Anniversary of Japan's Postal System Implementation

Today, January 24th, is the anniversary of the implementation of the postal system in Japan. On this day in 1871 the Postal Regulations were enacted. The first post offices were erected and postal services between Tokyo, Kyoto and Osaka started on March 1st of the same year. Until then people had relied on courier services. 

In that first year it took three days and six hours to deliver mail between Tokyo and Osaka. That's not too bad considering the distance and the landscape at the time. Over the next two years post offices were also established in Yokohama, Kobe, Nagasaki, Hakodate and Niigata. By 1873 about 1100 village leaders across the country had agreed to set up post offices. 

You can see a monument marking the "birthplace of postal services" at the current Nihonbashi Post Office, where the first Tokyo Post Office was located. Beside the monument there is a bust of Baron Hisoka Maejima who is known as the "father of the postal system" in Japan. I do not have a photo of the monument, so I just used a postbox photo with bunting for the feature photo. If you like post boxes, check out this gallery of post boxes on City-cost.