SCOUTING YESTERDAY | Mail service puts Dakota Territory towns on federal maps

This week in South Dakota history: Jan. 10-16

South Dakota mail, 1889. Image: Western Cover Society

Watertown property owners learned that every house and business in the city would be numbered 125 years ago this week as the Codington County seat prepared to join the ranks of South Dakota towns where the mailman could be relied upon to show up everyday.

The Madison Daily Leader told its readers on Jan. 16, 1900, that a special agent of the U.S. Mail Service was sent to Watertown to arrange a system for numbering houses, a requirement for the service.

Americans began putting street addresses on their homes — and letters — following the enactment of the Postal Delivery Act on July 1, 1863, which established mail delivery in towns where stamp and postage fees generated enough revenue to cover the cost of administering daily mail delivery, according to the United States Postal Service.

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