You've got mail

July 21, 2007 Last Updated: July 21, 2007 09:34 AM Community

Postal carriers have traveled the nation's back roads since the 1800s, with services increasing as the population grew.

In Butler County, that need has come to include 51,470 mailboxes on rural routes.

Divided between 110 routes, the county's rural carriers travel a collective 3,501 miles, placing letters in roadside boxes.

With so many miles of mailboxes, it seems the view would get tiresome. But a leisurely drive on a few local roads revealed some creative diversions.

TO A TEEElizabeth Somerville doesn't have to look far to recall the pastime of her late father. At Somerville's house, mail is delivered to a giant golf ball on a tee, a gift she purchased for him in the mid-1990s. The tee has since entertained neighborhood visitors, who often slow to admire the box. "We had to cement ours in, because someone did try to steal it," she noted. Although not an avid golfer, Somerville says she admires the sport. "Appreciate the sport? Yes. I do. I have a lot of respect for people that can do it. I don't know what I do is called golfing."

Although two quarter horses graze on Jane Kummer's 20-acre farm in Butler Township, two others collect mail instead of hay. Kummer acquired the two horse-shaped mailboxes about 10 years ago, when a friend picked them up at a Florida flea market. "The tail on the rear end comes down to put the mail in," Kummer said. "It would have been nice if it would have been the head — but it's in reverse."

When buying her home 24 years ago, Marie Turner's first thought was to replace its wrought-iron mailbox. "It was just horrid," said Turner of Forward Township, whose ongoing complaints eventually prompted her husband to try and remove it. "We couldn't. It was cemented into the ground," Turner said. "This thing would withstand a nuclear war." As a result, the Turners gave in to their neighbors' protests, who described the decorative stand as a landmark. The stand has since been stripped and painted, continuing to guide neighborhood travelers. In the end, the stand's strength has served as a benefit. "There have been several situations over the years of vandalism to mailboxes on our street," Turner says. "Well, nobody can vandalize our mailbox." Turner is joined by sons Alex, left, and Evan.

After 40-plus years as a carpenter, Ron Davison has amassed a pile leftover lumber. After a few beers one night in his shed, Davison put the lumber to use, creating a larger-than-life hammer and saw to hold up his mailbox in Center Township. "I've been doing carpentry and woodwork my whole life — so that's just something I came up with," said Davison. "I come from a family of carpenters, so it runs in the family." Lucky that Davison kept his original project plans. He already has rebuilt the structure once after damage from passing cars.

When school buses pass Bill Secunda's house, children typically scream. It could be the 12-foot gargoyle looming near the road. Created six or seven years ago as a Halloween prank, the Summit Township sculptor said the metal gargoyle makes a statement about damage so common on rural routes. "It's supposed to be the creature that beats up everybody else's mailboxes," Secunda said. "With one hand he's pulling the mailbox out of the ground, and with the other he's got a big stone — like he's pummeling the mailbox."

Alex Wilson doesn't know the reason behind her mailbox design, but the Parker woman is happy with the whimsical discarded mystery tank that came with the house she purchased last year. "I think its adorable," Wilson said. "It needs work, but I'd like to eventually paint it up. Wilson said neighbors have never explained the unusual mailbox design, now an accepted part of the landscape.

Frank Gray takes pride in his work. "I'm a fourth-generation steam fitter, Local 449," said Gray, whose great-grandfather was among the union's charter members. To demonstrate that pride, Gray uses a painted pipe wrench to support his mailbox in Penn Township. Gray began using the wrench about 10 years ago, moving it to a new concrete base when his family relocated several years later. Gray's home interior is also suggested by the nautical scene on the mailbox itself, since the decor has a nautical theme.

Who would have thought a few scraps of metal could take on the personality of Weldo Clampett, the beloved mailbox at B&B Motors in Center Township? Created years ago by Ron Ferne, who owns the business with his brother Bob, Weldo is made up of an exhaust pipe and muffler, with a catalytic converter for his head. He wears a brake rotor as a hat. "He's got some pipes for eyes, bolts for his mouth — whatever I had lying around the garage," Brian Ferne said. Shown with Weldo are Brian Ferne, far right, along with his brother Bob, "Uncle Ray" Andressi and their brother Ron, far left.

Frustrated by cars hitting his mailbox, Glenn Cooper got busy with some woodworking tools. "People kept running over it, so he decided to put up something they wouldn't be so liable to run over," said Ruth Cooper, describing how her husband fashioned the mailbox mount from a stump. Since it appeared about three years ago in Slippery Rock Township, the stump's only change has been alternating colors of paint on the carved decorative face. "When it needs a paint job, he'll just change the color on it," she said. "It's just something he does in his spare time."