Barefoot mailman
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The term barefoot mailman refers to the carriers on the first U.S. Mail route between Palm Beach, Florida and Miami, Florida, established in 1885. As there was no road at the time connecting Palm Beach and Miami to each other (or to anywhere else, for that matter), the carrier travelled by boat, and by walking along the beach. The mail carriers walked the beach barefooted to take advantage of the firmer sand along the water's edge. Prior to the establishment of the "barefoot route", mail between Palm Beach and Miami travelled a long roundabout route through New York and Havana, Cuba.
A round trip of 136 miles from Palm Beach to Miami and back took six days. The carrier would leave Palm Beach on Monday morning, travelling by boat to the southern end of the Lake Worth Lagoon. He would then cross over to the beach and walk down to the Orange Grove House of Refuge in what is now Delray Beach, where he would spend the night. The next day (Tuesday) he would continue walking down the beach to the Fort Lauderdale House of Refuge, where he would spend that night. On Wednesday the carrier travelled by boat down the New River to its inlet, and then would walk down the beach to Baker's Haulover at the north end of Biscayne Bay. Finally, he would travel down Biscayne Bay by boat to Miami. On Thursday he would start the return trip, arriving in Palm Beach on Saturday.
The carriers also took "passengers" with them, guiding any travellers who were willing to walk the beach with the carriers. At least ten different men worked at one time or another on the "barefoot route". One, James Edward Hamilton, died on the route, although his body was never recovered. He was presumed to have drowned or been taken by an alligator while trying to swim across an inlet to retrieve his boat from the far side. The "barefoot route" was used until 1892, when a rock road was constructed between Palm Beach and Miami.
[edit] Post Office Mural
(From the collection of the Smithsonian American Art Museum)
In 1939 the Section of Fine Arts, United States Treasury Department, Procurement Division, contracted with Stevan Dohanos to paint six murals depicting the "Legend of James Edward Hamilton, Mail Carrier" in the West Palm Beach, Florida Post Office. Charles W. Pierce, who had been one of the carriers on the "barefoot route", was Postmaster in Boynton Beach, Florida at the time, and corresponded with Dohanos, providing photos of James Hamilton in the clothes he wore on the "barefoot route". Dohanos later recalled that Pierce first used the term "barefoot mailman" in their conversations, and that the term thereafter was applied to the murals.
[edit] Novel and Movie
In 1943 the Theodore Pratt novel The Barefoot Mailman, based on the story of James Hamilton, was published by Duell, Sloan and Pearce, New York. In 1951 the book was made into a movie starring Robert Cummings, Terry Moore, Jerome Courtland and John Russell.
[edit] References
- Charles W. Pierce (1970). Pioneer Life in Southeast Florida. University of Miami Press. ISBN 0-87024-163-X.
- Lynfield, Geoffry (1984). "Theodore Pratt (1901-1969) a Reassessment". The Spanish River Papers XII (3).[1]
- History of the barefoot mailmen URL retrieved June 18, 2006
- Review of the movie The Barefoot Mailman URL retrieved June 18, 2006
