Evidence from credible sources supports the statement as accurate. Learn more in Methodology.
Appointment records or authoritative historical sources confirm Franklin held the office of Postmaster General and document his role in organizing the colonial mail service.
Benjamin Franklin was appointed Postmaster General by the Second Continental Congress on July 26, 1775, and the Smithsonian’s National Postal Museum and the U.S. Postal Service explicitly describe him as the first Postmaster General of the national postal service that evolved into today’s USPS. Years earlier, from 1753, he had served as (co-)deputy postmaster general for the British Crown in North America and undertook major reforms—new surveys, milestones on principal roads, shorter routes, and night riders—that reorganized and greatly improved the colonial mail system. While Crown-appointed postal officials such as Thomas Neale and Andrew Hamilton predated him, modern postal-history authorities still treat Franklin as the first Postmaster General in the American tradition and credit him with binding the colonies through a more organized mail network. Verdict: True, because authoritative postal-history sources consistently identify Franklin as the first Postmaster General of the Continental postal service and document his central role in systematizing and improving the colonial mail system, even though earlier Crown officials held related posts.