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Show I. ii i rm mmmmmm jnm n tk. J i v -A, j : c ? 'v ' j .0 -v Lev- i ,!K j A(A"A. !" , - ' i ; Max Martinez, Postal Service Transportation Specialist, Western Area Distribution Networks, Denver, awarded retiring Kent Mclnelly (fourth from left) a plaque honoring his 45 years as a mail carrier for the Postal Service. Garfield County Commissioner Maloy Dodds, awarded PANGUITCH A family tradition ended in October when Kent Mclnelly retired after 45 years of carrying the mail in Garfield County. - Mclnelly was recently honored when Max Martin presented him with a unique plaque from the Postal Service displaying some of the nation's most prominent . ..- ni)MWI. i.a.i.i.i.i.rnl.ri.f,...i.d him some gifts from the county and Kent's wife Phyllis holds a plaque from the county's post-' post-' masters. Kent has an arm around his mother Twila Mclnelly of Escalante who prepared his lunch daily on his run from Panguitch to Boulder and back. Mclnelly Retires After 45 Years Mail Service In Garfield County stamps, including Utah's popular Delicate Arch stamp. Commissioner Maloy Dodds, also presented Mclnelly with gifts from the Garfield County Commission in behalf of the county's residents, and local postmasters prepared a large framed replica of the Utah arch stamp to honor Mcinelley at his retirement. Mclnelly first took over in August 1952 from his father Arthur Mclnelly who had carried the mail since the early 1940's. Mclnelly estimates that he has driven close to four million miles in that time at some 85,000 miles a year with never a serious accident. acci-dent. Now, when his wife says, "Let's go for a ride," Mclnelly says he may be a little more inclined to do so. A native of Escalante, Mclnelly says his intial route took him over the mountain from Escalante to Widtsoe to Antimony Anti-mony to Junction to pick up the incoming mail, then back to Escalante, on to Boulder, back to Escalante and back to Junction again with the outgoing mail from the county. In those days, he said, he even did the trip on Sundays for two or three years. For a few years after that, when Highway 12 was opened to Escalante though Bryce valley, he picked up his mail at Henrieville, took it back to Escalante Esca-lante and Boulder and returned to Henrieville. In 1959 when he signed the contract for the county, he and his wife Phyllis moved to Panguitch. Since then he has taken the mail from Panguitch to Boulder on Highway 12, stopping at the post office in each community along the way, and returning to each in the late afternoon to pick up the outgoing mail to deliver to Panguitch. Mclnelly's postal route is probably one of the most beautiful in the nation, and his travels along Highway 12 take him over one of the nation's 10 most scenic highways. But it is also one of the most dangerous, and becoming becom-ing more so, he says, as tourism increases each year. He says he constantly had to watch for those who were driving too fast, or too slow, or those simply parking suddenly on the highway, enchanted enchan-ted with the local scenery. But there were hazardous times in the past, too. The winter months traveling over the mountain moun-tain in the deep snow between Escalante and Widtsoe made chains and good fortune a necessity. neces-sity. He remembers in the 1970's when the Calf Creek bridge washed out and he had to use the Hell's Backbone Road to travel to Boulder and back for a week. "It was rainy weather and very, very slick and muddy," he recalls. In the 1980's the Henrieville bridge washed out. "I unloaded (See MAILMAN on Page 4A) MAILMAN From Front Page the mail from the mail truck and carried it on my back across planks laid on the bridge and rented a truck in Henrieville, went to Escalante and Boulder, returned with the outgoing mail and carried it back over the planks to the mail truck," Mclnelly remembers. What will he miss? "Two things. The very close friends I made in every town and my mother's cooking," he said. "She made lunch for me every day." Mother, Twila Mclnelly, Escalante, Esca-lante, is 87. He expressed his sincere gratitude to everyone who had made his long career such a pleasure. Kent and Phyllis plan to move to Hurricane, but he says he expects he'll be making lots of trips back to the area in the summertime. The Mclnellys have five daughters, 17 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren. |