After the United States Postal Service opened, it influenced other options to communicate to be invented. Average American citizens, fed up with high prices, since sending a letter more than one hundred and fifty miles cost around twenty cents, or roughly six dollars today—were turning to cheaper methods of communication, almost putting the United States Postal Service out of business (Gallagher). Some examples of these inventions are the telephone, radio, and telegraph. The postal service needed a more efficient way to deliver mail during the California Gold Rush. That is why “The Pony Express was founded in 1860 by the Central Overland California and Pike's Peak Express” (Obringer). Other services also opened to compete with the postal service after it was established. After Benjamin Franklin was postmaster general, he influenced other postmaster generals to improve his routes and systems to make the delivery of mail faster. Some of these routes are used as parts of routes today.