conditions and the consequent temptations for sin he perceived in London for young men. The first YMCA meeting was held in Williams’ drapery shop in St Paul’s Churchyard on June 6, 1844 and included 12 young men in total. Their objective was the “improvement of the spiritual condition of the young men engaged in houses of business, by the formation of Bible classes, family and social prayer meetings, mutual improvement societies, or any other spiritual agency.”

George Williams wasted no time in organising YMCA branches throughout England, Scotland and Ireland. Over the next 10 years, YMCA movements also began to develop across Western Europe, Australia, New Zealand, India and North America.

The first YMCA in North America was established in Montreal, Quebec in 1851. Later that year, the first YMCA in the United States opened in Boston on December 29, 1851. It was founded by Captain Thomas Valentine Sullivan (1800–59), an American seaman and missionary. By 1853, the Boston YMCA had 1,500 members, most of whom were merchants and artisans.

First YMCA in Montreal By Denis Jacquerye

The idea of creating a truly global movement with an international headquarters was pioneered by Henry Dunant, Secretary of YMCA Geneva, who would later go on to found the International Committee of the Red Cross and win the first Nobel Peace Prize.

Henry Dunant successfully convinced YMCA Paris to organise the first YMCA World Conference. The Conference took place in August 1855, bringing together 99 young delegates from Europe and North America. They met just before the 1855 Paris World Exposition of the same year. The delegates discussed joining together in a federation to enhance cooperation amongst individual YMCA societies. This marked the beginning of the World Alliance of YMCAs.

Emblem of 1881

The similar Young Women's Christian Association or YWCA was founded in 1870.

Long before Williams' death in 1905, the YMCA had achieved a membership of 150,000 in Britain and half a million in America with thousands of branches worldwide.

One of George Williams aims for the YMCA was to promote a muscular Christianity. He wanted to put Christian principles into practice by developing a healthy "body, mind, and spirit". The organisation was very influential during the 1870s and the 1930s in promoting good sportsmanship in athletic contests in gymnasiums and swimming pools. Three sports: basketball, volleyball and racquetball were invented in YMCA facilities.

YMCA Association Men cover, June 1919

Basketball was invented at the YMCA International Training School (later named Springfield College) in Massachusetts in 1891. Its inventor was Canadian YMCA trainer James Naismith.

Volleyball was invented in a Holyoke, Massachusetts YMCA in 1895. Its inventor was a YMCA physical education instructor William George Morgan.

Racquetball was invented in the Greenwich, Connecticut, YMCA in 1950. Its inventor was Joe Sobek a tennis, handball and squash player who worked in a rubber manufacturing factory,

Late 19th century Baseball star Billy Sunday started his evangelist career touring YMCAs. Sunday drew enormous crowds at YMCAs across the USA, who clamored to hear the famous baseball player recall his faith journey.

On January 13, 1979 The YMCA filed a libel suit against the Village People for their "YMCA" hit. It considered the song defamatory. The two sides settled out of court and the YMCA later expressed pride towards the band for their song as a salute to their organization.

Today the YMCA is a worldwide organisation with its headquarters based in Geneva, Switzerland. it now operates in 120 countries and reaches 58 million people.

In its early years, the YMCA organization provided beds and shelter to young men leaving the countryside for work in the cities. Many YMCAs throughout the world still maintain residences as an integral part of the programming. YMCAs in the United Kingdom are known now predominantly as organizations that provide accommodation for vulnerable and homeless young people. Across the UK the YMCA provides over 8,000 bed spaces, and is thus one of the largest providers of safe supported accommodation for young people.

Source YMCA

United Nations

The United Nations isn't the first world organisation. The League of Nations, the first intergovernmental organisation whose principal mission was to maintain world peace, was founded after World War I in 1920, with an aim to prevent the repeat of the war. However, soon after the League of Nations was formed, the world was caught up in another war: World War II.

The UN was founded after the Second World War to replace the League Of Nations which had been so ineffectual in preventing war.

HISTORY

The term "United Nations" was first coined in 1942 by Winston Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt in the Declaration by United Nations. This declaration was made to officially state the cooperation of the Allies (Great Britain, the United States, and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics) and other nations during World War II.

The United Nations Conference on International Organization (UNCIO) took place between April  25, 1945 and June 26, 1945 in San Francisco. On the last day of the conference delegates from 50 nations signed a charter creating the The United Nations Organisation — later known as the United Nations.

