THE JOLLY POSTMAN

Tuesday, January 20, 1959. It’s so easy these days to do a Google search to find out what day of the week a date fell on in 1959. While rummaging through old files, I found the wildest piece of memorabilia.

The handwritten notes on a water-stained piece of blue paper, dated Jan. 20, 1958, (obviously, he meant January 1959 because I didn’t start school until September 1958) were written and used by my father, who in those days had the title of a mailman. Back then, his day off varied each week, but obviously, his schedule allowed him to come to address my kindergarten class on a Tuesday..

Why can I not remember a movie after I see it or a book after I read it, while the smile on my father’s face and his animated presentation that Tuesday in 1959 remain indelibly etched in my mind? See my blog post, More Lincoln School Memories, dated August 3, 2021.

I not only remember the leather satchel my father brought along that month that I turned 5 1/2, but I can also picture the wooden rack he had with him to show the cubbies used for sorting the mail. Mainly though, I remember his zeal. That’s an important lesson in and of itself.

The telling paper showing the 1st class mail rates at 4 cents an ounce with Airmail costs of 7 cents for U.S. + possessions and overseas tells volumes. With an introduction, conclusion, and the facts in between, it was a perfect paper. He unequivocally scored an A+.

We learn so much from the generations before us. My father not only taught mail delivery basics to the young students on that day and how costs change, but he handed down life lessons. My father’s robust presentation exemplified the importance of displaying manners and acknowledging opportunities.

Respectfully signing off his presentation on that winter day, my father first thanked the school principal, Mr. Johnson, then my kindergarten teacher, Miss Cohn, and the other kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Gaines. He ended by thanking “all the people who are here today for their kind attention.”

Thanks for the memories dad. I feel as proud as a peacock today as I did on that Tuesday in 1959.

1953 (the year of my birth) Union Card - Benjamin Mark - National Association of Letter Carriers Branch 67, Elizabeth, New Jersey

Page 1 of 2 of presentation notes dated January 20, 1958

(Obviously, he meant January 1959 because I didn’t start school until September 1958)

Page 2 of 2 of presentation notes dated January 20, 1958

(Obviously, he meant January 1959 because I didn’t start school until September 1958)

This week marks 25 years since my father’s passing but he is never far from my mind