TAYLOR COUNTY, FL GENWEB

Perry Post Office

The information for this article came from the Franklin Inman Historical Collection,

the Penny Saver Paper, and the Taylor County Historical Society.

     There is no record of a Perry post office at all prior to the Civil War.

    How pre-Civil War Taylor Countian's got their mail is obscured by the mist of time, although it is known that there was a post office at "Fenholloway," closed by the Confederate during the war, because it was reportedly a "hotbed" of Union sympathizers.

    The first official record of a post office at Perry is a Confederate list published sometime during the war, which shows that the Southern government had established a post office at Perry in Taylor County, along with 15 other offices, mostly in the northern and central part of the state, as far south as Bartow, in Polk County.

    The first Union post office established at Perry was established under the name of "Rose Head" February 23, 1869, but the Yankees evidently lost track of their new office in the confusion of Reconstruction, and on December 4, 1874, Second Assistant Postmaster General John L. Barett wrote to the "PM at Rose Head, Taylor County, Florida" to ask, "Is Perry, the new county seat, the local name for Rose Head?"

    "If not," he added, "please give the direction and distance of Perry from Rose Head."

    Postmaster Henry Tillman, the fifth Union postmaster at Perry, wrote back, "Perry and Rose Hill is one and the same place. By some mistake the PO was named Rose Head when it should of been Perry, Perry is the county seat of Taylor County, Fla."

     This brought about an official name change in Washington, and the local office became "Perry" on May 28, 1875.

    Allen O. Quinn, appointed February 23, 1869, was the first Union postmaster at Rose Head. He was succeeded by Jesse Colson, Thomas York, B. F. McCollister and Tillman.

    Salary records are incomplete, but both York and Tillman got $12 a year for their services. By 1911, the salary was up to $1,500 a year, a respectable sum for the day.

    Tillman was succeeded by Thomas J. Faulkner, Preston D. Woods, Matthew W. Lundy, Thomas W. Lundy, Preston D. Woods, and Thomas W. Lundy again, appointed February 5, 1896 who served until April 16, 1907, the first postmaster to serve for a substantial length of time.

     Lundy's successors were David P. Morgan, James H. Lundy, L. M. Caswell, and Thomas W. Lundy again, appointed December 19, 1922. He served this time until October 28, 1933.

     Beginning in 1933, the postmasters were Leslie George, John W. Puckett, Virginia D. Puckett, Henry S. Thompson, Thomas L. Holmes, and B. Franklin Inman, who was appointed August 24, 1966, and served until September 1976.

    Records are vague about the location of the post office in the early days and it is surmised that the location was changed from one place to another as the postmasters themselves changed.

One post office was located at the northeast corner of the courthouse square, at the intersection of Washington and Main Streets. The picture above is believed to be this location. The Tom Lundy family occupied the second floor of the building while he was postmaster from 1898 until 1907.

The post office was housed in a building on Main Street next to O'Quinn's Drug Store when the building at Green and Washington Streets - drawing below, was completed in 1935.

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