Today Is The 100th Anniversary Of Air Mail

(Dover, NH) - It started on May 15th, 1918 when a World War 1 biplane took off from the banks of the Potomac River between the Lincoln Memorial and the Washington Monument.

The US Postal Service has created a new Forever Stamp to mark the occasion.

In the midst of World War 1, a small group of Army pilots delivered mail along a route that linked Washington, Philadelphia and New York City.  The US Post Office Department, the predecessor of the US Postal Service, took charge of the U.S. Air Mail Service in August of that year and operated it until 1927.

Interesting fact: Charles Lindbergh was an airmail pilot before he made his historic solo flight across the Atlantic from New York to Paris in 1927.