In
the early days before the trains came through the Dallas Center area in
1869, the mail for the early settlers was brought by stagecoach route
and picked up at "Pierce's Point", a farm northwest of the
present town site. This was in Sugar Grove township and may have
been in the vicinity of the Clarence Hill farm. The stagecoach
also stopped at the Brenton-Ingersoll farm northeast of Dallas Center.
What is believed to be the first post office in Dallas Center was
located on the north side of Walnut street, in the northwest corner of
the business block, where Dallas Motors is presently located. This
frame, two-story building with overhanging second-floor porch, typical
of the buildings of the day, was destroyed by fire on July 4,
1901. The post office was then moved to the south side of the
street between the corner drug store and Brenton's bank. In 1937,
fire destroyed this post office and it was housed temporarily in the
building just east of Dallas Motors. On November 1, 1938, the post
office was established in the Citizens Bank building at the northeast
corner of the business block where it remained 25 years. On April
27, 1963, the post office was moved to its present location in a new
brick building in the triangle business section southeast of the main
business block.
Because of the fires, records have been lost, making it impossible to
list all of the early postmasters and the number of years each one
served. The first postmaster was David Smart. In 1878, the
postmaster was O. N. Steele, followed by M. E. Ridle, G. Harry Loring,
S. A. Sumner and John Fox. S. A. Sumner served again as postmaster
and was followed by George Lloyd who served from 1914 to 1932; Earl
Rhinehart, from 1932 to 1936; O. F. Ward, 1936 to 1955. Maynard
Ward was acting postmaster from August 1955 to December 1955.
Lawrence Meyers was then appointed, and served until 1958. He was
followed by Garth Mann who served until January 1967. Again,
Maynard Ward was appointed acting postmaster until Wesley Ward, the
present postmaster, was appointed August 12, 1967.
Rural free delivery service was established in Dallas County October 1,
1900. The first rural route was described as follows:
length, 24 miles; area covered, 36 square miles; population served, 629;
number of houses on the route, 124; carrier, John Schlosser. He
was followed by Harry Schunk and J. D. Cadwell. Route two was
served by Otto Sisler from 1900 to 1903. For 22 years, from 1903
to 1925, John w. Elliott delivered mail daily, except Sunday regardless
of weather and road conditions. For a short time there were two
more rural routes out of Dallas Center, carried at different times by J.
A. Ward, W. H. Stevens, F. B. Collins and Webb Cramer. At one time
Webb Cramer delivered mail daily to Panther store by motorcycle.
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