The United Nations Organisation did not instantly come into being with the signing of the Charter, since in many countries the Charter had to be subjected to parliamentary approval. It was finally ratified and established on October 24, 1945.

The flag of the United Nations was adopted on December 7, 1946.

The first meeting of the United Nations General Assembly was held in Westminster Central Hall, London, on January 10, 1946.

The United Nations Security Council is the organ of the United Nations charged with the maintenance of international peace and security. It held its first meeting at Church House, Westminster, London on January 17, 1946.

First Steps is a 1947 short documentary film about the treatment of children with disabilities. It was produced for the Department of Social Affairs of the United Nations by Frederic House Inc.  The film was awarded an Academy Award for Best Documentary (Short Subject) in 1948. The Academy Award for First Steps still resides at the UN Headquarters in New York.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is the first document to detail the fundamental human rights that must be protected. The declaration was proclaimed by the General Assembly of the United Nations in 1948.

The headquarters of the United Nations occupies a site beside the East River in Manhattan, on land purchased from the real estate developer William Zeckendorf Sr.  A last-minute gift of $8.5 million from John D. Rockefeller allowed the United Nations to set up headquarters there, Before that, the UN had considered moving to Philadelphia, San Francisco and Boston.

President Harry S Truman laid the cornerstone at the United Nations headquarters and called it a workshop of peace on October 24, 1949. The complex was designed by an international team of architects, and the buildings were built using materials from all over the world. Construction was completed on October 9, 1952.

UN headquarters in New York City. Wikipedia

The longest UN speech in history was delivered by Indian Defense Minister Krishna Menon on Jon January 23 and 24, 1957. He spoke for a total of 8 hours and 12 minutes, defending India's position on the Kashmir conflict. Menon's speech was a comprehensive and detailed account of India's history and claims on Kashmir, as well as a critique of Pakistan's position. He also spoke about the broader implications of the Kashmir conflict for international peace and security.. The speech ended with his collapse and hospitalization due to exhaustion.

The United Nations was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2001 sharing it with its secretary general  Kofi Annan.

The most recent country to be admitted to the UN was South Sudan in 2011. The Republic of South Sudan joined the United Nations as the 193rd member state shortly after gaining independence.

Saudi Arabia became in 2013 the first nation to reject a seat on the United Nations Security Council.

The Paris Agreement is an agreement within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change dealing with the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions around the world, starting in the year 2020. 174 world leaders signed the agreement at the UN headquarters in New York on April 22, 2016, the most member signatories in a single day.

FUN UNITED NATIONS FACTS

When the United Nations was founded there were 51 members. There are now 193.

By Roke - Map showing United Nations members and the decade they joined the UN

UN Peacekeeping forces comprise 116,919 field forces from 123 countries.

The UN Charter comprises 8,778 words. The second draft of the European Union Ecolabel preliminary report for Sanitary Products (including toilet paper) has over five times as many (44,065) words.

The United Nations provides food assistance to an average of 91.4 million people in 83 countries each year. It also provides vaccinations for 58 per cent of the world's children.

There are three countries that are not members of the UN: Kosovo (not recognized by enough UN members), Taiwan (place was taken by China in 1971) and Vatican City  (religious reasons).

Because it will pose to be a serious challenge to accommodate the hundreds of languages spoken by the 193 member representatives, there are only six languages officially recognized by the UN. They are: Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish.

The United Nations officially use British English instead of American English.

Sources Daily Express, Loopjamaica

Trade union

A trade union is an organisation of employed workers formed to undertake collective bargaining with employers and try to achieve improved working conditions for its members.

 Rally of the trade union UNISON in Oxford during a strike. Wikipedia

Trade unions of a kind existed in the Middle Ages as journeyman guilds. In 1563 The Statute of Artificers was passed by Queen Elizabeth 1’s government. The Statute had some negative effects such as not allowing apprentices to look for work outside of their parish but it had positive effects as well such as requiring justices of the peace to maintain living standards and to monitor apprentices in their district. This meant that craftsmen received some protection from the state.

Boston shoemakers formed what is considered the first American trade union on October 19, 1648.  "The Company of Shoomakers" was formed in response to complaints "by occasion of bad ware made by some of the trade" and their goal was to set a quality standard and eliminate the shoddy workmanship. The Massachusetts General Court prohibited them from offering charitable or educational programs, or from fixing prices or settling disputes.

Various combinations of wage earners were formed in the 18th century, but modern trade unionism can be traced back to Britain's Industrial Revolution, which drew women, children, rural workers and immigrants into the work force in large numbers and in new roles.

