UK Postboxes in 2023

One thing that people in the UK seem to enjoy [citation needed] discussing is our various postboxes which are marked with royal cyphers, so I wanted to look at a few things.

I am not asking for clarifications or a yes/no, despite posting here, but thought it was probably the right place for it and to try and make some kind of timeline of threads that discuss it, and some details about official views from Historic England & Royal Mail, and allow for some discussion with links and images.

Post Offices are mentioned in the original OPR guide, but not Post Boxes - https://community.wayfarer.nianticlabs.com/discussion/23082/opr-candidate-action-guide-a-wayfarer-history-lesson

The earliest I can find is when a question was asked during an Ingress AMA, before Wayfarer was Wayfarer and was OPR.

This was revisited by the person who raised the query;

where @NianticCasey-ING noted;

However, the debate about which cyphers are eligible and not still continued.

Historic England & Royal Mail recognises that some post boxes have greater historical significance than others (https://historicengland.org.uk/images-books/publications/royal-mail-post-boxes/heritage-agreement-for-royal-mail-post-boxes/) in a joint policy heritage agreement they did;

which we are of coursed asked about during a review.

As mentioned, the debate continued still with many many threads to the point where they even took over the weekend trailmarker joke and even information about how many postboxes there are for each monarch, including Queen Elizabeth II.

(Numbers may be slightly off as based on 2015, and some postboxes would have been replaced)

Taken from the previously mentioned document from Historic England.

It is worth noting to non-UK reviewers that E II R postboxes will, in most cases only have a Scottish Crown logo in Scotland but these are the same as the regular E II R ones across the UK. If you're curious, look up Pillar Box War

Then, of course in September 2022 the monarch at the time, Queen Elizabeth II fell ill and sadly passed away. Unfortunately many used this opportunity to leap at the chance to submit a postbox with her cypher on claiming it was now acceptable as she had passed.

I shared my own view in that thread at the time, and still believe this to be the case.

Also discussed was the first C III R postbox, which has not yet been placed (to my knowledge) but would be of large cultural significance (there will be news stories about it) so I would personally rate that well for that section in a review.

I'll close out this long post of images & threads with this scan about the first Pillar Boxes from Historic England's document. Be nice to each other when discussing, and await the next very UK specific thread!


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