I often cite the Minkus article to explain numismatics to non-collectors. I also use it to show that independent of the actual objects of pursuit, hobbies centered on collecting share this same essential attribute:
"The pleasure lies in a certain special way of using one's mind. Stamp collecting is a hobby for busy, purposeful, ambitious people...because, in pattern, it has the essential elements of a career, but transposed to a clearly delimited, intensely private world." -- Ayn Rand.

A lot of what made it into America's founding documents regarding the post office was by Ben Franklin. Franklin established a very thorough network to gather news for his newspaper and then distribute his newspaper. I heard on the History Channel recently that delivery times were often less then than now, which is amazing considering that the fastest means of communication was horse and courier.

If you respect the Constitution, the power to operate "Post Offices and postal Roads" is in Article I Section 8. We have had discussions here in the Gulch about "Contradictions in the U.S. Constitution." It is a separate discussion entirely. This topic is about the hobbies of productive people.

Rand was a collector; and as I said, I have several articles on my blog about numismatics, a related field. It is likely that all collecting meets that standard, certainly for a productive person of high self-esteem.

My own interests range far and wide. In addition to coins and stamps, I have meteorites to go with my rocks. Some of the books on my shelf are old first editions, for instance a history of banking in American by William Graham Sumner. My first edition cyberpunks are all in plastic in boxes in storage. After the novels I went and found the Omni, Analog, etc., magazines where some of them first appeared. My aviation collectibles include manuals from before World War 2, but I have some gizmos and gadgets, and a piece of a National Geographic weather balloon from the 1920s. Stamps and coins tie into aviation, of course, and I have a postal cover canceled on two trips across the Atlantic in the Hindenburg. I also have quite a few First Flight covers, envelopes canceled at airport post offices in the 1920s and later as air mail opened up across the USA. Also in with the aviation materials are my Star Trek collectibles.

Rand, of course, spoke of structure, and she went with the Minkus catalogs. (Scott is the other publisher.) It is there that I do not have the same passion she did. I often encourage other numismatic collectors to find their own structures for their passions. Just a case in point: The standard Whitman folder for Mercury Dimes includes the 1942/1 overdate, which is an error, not a valid variety. (In 1917, the mint mark the half dollar was moved from the obverse to the reverse, creating two valid types for that year for Denver and San Francisco issues.) Anyway, my Whitman of Mercury Dimes has no 42/1 and never will. Follow Minkus, or Scott, or Whitman, or listen to that other drummer.

Her Minkus essay a series of great quotes. “It is the voices of individual men that stamps carry around the globe; it is individual men that need a postal service; kings, dictators and other rulers do not work by mail."
My blog post has only few representative samples. We are moving; and when we get unpacked I will write a follow-up.
http://necessaryfacts.blogspot.com/2014/...

It is not surprising to me that articles and items like the essay show up. Ms. Rand's influence has been felt by many people so powerful most just Joe Citizen working and being a Creator in his own way.
All such honors are her just due.