Five centuries of repressive legislation in Britain culminated in the passing of William Pitt's 1799 and 1800 Combination Acts which were a response to a series of strikes by skilled workers. They forbade Labor Unions from combining to campaign for better working conditions and for an increase in wages. This act was strictly enforced and workers breaking this new law could be sent to prison for up to three months. 

Early 19th century workplace militancy manifested in Britain's Luddite riots, when unemployed workers destroyed labor saving machines. The Luddite movement began in Nottingham and culminated in a region-wide rebellion that lasted for five years from 1811. Mill owners took to shooting protesters and eventually the movement was suppressed with military force.

The Luddite riots, when unemployed workers destroyed labor saving machines

On the repeal of the Combination Acts in 1824-25, organizations of work people were permitted to engage in collective bargaining, although still subject to legal restrictions and with no legal protection for their funds.

In 1834 six farm labourers from Tolpuddle, Dorset, were sentenced to transportation for forming a 'friendly society'. However, public outrage led to the Tolpuddle Martyrs being pardoned and the principle of workers being allowed to organize themselves was established.

The Trade Union Congress was the first long-lived national trade union center. A voluntary organisation of trade unions, it was founded in Britain in 1868. Delegates of affiliated unions meet annually to consider matters affecting their members. Today there are fifty affiliated unions, with a total of about 5.6 million members.

Make Poverty History banner in front of Congress House. By Kaihsu

Successive acts passed by the British parliament broadened the unions' field of action, such as the 1913 Act which allow the unions to engage in political activities.

The industrial disputes of the winter of 1978-79 in the UK undermined the James Callaghan government. It was succeeded by the Margaret Thatcher government, which in the Employment Acts of 1980 and 1982, restricted the closed shop, picketing and secondary action against anyone other than the employer in dispute. The Trade Union Act 1984 made it compulsory to have secret ballot for elections and before strikes.

In the United States, trade unions are often called labor unions. The International Workers of the World (IWW) was founded at Chicago in 1905 by 43 labor groups. Their slogan was "One big union for all." Within seven years the organization had around 25,000 members, concentrated in the Northwest, among dock workers, agricultural workers in the central states, and in textile and mining areas. 

The IWW was involved in over 150 strikes, including the 1912 Lawrence textile strike (1912), which grew to more than twenty thousand workers and involving nearly every mill in the town of Lawrence, Massachusetts. 

Labour union demonstrators held at bay by soldiers during the 1912 Lawrence textile strike

The great growth of US trade unionism came in the post-Depression years. Employers and the US Government have historically been more opposed to trade unionism than in Britain, often using police and armed guards to harass and protect strike breakers, which has led to episodes of violence and bitter confrontation.

US legislation includes the Taft-Hartley Act 1947, which among other measures outlawed the closed shop.

In the present-day US unions have the reputation of being open to the acceptance of new techniques, taking a broad view of these as conducive to greater essential prosperity.

The All-China Federation of Trade Unions (ACFTU) was founded on May 1, 1925, in Guangzhou,  China.  It is the largest trade union in the world, with over 302 million members as of 2021. The ACFTU is affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party and is responsible for representing the interests of Chinese workers and promoting their rights and welfare.

Over the years, the ACFTU has played an important role in China's labor movement and has been involved in a number of major labor disputes and strikes. It has also been criticized by some for being too closely aligned with the Chinese government and not always fully representing the interests of workers.

In 1973 a European trade union confederation (ETUC) was established, with a membership 20.9 million.

Solidarity, a Polish trade union, was founded as the first independent labor union in a Soviet-bloc country on September 17, 1980.

Solidarity, ETUC Demonstration—Budapest 2011. By Derzsi Elekes Andor 

Source Hutchinson Encyclopedia

Secret Service

The agentes in rebus were the late Roman imperial courier service and general agents of the central government from the 4th to the 7th centuries. Two were appointed to each province in 357, one in 395 and more again after 412.

In modern times, the French police officer Joseph Fouché is sometimes regarded as the primary pioneer within secret intelligence. Among other things, he is alleged to have prevented several murder attempts on Napoleon, through a large and tight net of various informers.

By the end of the American Civil War, between one-third and one-half of all U.S. paper currency in circulation was counterfeit. This served as the catalyst behind the formation of the U.S. Secret Service. On July 5, 1865, the Secret Service was created under the U.S. Treasury Department in Washington, D.C

Badge of the United States Secret Service

The legislation creating the agency was on Abraham Lincoln's desk on April 14, 1865, the same day he was assassinated.

