The Camden chronicle. (Camden, Tenn.) 1890-current, 1902-04-25
Barlow Man Tells Of His Expert
enoe as a Mail Carrier.
GREAT CHANGES HAVE BEEN WROUGHT
Postage In tho Old Days Was Much
Higher Than Now-Reoelvers
Of Letters We're the Ones
Who Paid.

boys. excuse me for telling you
story about the old times. Sixty
four years ago, when I was twelve
yeas old, my father was the postmas.
Ter In our town and had to make CON
tracts for carrying the mail to other
neighboring towns. He gave these
contracts to needy men and the pay
was generally ONE dollar day One
of these men got sick and my father
made me take his place and ride the
mail to Roswell all winter. It was
twenty-five miles away and l had to
ride there and back in day, and he
paid me the dollar for every trip. It
was a bitter winter and sometimes
when ! cot home / had to be helped
off of the horse for I was frozen up
and helpless. But l was a tough and
hardy boy and always ready for the
next trip On my first ride the good
old women on the route did not know
me. They used to knit socks and send
them to town by the old man to sell
and carry back some coffee or sugar
or indigo, or copperas, or some little
thing, but they didn't know me, and
remember that one old woman came
out to the gate and said: Are you the
mail bOy?" And | laughed and said:
Eyes, nam, I am not the female boy"
: She smiled and said: you are mighty
Nittle to carry bundles, but / would
like for You to take a couple Of pairs
of socks and bring me back the 2y
in coffee if you win. III give yoa a
little bag to put it in, ard you can
hang it on the horn of your saddle"
~Of course did, for l always liked to
bblige the women, and besides my
father kept store and got the trade.
Sometimes I had as much outside of
the mailbag as there was inside.
made fourteen silver dollars that win
ter and felt rich.
But want to tell you about the mail
business as it was then. There were
no stamps or stamped envelopes-nor
any other kind of envelopes. We
Nwrote on a long paper called foolscap.
tn got that name from the watermark,
which was a fools cap and bells
stamped on the paper. After writing
We could fold the sheet up to the size
of letter and slip one fold in the
other-thumb-paper Fashion - then
seal it with a wafer and address it,
The waters were round and thin, and
were made of -four paste, and when
held on the tongue a moment got soft
and sticky. In my young days the
postag was paid at the end Of the
line by Che one who received the let
ter. 1t was IL IL cents if it did not
come or go outside the State-18 "a
Iglif from or to an adjoining State, and
, 25 cents of still farther off. But if
it was to go to California it had to
be prepaid and sent by Wells and
Fargo's express and cost a dollar, and
was a month on the way. Just think
of it. Now it costs only two cents and
takes only four days. That overland
express almost made us boys crazy
They published a book called "Ten
y Years Among the Mail Bags" and II
had pictures in it-pictures of the
boys riding the mail on Indian ponies
riding on a run of ten miles in an
hour, and then he was lifted off Of
his pony and put ON a fresh one fol
another ten miles. The boys had tC
weigh not less than sixty nor over
y,{u.a%vr ,.or,,,S oud had ~ m o1Yo Forty
miles a, day-20 east and 20 west. L
look about two hundred boys and foul
hundred ponies to do the work, ant
I wanted to be one Of the boys mighty
bad Part of the route was beset by
hostile Indians and the express com
pany had to keep soldiers at these sta
lions to guard the ponies, and the boys
had to keep a sharp lookout between
the stations. One of the pictures
showed some Indians shooting at {
9oy as he bent over the pony's neck
and was flying like the wind. He haC
left the track and taken roundance OF
them and / thought that was heroic.
The letters were limited to single
sheet of paper and a Thousand in
bag, ard that made about twenty
pounds Of mail Besides the mai
there were some two-pOny hacks Will
two drivers and guns and these car
ried gold dust from the mines to tn
eastern states and were limited t
two hundred pounds, which was wortl
nearly $4,000 and was a tempting
prize to both white and Indian rot
bers. But the gold express ran a
irregular intervals and nobody kney
when it was coming.
But now about postage. Not man