Anyone who travels the roads of Aroostook County has to appreciate the lengths to which people go to protect their mailboxes from the snowplow and other threats. I have not had a mailbox for years. Between Halloween pranksters and winter snowplows, I just can’t keep one standing.
So I have great admiration for the ingenuity of Aroostook County residents who have succeeded where I have failed. I continue to marvel at the variety of strategies they devise to protect their mailboxes from whatever might take them down.
Back when the snowbanks rose high overhead, I was traveling south on Route 1 when I came upon a man who had just crossed the highway to retrieve his mailbox from the snowbank. He had attached the box to a long board which he thrust into the snow beside the road until the mail arrived. Then he carried the whole contraption back to his house.
He is not alone. Since then I have observed other examples of portable mailboxes.
Some people just place the box on top of the snow — no board. Others save on lifting by attaching the mailbox post to an old lawnmower that can be wheeled to the roadside and rolled back to safety after the mail comes.
But people who are not home when the mail arrives need more permanent protection. My favorite is a sort of cantilever: a mailbox attached to one end of long metal rail with a weight at the opposite end that lifts the box high into the air. Pull on the cord dangling beneath the box and there’s your mail.
Then there is the mailbox hung from a pair of chains attached to the arm of a solid wood structure anchored a safe distance from the road and designed to suspend the box above the snowbank so the plow can pass under it.
The craftsmanship in wood and metal of one such hanging mailbox near St. Agatha is matched only by the masonry that fortifies a mailbox beside the road in St. John between Fort Kent and Allagash. Encased in an armor of native stone, this mailbox sends a clear message: Don’t mess with me.
The black box struggling to hold on beside the road near Long Lake in St. Agatha has a different message. I can identify with its owners, determined to keep their mailbox through the winter no matter how much duct tape it requires. If they fail, they may end up with a post office box, like me.
ayup
That pull down one is a nightmare for us postal workers lol. But very creative!!!
Some of our local rural delivery people never read the famous ‘never rain nor snow nor sleet. etc.’ slogan that the USPS likes to throw out there.
They have no creed or motto.
The famous….
Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.
The above has nothing to do with the USPS and never has.
While it is not their official motto, it is inscribed on the outside of the main New York City post office so I would have to disagree with it having nothing to do with the USPS.
It was there when they moved it.
It was not added after the fact.. Learn your history.
Does that matter? It is related to the USPS in this manner thats all I am saying. Learn to admit your wrong.
Well, I’m not wrong.
Sounds like something a jackass would say..
lol thank you for saying what we were all thinking!
haha Thanks for posting that! Some people just like to argue, argue, argue, about nothing!
Because telling someone the truth is such a terrible thing.
Really nothing? A varient of it was used in USPS commercial right after 9/11.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qe_bIf0rbE4
actually, we do go out in rain, snow, sleet, ice, high winds, mean people, 100 degree weather etc. but we knew that going in so there really is no reason to complain :-)
My mail carrier is a wonderful person.The US govt couldn’t ask for a better representative!
You guys work hard, my hubby used to work for them as a fill in while in college. People have no idea what you do before you even begin to deliver the mail. Guess he should have stayed with them instead of trusting the business world. Brought down by Bain Captial.
I said some. There are post offices in this state that seem to not take that to heart. We at one time had a delivery person who would go out of their way to do an excellent job. What we have had since is sort of selective. Better not have too much snow and not be there to shovel it away from your mailbox. We get a nasty note. I don’t even want to go into the dealings with 04694 who shut the office down for lunch. It seems that every time, which I admit is rare, that I have to go there to pick up a package I always end up there when they are at lunch.