The secret service did not start protecting the President until after President William McKinley was shot and killed in 1901.The following year, President Theodore Roosevelt became the first President to be protected by Secret Service agents. Since then, every president has received Secret Service Protection.

In 1902, William Craig became the first Secret Service agent to die while serving, in a road accident while riding in the presidential carriage.

Eleanor Roosevelt regularly refused Secret Service protection, and instead traveled with a .22 Smith and Wesson on her person.

James Brady, the Secret Service agent that saved President Reagan's life became a Secret Service agent after seeing a movie starring Ronald Reagan as a Secret Service Agent.

Secret Service agents respond to the assassination attempt of Ronald Reagan

In 1565 Ivan the Terrible set up the Oprichnik, who were the forerunner of the KGB. Riding black horses and led by Ivan himself, the private army terrorized the populace. After seven years of abuse Ivan disbanded them.

The KGB was the main Soviet security agency, intelligence agency or spy agency, and the secret police agency during the Cold War. It was formed on March 13, 1954 as a successor of earlier agencies, the Cheka, NKGB, and MGB.

KGB is an initialism for Komitet Gosudarstvennoy Bezopasnosti, which translated in English as Committee for State Security,

During the Cold War it was Soviet policy for the KGB to monitor public and private opinion, internal subversion and possible counter-revolutionary plots in the Soviet Bloc. The KGB was instrumental in crushing the Hungarian Revolution of 1956, and the Prague Spring of "Socialism with a Human Face", in 1968 Czechoslovakia.

Vladimir Putin was a KGB Foreign Intelligence Officer for 16 years. He gave up his position in the KGB in 1991, during the putsch against Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev.

Putin in KGB uniform, circa 1980

After the dissolution of the USSR in 1991, the KGB was split into the Federal Security Service and the Foreign Intelligence Service of the Russian Federation.

Belarus is the only post-Soviet Union era country where the national security organization is still called "KGB", albeit it is lost in translation when written in Belarusian (becoming KDB rather than KGB).

The British Intelligence Agency MI6 was formed in 1909 but it was kept such a secret that it wasn't formally acknowledged until the year 1994.

The British Secret Service (James Bond's employer) really can issue a "license to kill". It's called a Class Seven authorization, and must be approved by the MI6 agent's superiors all the way up to the Foreign Minister.

Because the American Secret Service aren't allowed into the Oval Office, they turned the floor into a giant, digital scale so that they can monitor where the President is at all times.

All presidents and first ladies have secret service protection for life, and further that any children of former presidents get secret service protection until they turn 16.

Scouting

Charterhouse public schoolboy Robert Baden-Powell had an interest in the outdoors. His first introduction to Scouting skills was through stalking and cooking game while avoiding teachers in the nearby woods, which were strictly out-of-bounds.

Later, as a military officer, Baden-Powell was stationed in British India in the 1880s where he took an interest in military scouting and in 1884 he published Reconnaissance and Scouting.

Baden-Powell won fame as commander of the garrison during the 217-day siege of Mafeking in the Second South African War (1899–1900). This rise to fame fueled the sales of the small instruction book he had written in 1899 about military scouting and wilderness survival, Aids to Scouting.

Baden-Powell in 1896

On his return to England, Baden-Powell noticed that boys showed considerable interest in Aids to Scouting, which was being used by teachers and youth organizations. He was urged to rewrite this book for boys.

In 1906 and 1907 Baden-Powell wrote Scouting for Boys. He took many ideas from the experiences he made with the Mafeking Cadet Corps a paramilitary group of youths formed during the Mafeking siege. The youngsters supported the troops by carrying messages, which freed the men for military duties and kept the boys occupied.

Cover of first part of Scouting For Boys, January 1908

In the summer of 1907 Robert Baden-Powell held a camp to test ideas for his book. Twenty boys, drawn from Eton and Harrow public schools plus Poole and Bournemouth locals spent the week from August 1 to August 8 camping on Brownsea Island, in Poole Harbor on the south coast of England.

The boys  were organised into patrols (Bulls, Wolves, Curlews and Ravens), wore khaki, used the motto Be Prepared", studied cooking, fire-lighting, wildlife, life-saving and patriotism, and were given tests on knots and tracking. Reveille was at 6am, there was a compulsory siesta and lights out at 9.30pm. The public schoolboys were charged £1, the others 3/6d (17 1/2p).

