New Hope Rural Carrier Nancy Hicks returns long lost love letters

New Hope Postmaster Marianne Carr wanted everyone to be able to read about one of her rural carriers, Nancy Hicks, and the role that she played in reuniting some long lost love letters with their rightful owners at the time, the actual moment, when they were needed the most.

Marianne also emphasizes the specialness of hand-wriitten correspondence, how it can remain such an important part of a receiver's life and personal history.

Here is what Marianne wrote:

The picture that I am sending you is Rural Carrier Nancy Hicks (middle) with the son and daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Eual Worley when the three of them met for th first time on July 26.

Nancy had bought a scratched-up tin that had the logo for Chesterfield cigarettes 15 years ago at a yard sale. The picture postcards that were saved inside were from Eual Worley to his wife, Carrie, in the early 1940's.

Nancy had been trying to locate someone from the family to return the postcards to. As luck would have it, she saw Mrs. Worley's Obituary from the Times.


There was no visitation. The Graveyard service was 7/26/11 at 10 o'clock. Mrs. Hicks came into work to start casing her mail route and asked if she could take a day of annual leave. In a flash, her reliable sub was ready to run the route.

Nancy went to change and made the 10:00 funeral. The daughter, Mrs. Sharon Henson, was so touched by Nancy's efforts to give the postcards back to a family member, she notified The Huntsville Times.

The front page article is entitled LOST LOVE LETTERS, by Mark McCarter

The article did not state that Nancy is a Rural Carrier

This story is a testament to the hand-written word,  which is lost in email. One strong point about sending letters, postcards and greeting cards is that the sender actually held the article in their hand and wrote the message personally.


I used to cram on the lipstick when I was sending my sweety a letter with that special closure, a kiss. I have my own cedar box full of love letters myself!

Thanks for sharing that with us, Marianne!

Here is the beginning of the article from The Huntsville Times. To read more, click on the CONTINUE link after the excerpt.

New Hope yard sale discovery leads to 'memory for the rest of life'
From The Huntsville Times
by Mark McCarter

HUNTSVILLE, Ala. -- It cost Nancy Hicks 25 cents. How it wound up in a yard sale behind a New Hope minimart is "a piece of the puzzle we'll probably never know," she said.

The cheap purchase turned out to be a priceless packet of sentimentality leading Hicks on a 15-year search that finally ended last week at a Huntsville funeral home.


This story began in 1943, with a romantic World War II soldier and devoted husband named Eual Worley. On the rare days he didn't write long letters home to wife Esther, back in Missouri where they'd met, he'd send a quick postcard.

Dearest Darling:

I just came up town to mail your other card & letter so I thought I'd send you one of this part of the country. I can't send you my new address yet - so until I can, use the old one - I know something: I love you.
Eual

Esther saved each one, storing them in a Chesterfield cigarettes tin. Said her daughter, Sharon Worley Henson, "She kept everything. She was very sentimental."

But somewhere through the years, she was separated from the postcards.

Carrie Esther Woods Worley died July 23 in a nursing home near Marietta, Ga. She was 96. She was returned to Huntsville for burial at Maple Hill Cemetery next to her husband, Eual, who died in 1996 after working as a store manager and insurance man after the war.

The story doesn't end there.

It's just beginning.
CONTINUE>>>