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Mary Fields, born into slavery around 1832, was in her early sixties when she won a contract to carry the U.S. mail in Montana in 1895. For eight years she covered the 34-mile round trip between Cascade and St. Peter's Mission, going on snowshoes when snow stopped the stagecoach.

Mary Fields / U.S. National Park Service / USPS Historian

History

The story behind the card

Fields held a 'Star Route' contract: a rural mail route run by an independent contractor rather than a salaried postal employee. She is the first African American woman known to have carried the U.S. mail this way. Before that she had worked for years at St. Peter's Mission, run by Ursuline nuns, until the bishop barred her in 1894 after complaints and a quarrel with a male worker that involved guns. Around Cascade she was known as 'Stagecoach Mary'. A restaurant she opened failed within a year, reportedly because she fed people who could not pay, and in later life she ran a laundry from her home. When Montana banned women from saloons, the mayor made an exception for her. Many tales about her grew in the retelling after her death in 1914, but the mail contract is documented.

Türkçe oku
1832 dolaylarında köle olarak doğan Mary Fields, 1895'te, altmışlı yaşlarının başındayken Montana'da ABD postasını taşıma sözleşmesi aldı. Sekiz yıl boyunca Cascade ile St. Peter's Misyonu arasındaki gidiş dönüş 55 kilometrelik yolu aştı; kar posta arabasını durdurunca kar ayakkabılarıyla yürüdü.

Fields'ın aldığı sözleşme “Star Route” denen türdendi: Kırsal bir posta hattını, posta idaresinin maaşlı memuru değil, bağımsız bir yüklenici işletirdi. Fields, ABD postasını bu yolla taşıdığı bilinen ilk Afro-Amerikan kadındır. Daha önce Ursula tarikatından rahibelerin yönettiği St. Peter's Misyonu'nda yıllarca çalışmıştı. 1894'te hakkındaki şikâyetler ve bir erkek çalışanla silahların çekildiği bir kavga yüzünden piskopos onu misyondan uzaklaştırdı. Cascade'de herkes onu “Stagecoach Mary” (Posta Arabası Mary) diye tanırdı. Açtığı lokanta bir yıl dolmadan kapandı; anlatılanlara göre parası olmayanları da doyuruyordu. İleri yaşında evinde çamaşırhane işletti. Montana kadınların meyhanelere girmesini yasaklayınca belediye başkanı onun için bir istisna tanıdı. Hakkındaki hikâyelerin çoğu, 1914'teki ölümünden sonra anlatıldıkça büyüdü; posta sözleşmesi ise belgelidir.

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