Admittedly, it was in the late 40’s an early 50’s me & my siblings were required to write to our Grandma.
The address used was:
Grandma
Town, Tx
No zip codes in those day of course.
She got the letters.
I think they also got the clue from the return address who’s Grandma it was supposed to go to.
Also, of all the Grandmothers in that town, she was “The Grandma.”
One very respected local farmer, now deceased, told me in the 1990s that when he was in college in the early 1950s, 600 miles away, he would often get a letter from home the day after it was mailed.
If he didn’t misremember, that was truly amazing. We are from the same small town a hundred miles from the nearest large city and presumably the nearest regional postal facility.
About fifteen years ago, our local postmaster told me that if they received something addressed to my first name and the zip code, they would assume it was me and deliver it to me.
MIT has it’s own zip code. You’ve described a complete mail address. Did you get room deliveries? Around here (aus), room deliveries were handled by the organization, not by the postal service.
No, we had mail boxes in the lobby of the dorm. This was before there were a lot of deliveries. The only one I can recall is that the Coca Cola plant delivered bottles, but to the loading dock, not to us.
In the 1930s, there was a blues singer named Booker White. One of his recordings was “Aberdeen Blues”.
In the 1960s, there was a revival of interest in blues. White kids in the north were trying to locate old-time blues singers, to get them to come north to record and perform.
One group of kids sent a letter addressed to:
Booker White
Old blues singer
c/o General Delivery
Aberdeen, Mississippi
It was delivered.
In small towns I expect postal workers to know many individuals in their delivery area. And certainly any celebrities. In the big city? Fuggeddaboudit.
That reminds me of a story, probably apocryphal, that I heard on Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me a few years ago.
Many fans of the band Queen supposedly address their fan letters simply:
Queen
London, UK
They were misdelivered to Buckingham Palace.
Ripley’s Believe it or Not told far-fetched stories of unconventionally addressed letters that somehow reached them.
Another unconventional address, in the form of a classic rebus:
When I was a little kid, small town post offices seemed to know everyone. Or maybe it was just my colorful relatives.
I often sent letters addressed:
SKINNY
Long Prairie, Minn.
And my uncle Harlan would get them!