Blueslide, Washington — Post Office Left; the Neighborhood Stayed

Blueslide is a Pend Oreille River locality whose name is associated with an old landslide, but its more useful lesson is about what happens after rural institutions disappear.

A post office operated there in the early twentieth century, when timber, rail and river transportation gave small valley settlements more independent importance. It closed in 1926.

The closure did not empty the landscape. Homes and roads remained along the river corridor between Newport and Usk, even as services consolidated elsewhere.

Historical maps can make a closed post office look like the death certificate of a community. Blueslide is a reminder that the mail can leave before the neighbors do.