Postal Inspector

In 1897, to help inaugurate New York City’s new pneumatic mail system, officials sent a live black cat in a canister from the Produce Exchange Post Office on Bowling Green to the General Post Office on Park Row, a distance of 3,750 feet.

“How it could live after being shot at terrific speed from Station P in the Produce Exchange Building, making several turns before reaching Broadway and Park Row, I cannot conceive, but it did,” recalled postal supervisor Howard Wallace Connelly. “It seemed to be dazed for a minute or two but started to run and was quickly secured and placed in a basket that had been provided for that purpose.”

At its peak the system would carry 95,000 letters a day through 27 miles of tubes connecting 23 post offices. It was discontinued in 1953, outmoded by the growing volume of mail and the advent of the automobile.