Scouting for Boys was published in six fortnightly instalments of approximately 70 pages each, from January to March 1908. These six publications were a success and, as planned, were issued in book form on May 1, 1908.

Scouting for Boys has sold 150 million copies and was the fourth best-selling book of the 20th century worldwide after the Bible, the Quran and Mao's Little Red Book. 

The Brownsea camp and the publication of Scouting for Boys are generally regarded as the start of the Scout movement.

In 1909 Chicago newspaper and magazine publisher William D. Boyce was visiting London, when he found himself lost on a foggy street. He encountered a boy who came to his aid, guiding him to his destination. The boy refused Boyce's tip, explaining that he was a Boy Scout and was merely doing his daily good turn. Boyce's fascination was aroused and he met with staff at the Boy Scouts Headquarters. Upon his return to the US, Boyce incorporated the Boy Scouts of America on February 8, 1910.

Robert Baden Powell faced with an increasing number of girls wishing to take part in his scouting movement. He decided that girls should have their own separate organization, and the Girl Guides were founded by him and his sister Agnes in the UK in 1910.

During the first half of the 20th century, the movement grew to encompass three major age groups for boys (Cub Scout, Boy Scout, Rover Scout) and for girls (Brownie Guide, Girl Guide and Girl Scout, Ranger Guide).

First procession of Armenian Scouts in Constantinople in 1918

Worldwide, as of 2010, there are over 32 million registered Scouts and as of 2006 10 million registered Guides, operating in nearly every country.

Indonesia  has the highest amount of scouting participants worldwide with 17,100,000 male and female members.

Wikipedia Commons

In Cuba, there was a Scout organisation, but the Communist government replaced it by the José Martí Pioneer Organization. Also scouting organisations have been banned in the People's Republic of China. They have been replaced by Young Pioneers of China and Communist Youth League of China. Both the Cuban and Chinese  organisations are similar to Scouts, but without the international brotherhood and the peace mission.

David Beckham, Keith Richards and Tony Blair were all scouts.

Of the 312 selected as NASA astronauts, at least 207 had been active in scouting. All but one of the astronauts who walked on the Moon had been scouts. 

Republican Party (United States)

The Republican Party was founded on March 20, 1854 in a little white schoolhouse in Ripon, Wisconsin. About 50 slavery opponents began the new political group to oppose the Kansas-Nebraska act, which would permit each territory to allow slavery if they wanted to.

Republican Party Birthplace Museum, Little White Schoolhouse, Ripon

The name was partly chosen to pay homage to Thomas Jefferson's Republican Party.

The first official party convention was held on July 6, 1854, in Jackson, Michigan.

The first Republican candidate for president was John C. Frémont in 1856. His strong run in the election demonstrated that the Republican party dominated most northern states.

As the Whig Party collapsed, the Republicans became the second major party (the Democratic Party being the other one). It first came to power in the elections of 1860 when it won control of both houses of Congress and the Republican candidate, Abraham Lincoln, was elected president.

The elephant. has been the traditional mascot of the Republican party since November 6, 1874, when Thomas Nast first used it in a political cartoon published in Harper's Weekly. The cartoon, titled "The Third-Term Panic," depicted the Republican vote as an elephant standing at the edge of a cliff. Nast used the elephant to represent the Republican Party because it was seen as a strong and stable animal, just as the Republicans were seen as the party of stability and order.

1874 Nast cartoon featuring the first appearance of the Republican elephant

Following Lincoln, the USA had mostly Republican presidents until 1912. The party lost the presidential election just twice over that period (non-consecutively to Democrat Grover Cleveland in 1884 and 1892).

Ronald Reagan was the first Republican president who was a former member of the Democratic Party.

Neither of George W. Bush's daughters are Republican.

Red Cross

Swiss-born businessman Henry Dunant needed water rights for a business venture in French-controlled Algeria. The person who could get him those rights was Napoleon III, so Dunant decided to appeal directly to the French emperor. Napoléon III was with his army in Lombardy at the time fighting on the side of Piedmont-Sardinia in the Second Italian War of Independence. Dunant set out for Napoleon's headquarters at the small city of Solferino in Northern Italy.

Dunant arrived in Solferino on the evening of June 24, 1859, on the same day a battle between the two sides had occurred nearby. Nearly 30,000 were killed or wounded in the Battle of Solferino and many of them lay wounded, dying and dead on the battlefield. Shocked, the Christian-influenced businessman himself took the initiative to organize a group of volunteers to help them.

