Aug4

chicken scratch.

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undecipherable address? the postal service’s handwriting detectives are on it

Snail mail carries a special kind of charm — you can see it in the unique handwriting, uneven lines, and occasional pen smudges. But when it comes to pinpointing the intended address of a piece of mail, these perfectly imperfect human touches can present quite a challenge for post office machines. That’s where a U.S. Postal Service team comes in to do what machines cannot: decipher chicken scratch.
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In Salt Lake City, handwriting experts known as “keyers” work around the clock at the Remote Encoding Center to parse out illegible or hard-to-read addresses, usually sent to the center as digital images for human interpretation. Last year, the keyers processed roughly 1 billion pieces of mail, Ryan Bullock, the site’s operations manager, told CBS News.
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While the Postal Service once had 55 remote encoding centers nationwide, the Utah center is now the only such facility left, making it an essential part of the efforts to ensure handwritten notes reach their destinations — personality-filled penmanship and all. As the service continues celebrating its 250th birthday, watch the handwriting detectives at work.

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The phrase “chicken scratch” originates from the visual resemblance between a chicken’s foot marks and messy, illegible handwriting. Chickens, while scratching at the ground to find food, leave behind marks that look like a series of haphazard, uncoordinated lines and dashes. This imagery was then applied to handwriting that was difficult to read, hence the idiom “chicken scratch”.

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‘the only thing most people do better than anyone else is read their own handwriting.’

-john adams

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source credits: cbs news, Justin Sullivan, Getty images

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69 responses »

  2. this is what we call ‘pig’s foot’ and when I see HH’s writing – which, incidentally, he often can’t decipher himself! – I always add: sorry pigs! another one I use seeing his handwriting (and being a ‘leftie’ in writing doesn’t help either): by the way your writing looks, you should make the income of a doctor or a professor…. he’s not impressed! ;)

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  9. My printing and writing are both neat when I start out, but once my mind starts going off the track and I’m trying to keep up with putting things into written word, they both get wonky. Fortunately, my ‘chicken scratch’ printing stays readable, just messier, so I print most of the time.

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  10. Wow – you know what? I’ve always wondered how some pieces of mail make it to their destinations these days. Handwriting and machines are incompatible…but cheers to the human touch. It’s been a rite of passage for so many of us…of a certain age…learning to read scribbles. xo, Beth! 😁💕😁

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  11. I just looked it up and only 25 states still require the teaching of cursive. I’m always wondering what happens when there’s no one left who can, for example, read the original Constitution. I’m glad the post office still recognizes and supports the need. I’ve been told my irregular handwriting looks like a boy’s. Go figure.

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  17. I probably contribute to a few of the billions piece of mail that’s processed by the encoders! 😆 A very necessary job to help get important messages sent to loved ones.

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    • Scritch scratch!! I think this would be kind of a fun job ( for about 2 weeks), as you have contests to see who has the letter with the least decipherable scrawl and a happy hour after wok event with everyone doing shots and taking a wild guess at what the address might be and sending it off.

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    • and their job is so incredibly important. I had no idea that there were people who were assigned the job of trying to decipher hard to read addresses. they must feel a certain satisfaction when they figure out the addresses.

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  23. This made me think of that movie The Six Triple Eight on Netflix. Have you seen it? The way those women worked together like detectives to sort out and deliver the backlog of mail during WWII is wild. A very cool film.

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