TOLD by the PIONEERS - Washington Secretary of State

Told
by the Pioneers
So I called the man I was superseding. He was at Ellensburg. He
insisted that I take the post office. "Go to the store and move everything
that)ooks like it, and set it up at the depot," he told me. I was
postmaster three years without an appointment; then I was officially
appointed.
GRACE GATCH
King County
In the early days, when there was no postal delivery in Seattle,
everyone went down to the post office. for the mail . Strange as it
seems, it was a common practice in those days for women to be allowed
to go to the head of the line, such was the gallantry of the men.
Dr. Gatch, my father, noticed that his little girls, Ruth and Gay,
would come into the house with the mail, reading the postal cards. To
him, this was a reprehensible habit and he chided them about it, but
without result, as he observed. So he decided upon· a more drastic
method.
A few days later these little girls came into the house with the letters
and scared looks on their faces. They handed their father the mail,
and among the letters was a postal card which they had evidently read.
The postal card read as follows:
What are these little girls doing?
They are reading a postal card.
Is the postal card addressed to them?
No. It is addressed to their father.
The lesson was effective.
CLARENCE SHORT
Tale of a Pioneer Mail Carrier
Klickitat County
One of the earliest pioneers of the then Oregon and Washington
carried the mail from The Dalles to the Blockhouse, situated between
eight and nine miles from what is now called Goldendale. He carried
the mail on horseback in a pair of saddlebags provided for that purpose.
This was during the years 1872 and 1873. This mail carrier
was Meriel S. Short, who was living at that time on the Columbia
river, at a place known as Eight Mile Creek, about eight or nine miles
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