Henry Dunant at Solferino

In 1862 Dunant published a book, Memory of Solferino, in which he suggested an international association of volunteers be raised to help care for the wounded and imprisoned in wartime.

Arising from Dunant's suggestion, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) was created on October 29, 1863 in Geneva. Its job, under international law, was to protect the life and dignity of the victims of war.

A year later, the Swiss government invited the governments of all European countries, as well as a few others to attend an official diplomatic conference. Sixteen countries sent a total of twenty-six delegates to Geneva.

The Red Cross movement led by Henry Dunant officially began when twelve nations signed the First Geneva Convention, establishing the International Committee of the Red Cross on August 22, 1864.

Original document of the First Geneva Convention, 1864

Within three years, the Geneva Convention had been ratified by all the major European powers. Today's international Red Cross movement is the result of that 1864 conference.

Thanks to his bold venture, Dunant became the first person ever to win the Nobel Peace Prize in 1901.

The American Red Cross was established in 1881 by Clara Barton, an American humanitarian and nurse, who became involved with the International Red Cross while visiting Europe.

May Bradford was a volunteer nurse for the British Red Cross who followed her surgeon husband, Sir John Bradford, to northern France at the outbreak of World War I. During the war she wrote over 25,000 letters and notes, an average of 12 a day, for wounded soldiers who were too ill or too uneducated to write to their family. She also sat with the injured and dying and considered herself to be a surrogate mother to them.

Early in 1918, Ernest Hemingway responded to a Red Cross World War One recruitment effort in Kansas City and signed on to become an ambulance driver in Italy.

Ernest Hemingway in uniform as a Red Cross ambulance driver

American rock group Blink-182 was forced by the American Red Cross to remove a red cross from the artwork for their 1999 album Enema of the State as it was a violation of the international Geneva Conventions.

The ARC supplies nearly half of the donated blood in the US.

Postal Service

HISTORY

The first known postal document, found in Egypt, dates back to 255 BC. However, postal services existed on nearly every continent in the form of messengers serving emperors and kings even before that.

King Louis XI of France set up a Royal Postal Service in 1477 employing 230 mounted couriers.

The Royal Mail was created by King Henry VIII of England in 1516. From then until 1840, postage in the UK was generally paid by the recipient rather than the sender.

Poczta Polska, the Polish postal service, was founded by order of King Sigismund II Augustus on October 17, 1558.

Many early post systems consisted of fixed courier routes. The picture below shows a post house on a postal route in 19th century Finland.

The UK was the first country in the world to use a date stamp on its post when the Bishopmark — now known as the postmark — was introduced in 1661. It got its name from the first Postmaster General, Colonel Henry Bishop, appointed to King Charles II, who said he wanted to guarantee ‘that no Letter Carrier may dare to detain a letter from post to post’.

Benjamin Franklin laid out the framework that would set up the American postal system. Franklin invested nearly 40 years to establish a reliable system of private communications in the colonies. He was appointed postmaster of Philadelphia in 1737 and then joint postmaster general of the colonies, a position he held until 1774 when he was fired for opening and publishing Massachusetts Royal Governor Thomas Hutchinson's correspondence.

The U.S. postal system was established by the 2nd Continental Congress on July 26, 1775, with Benjamin Franklin as postmaster general.

In 1776 the Congress chose Benjamin Franklin's son-in-law to succeed him as postmaster general. Franklin had sailed that October for France on behalf of the Continental Congress.

The Postal Service Act, establishing the United States Post Office Department, was signed by United States President George Washington on February 20, 1792.  Postage was 6 - 12 cents depending on distance.

The first mail carried by train traveled between Liverpool and Manchester on November 11, 1830.

The first pillar boxes in the UK come into use in St Helier, Jersey on November 23, 1852.

London's first pillar box was erected on the corner of Fleet St and Farringdon St. Green with 10 collections a day on April 11, 1855. Five other pillar boxes appeared in London that day.

Red became the official color of UK post boxes in 1874. The earliest boxes were green, to fit in with natural surroundings, but many people complained they couldn’t find them.

The Pony Express was a mail service that delivered messages, newspapers, mail, and small packages by horseback, keeping California in touch with the rest of the United States. Its 2,000 mile route from Sacramento, California, to St. Joseph, Missouri, had to cross the Sierra Nevada, the Rocky Mountains, and the Great Plains. Each of the 186 stations were 10 miles apart where the rider would switch to a fresh horse. The mail service began operation on April 3, 1860.

