SPEEDIER MAILS

Auckland Star, Volume LXXV, Issue 307, 28 December 1944, Page 6

SPEEDIER MAILS

OFFICER LOOKS BACK

CHANGES IN 41 YEARS

One of the most experienced mail superintendents in New Zealand, Mr. Herbert John Cole, who has been superintendent of the mail room at Auckland for the past 12 months, will retire on superannuation tomorrow after 41 years' service.

Packhorses were used for the transport, of mails in many back districts in 1903 when entered the post office service as a cadet at Whangarei. To-day those districts have daily deliveries by motor car, and packhorses have long disappeared, while train and road services have provided regular through communication to Auckland where in the early years of the century the mail arrived perhaps once weekly by coastal steamer.

Probably no officer in the service has a better knowledge than Mr. Cole of conditions as they were in the Auckland Province for 20 years, from the time he joined the Department until he was transferred from Auckland to Blenheim in 1922 to become supervisor of the postal branch there. He remembers how the mails from Wellington and the south came by stesmer from New Plymouth to Onehunga, and were sent south by the same route, and recalls that when the Main Trunk railway was opened about 34 years ago the time taken, for the 'journey .from Auckland to Wellington was' just under 24 hours. To-day air mails pass between the two cities in two and a quarter hours, while the distance is covered by the fastest expresses in little more than half the time required in the early years of through rail transit. "Tremendous Advances"

"The whole of the mail services have been greatly speeded up by night trains, air transport and motor vehicles," said Mr. Cole. "Mails sorted in Auckland in the evening reach their destinations in the outer parts of the province and even further afield next morning, and now it is almost the rule for deliveries to be made throughout the province the day after posting. The tremendous advances in transport since the opening of the century have been fully reflected in the mail services." «

Another change Mr. Cole observed was the surprising growth in the volihne of mail traffic and in the postal staffs. When he came to Auckland in 1905 the mail room staff consisted of only 25 men. To-day there were a hundred in the mail room, and other branches had been developed, including th'e registration, parcels delivery and messenger services, which brought up the total to nearly 250. That gave a fair indication of the expansion in the mails over nearly 40 years. As Many Women As Men

"The handling of mails is no longer wholly a man's job," he remarked. "Nowadays there are nearly as many women as men in the mail branch. Women not only take their share in sorting the mails, but also help with the postal deliveries, drive vans, make clearances from city and suburban postal boxes and deliver parcels. In last week's rush women did much to enable Aucklanders to receive their gifts, parcels and greetings cards before Christmas, and we had an illustration of the speed and efficiency of the postal services in such a busy time." Modern machinery had eased the burden on the postal staffs, said Mr. Cole and conveyor belts, lifts and chutes now kept the mails moving .quickly and easily, where loaded baskets were formerly carried up and down stairs or from room to room. For four years between the time of his transfer to Auckland in 1905, and his appointment to Blenheim, Mr. Cole was on service overseas in the last war as a member of the postal unit in Sling Camp and in London and Brockton camp. He returned to Auckland six months after the conclusion of hostilities. In 1928 he went from Blenheim to Christchurch to become supervisor of the mail room there, and six years later was appointed business manager of the commercial branch in Christchurch. Three years later he became superintendent of mails in Christchurch. a position he held until he was called upon last, year to serve on the special committee which reported on the personnel of the postal branches throughout the Dominion. In December, 1943, he took up his present appointment in Auckland.