K 200. výročí zavedení sběrných listovních schránek v českých zemích
To the 200th anniversary of the introduction of post boxes in the Czech lands

Summary/Abstract: Post boxes first appeared in the capital of the Austrian monarchy in Vienna as early as in 1785, yet they were only intended for privileged persons, corporations and authorities that did not have to pay the postage. A general and permanent introduction of post boxes in Austrian monarchy with exception of the Kingdom of Lombardy–Venetia took place on 10th April 1817 through the decree of the Court Chamber that apart from other things determined the postage payment by the recipient for some inland post shipments. Consequently, at least one post box was ordered to be placed at every post office beginning with the 1st June 1817. Only abroad shipments, letters where the sender voluntarily paid the postage and letters sent to public authorities or private persons freed from postage were from then on destined to be checked in at the counter. The introduction of post boxes was advantageous both for the postal administration (a separate posting of each letter was cancelled) and for the customers (they did not have to wait at the counter). Yet frequent misunderstandings arose since some senders threw into the boxes also letters they were supposed to pay the fee for. Post offices were forbidden to forward such shipments; they had to establish a list of them and hang it publicly for the senders to come and pay the fee or to take their letters back. Complications connected to the introduction of post boxes even compelled the postal administration to consider removing them at the end of 1820s. The decree of the General Court Chamber from 18th February 1830 fortunately left the boxes in use and ordered that they were supplemented with a legible text explaining their purpose. In addition, a better accessibility of the boxes was assured by the municipal letters collection points that were ordered to hang out a post box too. A great expansion of boxes took place first with the introduction of post stamps in the Austrian monarchy on 1st June 1850. This important reform in paying the postage enabled franking all common inland letters and then throwing them directly into the post boxes. A simple and cheap way of prepaying the inland correspondence therefore led to the fact that post boxes became a common element in the municipal and rural milieu. Their exclusive placement on post offices, letter collection points and, since 1850, post stamps shops was swiftly overcome and they began to appear on busy street corners and everywhere where people concentrated. Since 1873, the so called rural (provincial) post boxes were introduced in places connected to the out-of-town post, which used to be a house of mayor or other convenient place. For samples of business goods and printed material, there were, however, different boxes designed for a considerably higher input than those intended for letters. The exact year of their introduction remains unknown, it had to be in 1870s or 1880s when the business in Austria soared. At the end of the 19th century, special boxes for the pneumatic tube post appeared in Prague, they were inspired by the Viennese system (opened in 1875) and the boxes varied from others with their red colour paint. The red boxes with a blue stripe and white lines served from 1931 both for express shipments in pneumatic tube post and for air mail. Since 1st July 1900, the post boxes were placed at all newly established post points, which were contracted places of lower importance where the service was managed by a contractual employee. The post box (or a special hole for throwing-in letters) was placed also on postal boats, hipomobile postal vehicles (not documented in our territory), carriages of postal trains, tramways, postal coaches, postal cars and trolleybuses (not documented in our territory). From the point of view of postal traffic, such boxes were referred to as mobile, to the contrary of the permanent or static boxes which were in majority. Apart from boxes for collecting of sent letters, several other types, connected to the postal traffic, developed in the course of history. This is especially letter boxes, i. e. boxes for letters in the place of residence of the addressee (their beginnings are linked to the construction of tenement houses in big cities in the 19th century), the delivery boxes first established since the mid-1970s in centres of smaller villages or at the main roads where the post service does not deliver to the addressee domiciles; further the P. O. Boxes that first appeared at the end of the 19th century in the most important metropolitan post offices in order to concentrate all letters of one addressee directly in the post office in case he did not wish the delivery to his place of residence; and finally, the temporary storage boxes being used, since the first half of 1970s for the service purposes only, such as a temporary depository of parcels by the foot postmen within the delivery area distant from the home post office. In February 2013, the Czech Post introduced the so called PostBox that enables posting of smaller volumes of both common and registered mail in a particular company.

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