Now I Know More by Dan Lewis Read Free Book Online Page A

neighborhood have gone through a testing process unlike any other in the area.
    The door-to-door mail truck most commonly in use today is called the Grumman LLV, short for Long-Life Vehicle. It was created in the 1980s and is the first vehicle specifically created for the U.S. Postal Service—prior to the LLV, the post office purchased all sorts of available vehicles (often military or government surplus) and repurposed them to serve mail carriers as well as possible. However, the driving needs of a postal truck are much different than almost all other cars out there, so the Postal Service and Grumman worked on a prototype in 1985 to meet those needs.
    The tests were rigorous and tedious—as well as bumpy. According to the Smithsonian Institute, the prototypes were subjected to tests that would make most people incredibly carsick. Prototypes had to drive over 2,800 miles while stopping every 250 feet (simulating a whole lot of mailbox deliveries)—that’s roughly the equivalent of driving from New York to Los Angeles while stopping more than 60,000 times. The trucks also had to drive more than 10,000 miles over gravel roads at speeds of thirty to forty-five mph and another 1,000 miles over three- to four-inch-high cobblestones, albeit at only ten to fifteen miles per hour. Then there were the potholes: Each of the prototypes’ four wheels had to hit at least 35,000 test potholes, often while travelling ten to fifteen miles per hour.
    The LLVs are made of corrosion-resistant aluminum and therefore rarely rust. Most cars are made from steel, which is cheaper, but then most cars aren’t intended to last as long as mail trucks. Grumman began producing the LLVs in 1987, meeting the U.S. Postal Service’s order of 100,000 to 140,000 vehicles (reports vary) within a few years. As it turned out, the Long Life Vehicles really have had long lives. Even though these trucks are still commonly seen in cities and suburbs throughout the United States, Grumman stopped production of them in 1994, meaning that even the newest LLV is two decades old.
    The LLVs will be retired soon, though. Not because they no longer work or are too expensive to maintain, but because of environmental concerns. Like most cars of the 1980s and 1990s, they aren’t very fuel efficient and will likely be replaced by hybrids or full-electric models over time.
    BONUS FACT
    In the United States, mail trucks are not required to have (and typically do not have) license plates.

CANNONBALL RUN
THE FASTEST WAY TO DRIVE FROM NEW YORK TO L.A.
    If you ask Google Maps how long it will take you to go from New York City to the Los Angeles suburb of Redondo Beach, California, you’ll find out that the 2,800-mile trip will take you roughly forty-four hours by car. That’s nonstop—no allowances for sleep, meals, bathroom breaks, or even refueling, and certainly no sightseeing. For the vast majority of us, that forty-four-hour estimate for any such cross-country trip is entirely meaningless. We’d take it slow, spreading the trip over at least four days, probably closer to six. We’d stop often along the way, making the trip part of the adventure itself.
    For Ed Bolian, the forty-four-hour estimate is similarly meaningless, but for the exact opposite reason. He wanted to get from Manhattan to Redondo Beach is much less time. Two-thirds of the time, in fact.
    In 1933, a man named Edwin Baker—“Cannonball” Baker as he’d later become known—made the New York to Los Angeles trip in roughly fifty-three and a half hours, easily a record at the time. (The interstate highway system hadn’t been built yet, so Baker’s fifty-mile-per-hour average speed was accomplished on county roads and unpaved thoroughfares.) Forty years later, that record still stood. It might have become a small piece of American folklore, mostly forgotten. However, when the 1973 oil crisis hit the American economy, Baker’s trip