Lynn Lau
Northern News Services

Inuvik (Nov 18/02) - Over the Remembrance Day long weekend, the Inuvik post office squeezed 1,550 mailboxes into the space of 1,200.

Postal worker Maidie-Anne Turner was busy passing out new keys for new boxes last week. - Lynn Lau/NNSL photo

Last Tuesday morning, unsuspecting mailbox holders arrived to find their dull metal boxes replaced with shiny new ones, with better locks and bevelled edges, but half the size.

"We had a few complaints here and there, but that's to be expected," said Robert Ploughman, operations supervisor.

Postal workers spent the weekend transferring mail from old boxes to new. Last week, people lined up out the door to exchange old keys for new ones (the old locks and keys are being collected for use at other post offices). And this week, those on the mailbox waiting list will finally receive their new boxes.

It was the first wholesale mailbox swap in the post office's history. Some of the old mailboxes date back to the early 1960s when they first went into what was then known as the Federal Building.

Historian and former mayor of Inuvik, Dick Hill remembers when mailboxes were only used by those who got mail -- "mainly government departments and big-wig operators."

When the town was new, most people got their occasional pieces of mail at the counter.

"It was not common for people to receive mail," Hill recalls.

A bank of 50 mailboxes was sufficient to cover the needs of the town. Later, as more people started receiving more mail, the post office installed more and more boxes, until the last of the space was used up in the mid-'80s.

As the town grew in recent years, Inuvik has been running out of mail boxes. Ploughman says about 150 to 200 people use the general delivery service regularly, a service that's supposed to be reserved for temporary residents only.

Some people have been on general delivery for years. Now there are boxes for everyone.