What does it mean?
What does "R.F.D" stand for? Please help!!
shareRural Free Delivery
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MovieChat Forums > Mayberry R.F.D. (1968) Discussion > What does it mean?
R.F.D. stands for Rural Free Delivery
shareAccording to the US Postal Service, Rural Free Delivery is:
The nationwide network of rural routes operated
primarily to deliver and collect mail from roadside mailboxes owned and
maintained by residents of communities without convenient postal
facilities.
That's funny. I knew that the R.D. stood for rural delivery for towns which don't have post offices, but I never knew that the F stands for.
But then, on the other hand, Mayberry actually does have a post office in some episodes, and the mail carrier still walks around to the residences.
If your town was built before they invented automobiles, then you have to walk to the post office to retrieve your mail because mail carriers cannot get around in those rural villages anyway even though the mail must get through!
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It means Rural Farm Delivery. Rural Farm Delivery I think is when the homes are so far apart that the mail is placed in mail Box along a main road. If you go driving along main roads in rural areas you will see mail boxes at the end of side streets.
shareMayberry did have a post office ,there were a couple of episodes where it was featured prominently. I am watching one now where Barney tickets the Governors car in front of it . I always thought that it stood for "Rural free District" which meant that it was an unincorporated town.
share[deleted]
Hello Everybody,
R.F.D. stands for Rural Free Delivery in 42 states,(don't ask me which ones!) in the rest it stands for Rural Farm Delivery. Yes, Mayberry had a Post Office, but it was only for mailboxes within the town limits of Mayberry. Out in the county it was R.F.D. In town you had a street address or a post office box number. Out in the county, you had a mailbox number such as: Sam Jones, Route 2, Box 579, Mayberry, N.C. 00000
The reason that I know this is that I grew up in the same small town in Georgia!
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Dickie Cox
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There wasn't always rural mail service. Back in the old days you had to go to town to pick up your mail. That is why there are these small towns that are just spots on the map now. They may have only had a store with a post office in it, and surrounding residents went there to trade and get their mail. RFD was officially enacted by Congress in 1902.
Nobody gets to be a cowboy forever.
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What's interesting is, if Sam had an R.F.D. address, he likely would be ineligible to hold his office on the town council, since he lived outside the corporate limits of Mayberry. Then again, Mayberry never had a police department and its sheriffs office even handed out tickets on Main Street, so Mayberry had an early, bite-sized version of metro government?
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