Page 4 - Demo

National Air Mail Week Covers of Indianayears, he read a supportive letter penned by President Roosevelt which discussed the growth of Air Mail in that time. According to the President, the service went from %u201csmall eighty-mile-an-hour planes on a short two hundred and eighteen mile route into sixtytwo thousand, eight hundred and twenty-six route miles.%u201d It%u2019s been estimated that, in its first year of operation in the U.S. (1918), there were 730,000 Air Mail pieces processed, and in 1937 that had increased to a phenomenal 150 million pieces.To heighten both anticipation and participation in the NAMW, an Educational Committee was formed to sponsor national contests. One involved designing a poster, and childactor Shirley Temple submitted one. Another asked high schoolers to write 250-word essays with %u201cWings Across America%u201d Shirley Temple%u2019s entry for the NAMW Poster Contest.National Air Mail Weekfirst Air Mail flight%u2014which involved a oneway trip between Washington, DC and New York City on May 15, 1918. Paul Younts, a Charlotte, North Carolina Postmaster and the official Chairman of NAMW, added that it would also commemorate the Wright brothers%u2019 historic first manned powered flight of December 17, 1903. In his official speech, Farley declared that the %u201cprimary objective is to turn definitely the attention of the American people to this service, to give them a broader understanding of its value, to arouse in them a deserved appreciation of its already great and still increasing contribution to the national progress.%u201d On the evening of April 2, 1938, Farley promoted NAMW to a vast audience of radio listeners on the CBS network. While expounding on the progress Air Mail had made in its first 20