By Judy Stevens
A humorous description of Babson Park’s first Post Office was included in Louise Quinn’s 1990 book entitled Crooked Lake – Babson Park Rediscovered.
Quinn states that in 1913, the first Postmaster of Crooked Lake, as Babson Park was called then, was William A. Buzzard. But residents reported that his wife Elsie was the person who actually did the work. This couple lived in a shack owned by the sawmill. In this shack was a trunk, and the trunk was the Post Office.
Quotes from the residents included the following:
- “If you want to mail a letter, give it to Elsie and she’ll put it in the trunk.”
- When someone needed a stamp, “Well, she’ll take the stamp out of the trunk.”
- “If you wanted to mail a package, she opened the trunk, took out a small scale, put your package on the scale and found out what you owed.”
- Residents trusted Elsie with their mail and came “at all hours” for their mail, which was delivered by horse and buggy from Frostproof.
- This “trunk post office” lasted until a larger sawmill was built on the west side of town.
Louise Quinn, Crooked Lake – Babson Park Rediscovered (Kissimmee, Fla: Cody Publications, 1990), 45.
The photo above is of the first post office in Babson Park, Florida. This photo is from a privately held collection and was from Rosemary Ahern’s scrapbook. Rosemary Ahern is the daughter of John and Virginia Ahern. John Ahern was instrumental in getting a post office established in Babson Park, Florida.
