Don Walters (above) is
celebrating his third year as Ochopee, FL, Postmaster. The World’s Smallest
Post Office is the latest assignment in his 20-year career. “When the
opportunity became available, I saw it as my chance to become a postmaster,” he
says. “In addition to my postal duties, I knew it was also a public relations
opportunity which I liked because I enjoy dealing with customers and the
tourists who come here and visit.”
Walters considers himself
somewhat of a history buff and enjoys sharing information about the post office
and its location.
According to Walters, the
original post office was in a general store. When it burned down in 1953, it
left the community without a post office. “The owner of a tomato farm offered
up a pipe shed on the property to the Post Office Department.”
“The farm gave the shed and
land to the post office but then sometime in the 1990s, the post office was
sold off to a local family named Wooten. Mr. Wooten owned an airboat tour
business, loved the area and liked having a post office nearby. He rented the
space back to the Postal Service for some obscene amount like $25 a month and
signed a 100-year lease.”
Ochopee is a Level 13 Post
Office. The current building is 89 years old and measures just 56 square feet.
Walters says his office functions more old school than other post offices which
have RSS (Retail Systems Software). “I have a scale and a cash drawer,” he
says. “I also have the internet, a printer and fax machine. The office also has
a contract carrier who serves around 500 customers.”
The walls of the Ochopee Post
Office are decorated with postcards from all over the world. “I get so many
I’ve run out of wall space,” he says. “I’ve had customers from India, China,
all over Europe, Russia, South Africa, South America and the list goes on.”
There used to be more than
1,000 people living in Ochopee, a Seminole Indian word for tomato farms. “We
are now inside Big Cypress National Park. This is in the middle of the
everglades.”
“All day long as cars pass by
the post office, they honk their horn as a friendly gesture,” he says. “I love
being the postmaster here.”
