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Until The Office Was Abolished:
QUEENSBERRY, William Douglas, 4xn DUKE OF, British sportsman: b. 1724; d. London, England, Dec. 23, 1810. He was devoted to horse racing and was familiarly known as "Old Q." He was vice admiral of Scotland from 1767 to 1776, and was then first lord of the police until the office was abolished in 1782. He succeeded to the dukedom in 1778 and was created a British peer in 1786. In 1789 he was removed from his office of gentleman of the bedchamber and held no further office. He was notorious for his excesses and was satirized by Robert Burns in The Laddies by the Banks o' Nith, and in an Epistle to Mr. Graham of Fintrie. Wordsworth addressed him in a sonnet as "Degenerate Douglas," and he was the original of the Earl of March in Thackeray's Virginians.Reforms in 1840 abolished local postal sys-sms and the old means of assessing rates. A ew nationwide postage of a penny minimum ?as introduced. By 1850 more than 7.5 million ?tters a year were delivered, and by 1919 the ost office had established its own fleet of mail ans. In the same year the first regular airmail ;rvice was opened, between London and Paris. The postal services grew rapidly in the in-;rwar years and after World War II. Whereas, i 1939, 8 billion letters and postcards were andled, in 1968 some 10.6 billion were han-led. But growth had slowed. In 1968, in an ttempt to increase revenues and to stimulate se, the post office abandoned the tradition of vernight delivery for most letters. Thereafter, rst-class mail, at a higher charge, was to be
REDWOOD, SIR Boverton, English chemist: b. London, 1846; d. 1919. He was educated at the University College School and accoir.-panied Sir Vivian Majendie on an inspect: tour of the petroleum fields of Europe, QK. and the United States. He became a consulting engineer and chemist and was appointed adviser on petroleum to the Admiralty, the Home office, the India office and the Colonial office He was created a baronet in 1911.
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