|
Thomas Neale (1641–1699) was an English project-manager and politician who was also the first person to hold a position equivalent to postmaster-general of the North American colonies. He was the only son of Thomas Neale of Warnford, Hampshire by Lucy, the daughter of Sir William Uvedale of Wickham, Hampshire and educated at Clare College, Cambridge. Neale was a member of Parliament for thirty years, Master of the Mint and the Transfer Office, Groom Porter, gambler, and entrepreneur. His wide variety of projects included the development of Seven Dials, Shadwell, East Smithfield, and Tunbridge Wells, land-drainage projects, steel foundries and paper-making enterprises, mining in Maryland and Virginia, raising shipwrecks, and developing a pair of dice to prevent cheating at gaming. He was also the author of numerous tracts on coinage and fund-raising, and he was involved in the idea of a National Land Bank, the precursor of the Bank of England. ==In America== Throughout the early years of the North American colonies, many attempts were made to initiate a postal service. These early attempts were of small scale and usually involved a colony, Massachusetts Bay Colony for example, setting up a location in Boston where one could post a letter back home to England. Other attempts focused on a dedicated postal service between two of the larger colonies, such as Massachusetts and Virginia, but the available services remained limited in scope and disjointed for many years. Central postal organization first came to the colonies in 1691 when Thomas Neale received a 21-year grant from the British Crown for a North American Postal Service. On February 17, 1691, a grant of ''letters patent'' from the joint sovereigns, William and Mary, empowered Thomas Neale,
Rates of postage were accordingly fixed and authorized, and measures were taken to establish a post office in each town in Virginia. Massachusetts and the other colonies soon passed postal laws, and a very imperfect post office system was established. Neale's patent expired in 1710, when Parliament extended the English postal system to the colonies. The chief office was established in New York City, where letters were conveyed by regular packets across the Atlantic. *1691: Thomas Neale received a 'postal patent' (concession to deliver the mail) for the American and West Indies; Neale appointed Andrew Hamilton, Governor of New Jersey, as his deputy postmaster. *1693: On May 1, Hamilton started weekly service between Portsmouth, New Hampshire and Virginia. Campbell, Duncan, and John organized the first postal network in America. *1698: Neale dropped Hamilton; Hamilton had revenue of less than two thousand dollars and expenses totaling approximately five thousand dollars for his period in office. Neale's franchise cost him only eighty cents a year, but it was no bargain; he died heavily in debt, in 1699 in Wiltshire. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Thomas Neale」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|