Though famous, the Pony Express was actually a failed venture that bled money and lasted only a mere 19 months.

There wasn't a single pony in the Pony Express, just horses.

Section 92 of the 1873 US Postal Laws and Regulations stated that mail deliveries be made "as frequently as the public convenience may require". Residential customers received mail two or three times a day until 1950 and some businesses received mail up to five times a day.

"Stagecoach Mary" was the first African-American woman mail carrier in the USA. She worked the route between 1885 and 1893 and never missed a day. She won the contract because she was the fastest applicant to hitch a team of six horses (she was 60 years old at the time).

In the 1870s, the city of Liège, Belgium tried to train 37 cats to deliver the mail. The whole endeavor failed miserably.

In the late 1800s in the Eastern Central (E.C.) district, which covered London's dense financial, commercial, and legal heart, mail was delivered 12 times a day.  The first delivery round began at roughly 7:30 AM, and a new round rolled out nearly every hour on the hour until the final delivery at 7:30 PM. Other urban areas of London didn't have it much worse, receiving 11 deliveries a day, while the outer suburbs generally had about 6.  

A hot air balloon was used to carry mail for the first time in 1859. John Wise left Lafayette, Indiana, for New York City with 100 letters. He was forced to land after only 27 miles.

After the first African-American woman postmaster in the United States, Minnie Cox, was wrongly pressured out of her post in Mississippi in 1902, President Theodore Roosevelt continued to pay her federal salary and punished the town by rerouting their mail to Greenville, 30 miles away.

In 1904, Laurie Island became the site of the first post office built in the Antarctic.

The "American Messenger Company" was started by two teenagers, Jim Casey and Claude Ryan in 1907. The company's name was later changed to "United Parcel Service."

The first official flight with air mail took place in Allahabad, British India in 1911, when Henri Pequet, a 23-year-old pilot, delivered 6,500 letters to Naini, about 10 kilometres (6.2 mi) away.

The world's first scheduled airmail post service took place in the United Kingdom between the London suburb of Hendon, North London, and the Postmaster General's office in Windsor, Berkshire, on September 9, 1911, as part of the celebrations for King George V's coronation and at the suggestion of Sir Walter Windham, who based his proposal on the successful experiment he had overseen in India.

The service was operated by the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and used biplanes made by Short Brothers. The first flight was made by Lieutenant Frederick R. Sowrey, who carried 60 letters and postcards. The journey took about 20 minutes and the mail was delivered on time.

The service was a success and was extended to other parts of the UK in the following years. It also inspired other countries to start their own airmail services.

The first airmail flight in Germany, 1912.

Up to June 13, 1920, parents had used the US postal service to post their children in order to save rail fares. On that date, sending children by Parcel Post was officially forbidden with the ruling that children are not "bees and bugs", the only postable livestock.

On March 20, 1922, the US Postmaster General Hubert Work issued a new regulation that required every household in the United States to have a mailbox or other receptacle for mail delivery. The regulation was issued as a response to the growing number of people living in rural areas who were not receiving regular mail delivery because they did not have a mailbox. 

The new rule allowed the Postal Service to expand its delivery network to more rural areas, which was essential for connecting communities across the country. Today, having a mailbox or other receptacle for mail delivery is still a requirement for all households in the United States.

The postmaster general's position was considered a plum patronage post for political allies of the president until the USPS was transformed into a corporation run by a board of governors in 1971.

ZIP Codes, or Zone Improvement Plans, were introduced for United States mail on July 1, 1963. The ZIP Code system was created to improve the efficiency of mail delivery by providing a more specific way to identify addresses. Before ZIP Codes, mail was sorted by city and state, which could lead to delays in delivery, especially for mail that was going to rural areas.

ZIP Codes are five-digit codes that are assigned to specific areas within the United States. The first three digits of a ZIP Code identify a specific geographic region, while the last two digits identify a specific post office or delivery area within that region. ZIP Codes are used by the United States Postal Service to sort and deliver mail more efficiently.

The five-digit ZIP code system was initially introduced, but it has since been expanded to include additional digits for more precise regional and local sorting. The extended ZIP code format, known as ZIP+4, was introduced in 1983 and includes the original five-digit code plus four additional digits for increased accuracy.

World Post day happens each year on October 9 to highlight the importance of the postal service. The day The date was selected as it marks the anniversary of the establishment of the Universal Postal Union by the Treaty of Bern of 1874 in Switzerland. Today The UPU is a specialized agency of the United Nations that coordinates postal policies among member nations. October 9th was first declared World Post Day at the 1969 UPU Congress in Tokyo.

