The Post-Master Vol. I, No. 1. March, 1897.

Quarto printed wraps, 16pp. With many pictorial advertisements, portraits and other illustrations including a centerfold of the newly inaugurated President McKinley’s Cabinet, advertised as a color print. In Very Good condition with a horizontal crease, staining and a few small punctures to the rear wrap, which also has a repaired tear at the inside bottom edge. Small yellow subscription slip laid-in. 

Written interchangeably as “Post-Master” and “Postmaster,” the only record of the publication (not in OCLC) appears in two contemporary journals. Printers’ Ink reprinted this excerpt from Marriott’s prospectus for the publication:
    "At one time advertisements were allowed in the Official Postal Guide when it was published by the Sadler Co of this city of which the undersigned was general manager.... Since that time there has been no publication that reaches every post office as well as postmasters direct, but by means of The Post-Master a copy of which has been mailed you you can now reach every post office in the United States There is a demand for such a paper and its publication is not an experiment it has come to stay The first number will appear the day after Mr McKinley is inaugurated edition will be 75,000 and a copy will be sent to each one of the 70,562 postmasters of the United States besides some 5,000 to officials foreign governments etc … At first glance this may strike you as an expensive method for the publisher of this paper to follow but it must be borne in mind that connected with this paper is one of the most extensive rubber stamp manufactories in this country…" 

Marriott had been a manager at Sadler Co., which furnished all manner of post office supplies, and his remark refers to The Postmasters’ Supply Co., advertised on the rear cover as selling comparable products. The Printers’ Ink article was critical of Marriott’s tactic: “It is in the guise of a public benefactor that PRINTERS INK points out the inexpediency of the Post Office Department permitting semi-official publications to be conducted upon lines that business men generally may not adopt… If the Post-Master may be sent legitimately to 70,000 post-offices for advertising purposes, it is just as legitimate to send Comfort or Fame to an equal number of postmasters or others for the same purpose, and if to seventy thousand, why, then, just as well to seventy million people.” 

This first (only?) issue was also reviewed in the April issue of 'The Postal Record', a monthly published by the National Association of Letter Carriers (edited by John F. Victory): “... From a literary and typographical standpoint it is a most creditable production, and we heartily wish for it a long career of usefulness… May we both serve well the purpose of our existence and be appreciated and criticized according to our deserts.”

The fate of the obscure publication is unknown, but it was presumably short-lived. Changing government regulations concerning direct mail advertising appears to have been a hot issue and may have put a quick end to the publication’s agenda. This copy comes from the estate of Amos Warren Knowlton and his father, Jabez Knowlton, who served as the postmasters of Newburgh, Maine from the mid-nineteenth to early 20th century. Marriott was an agent for Remington Typewriter Company at the time of his death in 1912, age 60.