The seven men in the photo are as follows from left to right:
Willie Sanford,Drury Fields(brother to Julian),Lum Shillings,Charlie Price,Charlie Forsythe,Robert Booser and Julian Fields(my husbands grandfather).Julian is riding the horse that he rode to carry the mail from Sardis to Center.
The following is part of the article that was published along with the picture.
Mrs.Fields memories of the early 1900's in the Sardis Community includes an old-time general store by the name of Fowler and Webb."They sold groceries,hardware,sewing machines and a little bit of everything."she said.
In decribing the store,she said,"It was a lively place,especially on Saturdays when the men all gathered to swap stories after they had worked hard all week in the fields.They talked about their fishing and about the angler who had caught the largest fish during the week.And on Christmas folks came to the store to buy things for gifts as well as fireworks.The post office was there in the store from 1904 to 1909 with Johnnie Webb as postmaster and store clerk.The mail was carried horseback by Julian Fields six days each week."
"There was also a general store and post office at Campti,Oswald Rogers was postmaster and store clerk there.Julian would go to Campti and pick up the mail bags and come on to Willauce as that was the name of the post office at Fowler and Webb's store.There Julian picked up the mail and rode on into Center to the post office there."she added.
"Julian would have to wait until 1:00 p.m. to leave Center,he waited until they got the mail bags ready for Campti and Wallauce.So he had to eat dinner in Center before returning to the post office for the mail.This mail job was six days a week in rain,sunshine,freeze or snow.Julian worked at this until Arthur Carroll got the rural route out of Shelbyville office."she said
My husbands grandmother was 83 years old when she gave this interview to Mattie Dellinger of the Light and Champion paper.As far as I can figure the distance that Julian rode every day was close to 20 miles to deliver and pick up mail,he did this in addition to also working in the fields to feed his family.Julian did this job until 1909 when the mail was ordered sent to Shelbyville.