The Town of Urbanna and the nation are celebrating the country’s first official post offices in July with Urbanna Post Office having been one of the first established in the United States in 1775.
The U.S. Postal Service announced last month that Urbanna, along with 69 other post offices in the nation, were in operation on July 26, 1775 when the Second Continental Congress appointed Benjamin Franklin as postmaster general of the United States. Urbanna’s post office roots go back at least to 1766 under British rule in America.
A post office notice in Williamsburg’s Virginia Gazette on March 21, 1766 states “that a rider will get off from Fredericksburg to be at Hobb’s Hole (Tappahannock) that night, where he exchanges mail with a rider from Urbanna, and returns to Fredericksburg on Thursday night.”
Along with Urbanna, there were a total of 14 post offices established in Virginia in 1775. The original post office sites were in Alexandria, Colchester (in Fairfax), Dumfries, Fredericksburg, Hampton, Hobb’s Hole (Tappahannock), Newcastle (in Hanover), Norfolk, Petersburg, Port Royal, Smithfield, Suffolk, Williamsburg and Yorktown.
As a town, Urbanna was established on paper in 1680 when the Virginia Assembly voted through the “Act of Cohabitation” to name 19 locations in the colony as towns in the British-ruled Virginia colony. The assembly recognized that the 12-foot depth of water in what was called Nimcock Creek, later Wormeley Creek and finally Urbanna Creek on the Rappahannock River provided a natural resource for a port town.
Town proclamation
At the town’s regular town council board meeting last Thursday, July 10, Mayor Bill Goldsmith presented a framed proclamation to Urbanna postmaster Dana V. Longest to honor the post office’s 250 years of service to the community. Longest has served as the town’s postmaster since 2016.
The proclamation established July 20-26, 2025 as a “time of appreciation to the dedicated staff of the Urbanna Post Office and encourages citizens to take time to express their gratitude, encouragement, and support to the staff of the Urbanna United States Post Office as they mark their official 250th year anniversary.”
Anniversary events
On July 23, the United States Postal Service is issuing a commemorative stamp in honor of all of the 69 official original post offices in the United States and a cancellation kit. There will be a digital ceremonial postmark available.
On July 26, from 10 a.m. to noon there will be light refreshments at the post office for the public and a short ceremony and a presentation of an Urbanna Post Office’s 250th cancellation stamp. The Urbanna cancellation image was created by local artist Lisa Wiggins.
Customers and stamp collectors are encouraged on July 26 to bring in a stamped envelope and have the town’s 250th cancellation image stamped on their envelopes.
