overland mail

American  

noun

U.S. History.

1. a government mail service, started in 1848, for sending mail from the Mississippi to the Far West.

2. (initial capital letters) a stagecoach line, established in 1858, linking Memphis, St. Louis, and San Francisco, which was then paid by the government to carry U.S. mail to the Far West. With various changes in ownership, name, and routes it continued until the completion of the transcontinental railroad in 1869.

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Example Sentences

See Examples For:

overland mail

Helped by his oldtime experience as an overland mail contractor.

From Time Magazine Archive

I have not the slightest doubt that I shall hear of him again as the proprietor of an overland mail, or the patron and capitalist of Greenland emigration.

From Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, and His Romaunt Abroad During the War by George Alfred Townsend

For in 1860 Russel, Majors & Waddel accomplished 267 a remarkable coup and brought the overland mail to the northern route.

From When the West Was Young by Frederick R. (Frederick Ritchie) Bechdolt

I wrote to you on the new year's day everything that had happened up to that time; the letter was to have gone by the overland mail of the 19th.

From Campaign of the Indus by T.W.E. Holdsworth

Silas St. Johns is offered as a sample of the men who built and operated the overland mail lines.

From When the West Was Young by Frederick R. (Frederick Ritchie) Bechdolt

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