FUN POSTAL SERVICE FACTS

On November 10, 1958 the merchant Harry Winston donated the Hope Diamond, the "most famous diamond in the world", to the Smithsonian Institution. The diamond was sent to the Smithsonian through U.S. Mail in a box wrapped in brown paper as simple registered mail with $2.44 postage.

In 2001, the German Post office began training courses to teach dog psychology to postmen. Figures showed that 3,000 postmen a year are bitten by dogs in Germany, leaving 2,255 pairs of torn trousers and $12 million (£8 million)  of medical bills.

In 2005, the Royal Mail admitted that Ascension Island in the South Atlantic had not received any post for three months because it had gone to Asuncion, the capital of Paraguay, by mistake.

As of March 2023, there are 154,965 post offices in India, more than any other country.

Four out of five Americans throw sweepstakes mailings into the trash.

The world's deepest post box is in Susami Bay in Japan. It's 10 metres underwater.

The American rock group The Postal Service was sent a cease and desist letter by the United States Postal Service for trademark infringement of their name. After negotiations, the USPS allowed the band to use their name in exchange for playing a free show at their national conference.

The United States Postal Service (USPS) delivers 44% of the world's mail. This is because the USPS is the largest postal service in the world, with over 31,000 post offices and 600,000 employees. The USPS delivers mail to every address in the United States, as well as to over 200 other countries and territories.

The USPS is a self-funded government enterprise, which means that it does not receive any taxpayer money. The USPS generates revenue from postage, shipping, and other services.

The United States Postal Service photographs every piece of mail it processes. In 2012, it took more than 160 Billion photographs.

The United States Postal Service is the single largest employer of veterans (22% of the postal workforce) and nearly a third of the veterans are disabled.

The United States Postal Service has about 1,700 employees in Utah who read anything that the automated systems can't read like illegible addresses. About five million pieces of mail are read at this location daily. Seasoned employees generally average about 1,600 addresses read per hour.

The US Postmaster General is the second highest paid US government official behind the president.

The US Postal Service creed "Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds" is a translation of the phrase by ancient Greek historian Herodotus which referred to mounted Persian postal couriers around 500 BC.

In Iceland, you can hand-draw a map on a piece of mail without an address, and it will still make it to its destination.

The Archangel Gabriel, bringer of messages, is patron saint of postal workers and the Post Office.

Sources Daily Mail, Daily Express

Parliament

The word "parliament" meaning a legislative, elected body of government, comes from the French word parler, which means a talk.

The Althing of Iceland is the oldest parliament in the world. The first althing met near Reykjavik in AD 930. Its convening is taken as the founding date of the Icelandic commonwealth, which survived for more than three centuries until 1262. After Iceland's union with Norway, the Althing still held its sessions apart from a gap of 45 years in the first half of the 19th century. The present parliament building, the Alþingishús, was built in Austurvöllur, Reykjavík in 1881, of hewn Icelandic stone.

Iceland's parliament House, at Austurvöllur in Reykjavík, Wikipedia Commons

The first Parliament in England was summoned by baronial leader Simon de Montfort, then in rebellion against Henry III. It was attended by elected knights of the shires and burgesses plus archbishops, bishops, abbots, earls, and barons between January 20, 1265 until mid-March the same year. The meetings were held in the Palace of Westminster, now also known colloquially as the "Houses of Parliament".

Thirty years later, Edward I adopted de Montfort's ideas for representation and election in the so-called "Model Parliament." He first summoned it to meet at Westminster on November 13, 1295.

When Oliver Cromwell became Lord Protector of England in 1653, he set up the "Barebones" Parliament, which was made up of Non-conformist churchmen and army officers. It was named "Barebones" after one of the members "Praise God Barebones", a Fleet Street Leatherseller.

The Parliament of England met until it merged with the Parliament of Scotland under the Acts of Union. This union created the new Parliament of Great Britain which first met in 1707.

The Parliament of the United Kingdom is split into three separate parts, the House of Commons (the lower house), the House of Lords (the upper house) and the Monarch. Most legislative power is concentrated in the House of Commons.

The British Houses of Parliament, London

England is often referred to as the 'mother of parliaments' (a phrase coined by John Bright in 1865).

Members are forbidden from eating and drinking in the British Parliamentary chambers with only one exception. The Chancellor of the Exchequer may have an alcoholic beverage while delivering the Budget statement.