This is 99% Invisible. I'm Roman Mars.

The US Postal Service has been in the news a lot recently because horrible people are

trying to damage it. And what makes me particularly upset about this is that the Postal Service

is just the best. I was always a van, but I became evangelical after reading Winiford Gallagher's

book How the Post Office Created America. We did an episode with Gallagher a couple years

ago and even though I'm supposed to be taking a week off, it seemed like a good idea to

get this out in the world again. The Postal Service is critical to our way of life and

it always has been. And so here's 20 minutes of us telling you amazing stories about how

great the USPS is. Enjoy.

There are currently more than 31,000 post offices in the United States. There are grand

old ones that take up entire city blocks and there are smaller, humbler ones hiding away

in the backs of general stores in towns across rural America. With this one in Arizona, maybe

the most rural post office in the Continental US. The Super Post Office is located at the

bottom of the Grand Canyon. That's Vivian Campbell. My name is Vivian Campbell, and I am the

Postmaster of Peach Brings, Arizona. Vivian works closely with the Super Post Office

and she says there are only a few ways to get mail to the bottom of the Grand Canyon.

You either have to hike down there, ride a mule or ride a horse.

And so every day, Rainer Shine, mail gets packed on 10 mules to make a 2.5 hour trip into

the canyon. The Post Office is there to serve the people who live on the Avasubi reservation.

Avasubi meaning blue-green water people, named for the waterfall at the bottom of the

canyon. The falls are just magnificent. The water is so blue, it's not even indescribable.

The Avasubi receive a lot of food supplies, but otherwise their mail is pretty standard

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