The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1898-11-06
SIZE DRrYEs A NAN coAoH.
A Pretty Western Girl Who Prefers That
Calling TO Trembling SCHOOL.

NnllinS 70 IehchlnK ScnoOi'
ANDREWS. Ore, Oct. 26.-Three times a week
a blackboard comes into this town carrying q
United States mail pouch and driven by =
young woman. Her name is Rose Sturgeon
and she makes the thirty-flve-m mile trip be-
tween this place and Deniu and back on alter
nate days. She Ia one Of the few women who
serve Uncle Sam by carrying his mail over
lonely roads in the West. The road she travels
daily leads down through n big. barren valley
In southeastern Oregon from the village OF
DEMO to Andrews, whore the stage connects
with the road running from Burns south to
McDormitt, New. 1t Is very lonely and unfre-
uuented and one may ride along 1t for hours
ami see not n human being. There are borax
mines in the region and q few lone ranches
and mining camps living back from the road.
Miss Sturgeon is barely 20 years old. a whole
some and healthy looking girl and a fair tyne
OF tho bost feminine product Of the Western
mountains. She is tanned. as Kipling has put
It. with the tan OF the girl VINO doesn't care"
but the brown face which looks out from her
sailor hat or her fur cap Is good and pleasant
to see. Asked how she happened to take up so
unusual an occupation, she replied:
why. L needed to do something to earn
money. and 4 friend OF my father asked me In
fun one day how / would like to carry the mail
to Andrews. l considered it a Joke at first, but
afterward l got to thinking about 1t and / SON.
cluded I'd rather do that than teach school,
which 1 had been planning to do. I've always
been used to horses and to driving and I'm
not timid about being alone and &c l asked
did. and I've been driving the mail stage now
for almost a year. w
You see, l was born in this country and I've
always been used to the, mountains and the
big. barren plains and the wide valleys and
tn not Gnatn0 MANY rant,la and No ottDnnua T
don't mind driving along alone as a girl might
who had lived in n big town or a city. Some
tlmss | two aa os t + ssss sna have ON t hSs s Ss San oT
as half a dozen. but most Of the time / 60 alone.
4 am fond OF horses and my team is oom;
pany for me, and | like being outdoors so well
that / don't think I'd ever feel lonely as long as
could see all outdoors and the sky UP above.
Afraid o,, WIZ hg,d nSi oo Wh1 ,sessih,y sh Esnt 20 i ,o be
me up because there's never money enough
In that mail bag to warrant any road agent in
Il don't carry a revolver or anything Of
wanted me to. But the thing was always IN
! didn't want to buckle it around me because
1t looked so-so, sort Of mannish. you know.
I've had to face some pretty bad weather
sometimes when 1t would have been pleasanter
storms of snow and wind and sleet. but I
e. fSs very pys 9fd' e In fact En- I F Eo nsm liked %eSt the sto afons
horses, can travel. 1t makes you feel alive
dusty days last summer did. But it wasn't
any hotter on the road between DEMO and An
drews than i was nywhere else and not near
side a s~ehoolhouse.
~ think I've got q. pretty nice job. I
bly, do and 1 mean, to hold on to It Just as long
as Uncle Sam will let me-"