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Butterfield Overland Mail
Butterfield Overland Mail (officially Overland Mail Company) was a stagecoach service in the United States operating from 1858 to 1861. It carried passengers and U.S. Mail from two eastern termini, Memphis, Tennessee, and St. Louis, Missouri, to San Francisco, California. The routes from each eastern terminus met at Fort Smith, Arkansas, and then continued through Indian Territory (Oklahoma), Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Mexico, and California ending in San Francisco. On March 3, 1857, Congress authorized the U.S. postmaster general, at that time Aaron V. Brown, to contract for delivery of the U.S. mail from St. Louis to San Francisco. Prior to this, U.S. Mail bound for the Far West had been delivered by the San Antonio–San Diego Mail Line since June 1857.
The route was designated a national historic trail in 2023.
John Butterfield was a descendant of Benjamin Butterfield, who brought his family from England to the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1638. His father, Daniel Butterfield, lived at Berne, in the Helderberg, near Albany, N.Y., where John was born. He attended schools near his boyhood home, but his education was meager.
John's early involvement with stage lines started about 1820.
"John Butterfield was borne at Berne, in the Helderberg, near Albany, November 18, 1801. In early life we find him in the employment of Thorpe & Sprague, of that city, as a driver, and through the solicitation of Mr. Theodore S. Faxton came to Utica [NY], where he for a time was employed in picking up passengers from the taverns and boats for Parker's stages. After a time he started a livery [1827] with but small accommodations… His connection to Parker & Co. continued so long as they were still in business, and was succeeded by lines of his own, wherein he was a leading manager in the State until staging was superseded by railroads."
After his employment with other stage lines, John decided to use this experience for running his own stage lines in Upstate New York.
"Mr. Butterfield devoted his attention largely to lines running North and South. At the height of stage coaching he had forty lines running from Utica as headquarters to Ogdensburg and Sacketts Harbor on the North, and South to the Pennsylvania line, and through Chemung and Susquehanna valleys."
By 1857, when John was awarded the Overland Mail Company contract, he had had 37 years of experience working for and running stage lines. This was one of the reasons that Postmaster General A.V. Brown awarded him the contract.
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Butterfield Overland Mail
Butterfield Overland Mail (officially Overland Mail Company) was a stagecoach service in the United States operating from 1858 to 1861. It carried passengers and U.S. Mail from two eastern termini, Memphis, Tennessee, and St. Louis, Missouri, to San Francisco, California. The routes from each eastern terminus met at Fort Smith, Arkansas, and then continued through Indian Territory (Oklahoma), Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Mexico, and California ending in San Francisco. On March 3, 1857, Congress authorized the U.S. postmaster general, at that time Aaron V. Brown, to contract for delivery of the U.S. mail from St. Louis to San Francisco. Prior to this, U.S. Mail bound for the Far West had been delivered by the San Antonio–San Diego Mail Line since June 1857.
The route was designated a national historic trail in 2023.
John Butterfield was a descendant of Benjamin Butterfield, who brought his family from England to the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1638. His father, Daniel Butterfield, lived at Berne, in the Helderberg, near Albany, N.Y., where John was born. He attended schools near his boyhood home, but his education was meager.
John's early involvement with stage lines started about 1820.
"John Butterfield was borne at Berne, in the Helderberg, near Albany, November 18, 1801. In early life we find him in the employment of Thorpe & Sprague, of that city, as a driver, and through the solicitation of Mr. Theodore S. Faxton came to Utica [NY], where he for a time was employed in picking up passengers from the taverns and boats for Parker's stages. After a time he started a livery [1827] with but small accommodations… His connection to Parker & Co. continued so long as they were still in business, and was succeeded by lines of his own, wherein he was a leading manager in the State until staging was superseded by railroads."
After his employment with other stage lines, John decided to use this experience for running his own stage lines in Upstate New York.
"Mr. Butterfield devoted his attention largely to lines running North and South. At the height of stage coaching he had forty lines running from Utica as headquarters to Ogdensburg and Sacketts Harbor on the North, and South to the Pennsylvania line, and through Chemung and Susquehanna valleys."
By 1857, when John was awarded the Overland Mail Company contract, he had had 37 years of experience working for and running stage lines. This was one of the reasons that Postmaster General A.V. Brown awarded him the contract.