Many railway stations also handled mail. Those who lived a distance from the station had their mail delivered by a rural mail carrier, often based at the railway station. Those who lived nearby had to collect their mail from the waiting room. Each customer had a key to their mailbox.

Another form of communication, alongside the railway, that underwent extensive development during the latter half of the 1800s was the postal service. In 1855, both mailboxes and a uniform postage system in the form of stamps were introduced.

Alongside the National Postal Agency’s post offices and branches in the cities, so-called post stations were established starting in the 1860s. These offered a limited range of services and were located in rural areas.

Running a post station was often a part-time job for, for example, a shopkeeper or a schoolteacher. As the railway expanded, many post stations were combined with the new railway stations. There, you could find mailboxes, post office boxes, and a postal window.

After rural mail delivery was introduced in the 1870s, it was based at the nearest post station. In the 1880s, the Postal Savings Bank began its operations. Thereafter, the post station also served as a bank.

At its peak, there were thousands of post stations. There is no exact number of how many of these were also railway stations. The post station disappeared in the 1970s.

The post boxes here come from Gårdsjö combined railway and post station in Västergötland. On loan from the Post Museum in Stockholm.