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Stamps
The special pneumatic mail system reduced rate,
known as “de l'orage” (the storm rate) (1927)
By Hervé Barbelin of the Academy of Philately
The conference used press clippings along with sample correspondence to tell the story
of a special rate in response to a weather event.
The conference used press clippings along subscribers in the Invalides, Segur and
with sample correspondence to tell the sto- Vaugirard telephone sectors, which nor-
ry of a special rate in response to a weather mally depended on the Segur exchange,
event. had their telephone service cut off. The offi-
A storm burst the sewer system and floo- cial repair time was expected to be several
ded the basements of the “Segur” telephone weeks.
exchange to a height of two metres on the The postal minister, Maurice Bokanowski,
afternoon of 11 July 1927. It followed on initially took two usual steps in these ins-
an earlier storm which had caused flooding tances: he suspended collection of the
rising to 50 centimetres on 6 July and a subscription fees and provided users ac-
fire caused by a short-circuit on 25 June, cess to public telephone booths at the same
which had led to damage that was about to rate as if they were using their subscriber
be repaired. The exchange accumulators telephone. Faced with protests by users
and distributors were flooded and 12,000 due to the perceived poor compensation
for a disruption due to last several weeks,
the minister then decided that subscribers
could, as of 18 July 1927, and for the pe-
riod during which their telephone service
would be disrupted, send and receive mail
via the pneumatic system at the cancel-
lation rate of 0.30 francs (that is, the unit
price of a call) instead of 1.50 francs (the
rate of the first pneumatic mail service le-
vel, 01/05/1926). The rate was even lower
than for a single letter at the domestic rate
(0.50 francs).
The mail of the type sent by the subscribers
had to be deposited at the counter of one
of the offices of the 7th, 14th or 15th arron-
dissements or at the counter of the subur-
ban municipality for suburban subscribers
First day of the measure, 18 July 1927; benefits from the measure allowed with
the telephone number of the sender (Segur). The signature of the PARIS 102
counter (boulevard Pasteur, in the 15th arrondissement) proves the validity of the
cancellation. The telephone number of the recipient was not required.
10 Delcampe Magazine