Interesting Combination lock

[coppinpr]

Not really a discovery as Ive had this for over 20 years. I think only the members from the former British colony across the pond will recognise the photo below, it comes from the days when most rural areas of the USA did not have a door to door postal delivery and people made the trek into town every week to collect their mail from their personal box situated along the inside wall of most post offices. A great many were made by the Keyless lock co , Indianapolis and had very complex combination locks. This one (now mounted on a box to form a money box) still has the original postmasters copy of the opening instructions which show just how complex they were. This one reads

turn the dial RIGHT three times and stop at C/D
turn LEFT and stop at F the second time around
turn RIGHT and stop at I
turn the key to open

I assume they have all gone now,but I guess some might still be in use out in the sticks.

box combo.jpg (35.27 KiB) Viewed 1503 times

[operator bell]

I saw an entire wall of those, still in use, in a rural post office about 30 years ago. They're probably gone now.

Most of rural America still doesn't have mail delivery, but now the boxes at the PO are uninspiring metal doors with regular keys.