Delivering the Mail With Grandpa

Before his retirement, my paternal grandfather was a rural route mail carrier outside Edgerton, Wisconsin. As a child, I lived three hours away in Michigan City, Indiana, so if I was to go along, it was always on a Saturday over a weekend when my family and I were visiting. I was too young to understand precisely the roads his route took, but as I look at a map now, I suspect we were mostly on East County Road 59 and M between Edgerton and Milton.

Grandpa could amaze me with an alphabetical recitation of each of the 50 states and their corresponding capitals as well as explanations about the then brand new zip code system and why it was going to revolutionize mail delivery. His driving and delivery style also was a source of amazement. Situated to the right of center on the bench seat of his green 1965 Chevrolet Impala station wagon, he used his left hand to maneuver the steering wheel, his left foot to operate both the accelerator and the brake, and his right hand to stretch through the passenger window to pull down the mailbox door, pull the outgoing mail from the slot, shove the incoming mail into the slot, slap the door back up, and ram the flag back down into place in what seemed like one fluid motion, before roaring off to the next house.

Grandpa’s day started long before I was even awake on the Saturday I remember best, for he first had to go to the post office to do all the sorting for his route. It was just before Christmas in 1967, just a few months before I would turn ten years old. He asked me soon after we arrived on Friday whether I’d like to come with him in the morning. He said he could really use my help because at Christmas time, there was a lot more mail than any other time of the year. I was excited to be his helper so agreed to go.

“It means you have to be ready at 7:00,” he warned.

“I’ll be ready,” I promised because I knew what we would do first before setting out for deliveries.

At 7:00 sharp, Grandpa pulled into the driveway with the way-back of his station wagon filled high with bins full of first class mail, small packages, fliers, magazines, and newspapers. He had spent the past two hours at the post office arranging the mail so that it was in the order of his deliveries to be as efficient as possible once he began the route. He had used a rubber band to wrap the first class mail, along with any special catalogs, magazines, or newspapers, in a bundle for each address, and had memorized which addresses would also receive a parcel. The fliers were all in their own bin because each house would get the same thing. These were the coupons for the grocery and department stores. My job would be to sit in the back seat (no such thing as seat belts at this time) and systematically go through the bins handing him the bundle for the address along with the fliers, and any packages.

“Ready to go?” he asked as he stomped snow from his boots.

“Ready, Grandpa,” I replied as I slipped my hands into my mittens.

I clambered up into the passenger seat and pulled the door shut in excited anticipation of our first stop—Wickes Pancake House. Grandpa ordered eggs, Canadian bacon, and toast, which he spread carefully with butter and “jel.” He had coffee, but I had a large glass of whole milk with my short stack of pancakes with butter and maple syrup. At 8:00 it was time to get started with the deliveries, and this time when I got in the car I hopped into the backseat so I could do my job.

One of the people on the route was Grandpa’s sister, my Great Aunt Bea. She knew his schedule so well that she was already trudging out to the end of her long driveway bundled up against the cold, galoshes on her feet that were at least six inches deep in snow, as we came around the corner and pulled in tight up against her roadside mailbox. “You can hand Aunt Bea her mail, Honey,” Grandpa instructed over his right shoulder. I rolled down my window in preparation.

Aunt Bea poked her head inside. “I was worried ‘bout your schedule today with all this snow,” she said in her Wisconsin lilt.

“Ya, it’s been a bit slippery for us,” he answered back with the same Norwegian accent.

“So, ya got a helper today, do ya?” she asked, gesturing to me.

“Ya, she’s a good little helper, our Debbie.”

“Well, of course she is. You excited ‘bout Santa?” I nodded my head, a smile on my face. “Oh ya, I s’pose since you’ve been such a good girl helpin’ out on the route and all. Well, best be gettin’ on I s’pose.” She took the mail from my hand and then handed me a round tin decorated with snowflakes. “That’s yer lefse,” she said to Grandpa.

He gave her a salute with his right hand and said, “See ya Monday night.”

“Oh, ya, sure, big party Christmas night, see ya then.”

Aunt Bea’s packet was the last bunch from the bin I’d been working through, so as Grandpa headed off to the next house, I put the empty bin in a stack I’d created on the far left of the backseat. I put the tin in the empty bin I’d placed in the middle of the seat, and then hopped over into the way-back to maneuver the next bin over onto the floor so I’d be ready in time before his next stop.

“Jenkins, with a package.” Grandpa called out. I already had the Jenkins bundle in my hand along with the fliers, so handed that over the seat to him. I then quickly scrambled into the way-back and grabbed the next package in the stack. I looked at the address to make sure it said Jenkins on it, and then scrambled back over to hand it to him, too. He took the package from my hand, the bundle of mail already ready, pulled in close to the box, opened the door, pulled the outgoing mail out, shoved the incoming mail and package in, shut the door, pushed down the flag, and handed me what had been in the box. We then repeated the same thing at every house until all the bins were empty.

At just about every stop that day, when Grandpa opened the mailbox door, inside there was a wrapped present or an envelope. The envelopes contained money as a thank you for upholding the postal code, “Neither rain nor hail nor sleet nor snow nor heat of day nor dark of night shall keep this carrier from the swift completion of his appointed rounds.” The packages all contained sweets of one kind or another. I piled the delicious sugar-infused treats of cookies, coffee cakes, homemade donuts, maple sugar candies, rum-soaked fruit cakes, and fudge into the middle bin I’d set up and couldn’t wait to get them back to Grandma and Grandpa’s house where I might be able to sample some of them.

“You know what I think is really funny Grandpa?” I asked.

Grandpa scooted over to the driver’s side and patted the passenger side up front to indicate it was time for me to hop forward. He glanced over at me and asked, “What’s that Sweetheart?”

“The first family on your route are the Amundsons, which starts with an A. The last family on your route are the Zeiglers, which starts with a Z. That means that the list of people you deliver to goes from A to Z. I think that’s funny.”

He smiled indulgently at me and said, “Ya, that’s pretty funny.”

Grandpa’s been gone a very long time now, but delivering mail with him is one of those unforgettable memories that I have always cherished. And eating those goodies he got that day was pretty nice, too.

Copyright DJ Anderson, 2014