Here’s to hoping that I never wind up needing a mailbox like any of these.
after having mine destroyed in this area of bangor a couple times by vandals with bats, i made one out of 2 by 10 pressure treated and covered it with white metal ,they only tried one more time,lesson learned ,didnt hardly ding it :)
A friend of mine was sick of losing his to vandals all the time so he set a 3″ cast iron pipe in a 4′ hole filled with cement (the pipe and hole). Never lost another one after that! :-)
I’ll do something like that next time. One time, I did the hard work setting a post back from the road with a high horizontal post and the box suspended from chains. The problem is that I hung my existing “economy” box from it. The plow truck never hit it but those plows sure can throw snow, ice and rocks hard enough. It lasted 2 storms and then the door wouldn’t close. I got used to going out with 2 pair of vise-grips trying to straighten it out after each storm.
Kathryn, I loved your article! I laughed outloud at some of those photos and descriptions. I, too, have marveled at the ingenuity some people have used just to receive their mail. It becomes a matter of out witting mother nature, road hazzards and vandals. Not an easy task for most but as you said, Aroostook County residents are very creative.
Our mailbox swings completely around. If the plow hits it, the driver best hustle along as the mailbox will return the favor and hit it’s backside as it comes back around …. and we’re not even in the county. Desperation is the mother of invention no matter where you live.
Rural Free Delivery will become obsolete with the touted losses by the postal service, then we will not have to worry about snowplows taking out the mailbox. Used to be that the plow would lift its wing when approaching the driveway and mailbox, but now some drivers have been known to take out the boxes deliberately.
They want to priviatize it, who else PREFUNDS retirement for 75 years. Rural delivery will be gone, anything to make a profit. As the speaker of the house said, SO BE IT
Great human interest story. WE need more stories like this in the BND
I agree. The articles are always too depressing!
Stronger punishement and paying back the owners for these mailboxes should be addressed.
I used to know a man whose mailbox was vandalized time and time again so he decided to fight back. He used a piece of well casing for the post and welded another piece on the top and tucked his mailbox into it. It didn’t take long before it was attacked again. He went out the next morning to get his mail and discovered the remnants of a shattered baseball bat lying on the ground. LOL
“He went out the next morning to get his mail and discovered the remnants of a shattered baseball bat lying on the ground.” Hahaha, thanks for the laugh!
My mailbox is on a post and the box rotates if it’s hit.Works great-11 years and counting.
Brilliant! Mine is beat to crap and I’m not replacing it, I’ve considered throwing a cement block in it though. Good idea!
Mine (mentioned earlier) has been at it’s current site for 12+ years and was at our old house for at least 5 before that. They are wonderful, aren’t they? :)
A homeowner on Rt 89 between Caribou and Limestone had a RR rail buried in the ground, and when the State plow hit it with the wing, it swung the whole plow truck off the road and into the ditch. The State then came through and made homeowners remove any “permanent” installations that could damage the plows if they hit it. I had mine on a swivel so if the plow hit it it would just spin around, they used to hit it to see how many times it would swivel, it looked like a triangle after a few hits, and I would bend it back in shape.
Great article/pictures. I can relate to the duct tape too. :)
They have mail delivery in the County???
For the time being they do… can’t promise it for much longer the way things are going.
Love the mail box on the lawn mower!!!!
I actually believe I know the person who has the mailbox on the lawnmower. Did I miss it or did it not say what towns these beauties were in?
Is there really anything of value being put in these mailboxes anymore? I mean, I get 3 bills a month only because I do not want certain outfits direct access to my checking account. it could easily be coinverted to on line payments. checks? I have that as direct deposit. the rest? Well coupons for hostess twinkies, $100 of an asphat driveway, 2-1 pizza at the pizza Raunch(yuch) and so on all gets shredded…But the ingenuity displayed here is hilarious, and the crzyvet comment about the state telling guys to remove permanent mailbox is interesting, USPS is/was run by the federal level so that tells me it trumps any state requirements.
when i’m not home i take my mailbox inside.
wicked cool.
The pictures are great ! How proud would Red Green be of the duct-taped mailbox?
Lots of mailboxes I see seem to be mounted too low. I think the bottom of the box is supposed to be 43 inches off the ground. Maybe plows would not hit them then?