The Day You Could Mail a Child
Sarah, imagine you need to send your little boy to his grandmother's house. You have no car. The train ticket costs more than a full day of work. What do you do?Sarah，想象一下你要把儿子送去奶奶家。你没有车。火车票比一整天工资还贵。你会怎么办？
I would walk. Or wait until I had the money.我会走过去。或者等到有钱的时候。
In 1913, some American parents found a third option. They put postage stamps on the child and mailed him.1913 年，有些美国父母找到了第三个办法。他们给孩子贴上邮票，把他寄出去。
That cannot be true.这不可能是真的。
It is. And the strangest part is that the post office played along.是真的。最奇怪的是，邮局还配合了。
Okay. How does something like this even start?好吧。这种事到底是怎么开始的？
On January 1, 1913, the United States Post Office opened a new service called parcel post. Before that, you could only send small packages, about 4 pounds. Anything bigger went by private companies, and they charged a lot.1913 年 1 月 1 日，美国邮政局开通了一项新服务，叫包裹邮递。在这之前，你只能寄小包裹，大约 4 磅以内。更大的东西要走私营公司，收费很贵。
So this changed daily life for ordinary families.所以这对普通家庭的日常生活改变很大。
Huge. Suddenly a farmer could post a box of eggs to a city, and a mother could order shoes from a catalog. Millions of parcels moved in the first few months.改变非常大。突然之间，农民可以把一箱鸡蛋寄到城里，母亲可以从商品目录上订鞋。头几个月就有几百万个包裹在路上。
And nobody wrote a rule saying you cannot post a person.而且没人写一条规定说不能寄人。
Exactly. The rules talked about weight and size. They never said what a parcel was allowed to be.正是这样。规定只讲重量和尺寸，从没说包裹里可以装什么。
So people tested it. With a baby.所以有人就试了。用一个婴儿。
Two weeks after the service opened, a family in Batavia, Ohio, mailed their eight-month-old son, James, to his grandmother a few miles away. He weighed just under the limit, so the postage was 15 cents.服务开通两周后，俄亥俄州巴达维亚的一家人把 8 个月大的儿子詹姆斯寄给了几英里外的奶奶。他的体重刚好在限重以内，邮费是 15 美分。
Fifteen cents. And his mother put the stamps on his clothes?15 美分。他妈妈把邮票贴在他衣服上？
On his clothes, yes. They even bought 50 dollars of insurance, in case the baby got lost. A rural carrier called Vernon Lytle carried him the whole way and got a signature at the door, like any other delivery.贴在衣服上。他们甚至买了 50 美元的保险，怕孩子丢了。一个叫弗农·莱特尔的乡村邮递员一路抱着他，到了门口还按流程要了一个签收签名，跟送别的包裹一样。
I keep waiting for the part where someone says no.我一直在等有人说不行的那一段。
That part comes later. First, newspapers picked up the story, and other families copied it. One in Pennsylvania paid 45 cents to send a daughter to relatives.那一段在后面。先是报纸把这个故事登了出来，别的家庭开始模仿。宾夕法尼亚有一家花了 45 美分，把女儿寄给了亲戚。
Did the children travel inside a mail sack?那些孩子是装在邮袋里运的吗？
No, and this matters. They walked or rode with a postal worker. Nobody was thrown in with the letters.不是，这点很重要。他们是跟邮递员一起走、一起坐车的。没有人被塞进信件堆里。
That is a small comfort.这算是小小的安慰。
The most famous case came a year later, on February 19, 1914. A five-year-old girl named May Pierstorff lived in Grangeville, Idaho. Her grandparents were 73 miles away in Lewiston.最有名的一例在一年后，1914 年 2 月 19 日。一个 5 岁女孩叫梅·皮尔斯托夫，住在爱达荷州格兰吉维尔。她的祖父母在 73 英里外的刘易斯顿。
Let me guess. The ticket was too expensive.我猜，车票太贵了。
A ticket cost 1 dollar and 55 cents, which was a full day of work for her family. May weighed 48 and a half pounds, just under the 50-pound limit. The postage came to 53 cents.一张票要 1 美元 55 美分，相当于她家一整天的工钱。梅体重 48.5 磅，刚好在 50 磅限重之内。邮费是 53 美分。
So they really did it.所以他们真的做了。
Her cousin Leonard worked on the mail train. He fixed the stamps to the back of her coat and took her with him in the mail car. She ate a hard candy and a red apple her mother packed, and she felt a little sick on the mountain curves.她的表兄伦纳德在邮政列车上工作。他把邮票贴在她外套背面，带着她坐在邮件车厢里。她吃着妈妈准备的硬糖和一个红苹果，山路转弯太多，她有点晕。
Poor thing. Did anyone notice?可怜的孩子。有人发现吗？
The conductor did. He asked for her ticket, then saw the stamps and laughed. Later he called a reporter, because he thought it was a good story.列车员发现了。他先是要她的车票，然后看到邮票，笑了。后来他打电话给一个记者，因为他觉得这故事挺好玩。
And that is how the post office heard about it.邮局就是这么知道的。
That is exactly how they heard about it. Leonard got a letter threatening to give him 500 demerits. At 700, a postal worker lost his job.正是这样。伦纳德收到一封信，说要给他记 500 个过失分。累计到 700 分，邮递员就会被辞退。
For delivering a child safely?就因为安全地送了一个孩子？
For delivering a child safely. In the end, May's family paid half the price of a train ticket, and the matter was closed.就因为安全地送了一个孩子。最后梅家补了半张火车票的钱，这事就算了结了。
So the cheap trip was not cheap after all.所以这趟便宜的旅程其实也不便宜。
The post office banned mailing people that year, and by 1920 it was a federal crime. In every recorded case, though, not one child was lost or delivered to the wrong house.邮局在那一年就禁止邮寄人，到 1920 年这成了联邦罪行。不过在每一个有记录的案例里，没有一个孩子丢失，也没有一个被送错门。
The mail went through.邮件送到了。
The mail went through. If you enjoy strange true stories from history, join us for the next episode of Learn English with Podcasts.邮件送到了。如果你喜欢历史上这些离奇的真实故事，欢迎收听下一集 Learn English with Podcasts。