The New Student's Reference Work/Dead-Letter Office

Dead-Letter Office, in the United States postal department, is the place where unclaimed letters are sent. After remaining a month in the office to which they are directed, the unclaimed or “dead” letters are sent to Washington, and opened in the dead-letter office. If the writer's address can be found, the letter is returned to him; if not, it is destroyed. In one year nearly 7,000,000 pieces of mail were received. Many had no state on the address, 3,000 had no address at all; $92,000 in cash and more than $3,000,000 in drafts were found in the letters. Thousands of magazines, illustrated papers, picture-cards and valentines were sent to hospitals.