PHOTO BY DAVID LOWE Pat Justice, who retired from the U.S. Postal Service in December but now delivers mail as a contract driver, loads packages into his pickup before beginning his route. After 32 years and seven months in the U.S. Postal Service, even retirement can’t keep Pat Justice from delivering mail.

Justice, who retired in December, runs the contract carrier route formerly served by Jarvis Carlile. The route, which includes about 120 miles of driving, runs from Lampasas to Evant to Hamilton and back into the northern portion of Lampasas County.

Justice plans to bid to keep the route when the current contract expires in a few years.

The postal carrier, who moved to Lampasas in 1964 as an eighthgrader, is continuing a family tradition of sorts with the U.S. Postal Service. His father-in-law, Daryl Edwards, worked as a rural mail carrier for the Kempner area from July 1948 until his retirement in September 1982.

Edwards convinced his son-inlaw, who was working in road construction at the time, to take the postal employment test in 1977.

“He knew what a good career it would probably be in the postal service,” Justice said.

“The benefits were too good to pass up,” he added, recalling his father-in-law’s advice.

Opportunities for advancement arose soon, as Justice worked both as a part-time and full-time clerk during his first six years with the Postal Service. He also was appointed to supervisor relief when supervisors took vacations or were out of the office for other reasons.

In the middle of 1983, Justice bid on a postmaster position in Rochelle.

He took the job in January 1984 and fulfilled that role for nearly two years. As postmaster, Justice was responsible for about 170 post office boxes and had one rural carrier who served 160 boxes.

At such a small post office, though, Justice usually processed all the mail in about two hours, which left him with spare time to fill during his eight-hour work days.

“After about 20 hours I just couldn’t stand it, especially with my type-A personality,” he said.

Looking for a heavier workload, Justice delivered mail as a full-time carrier in Lampasas until the summer of 1996, when he began commuting to Marble Falls for his new role as a parttime clerk and carrier.

Three years later, he returned to the Lampasas post office, where he stayed until his recent retirement.

Justice said he enjoyed interacting with Lampasas County residents, many of whom he still serves as a contract driver, during his years as a clerk.

“Just about all of them were real enjoyable to work with and made it a lot of fun for me,” he said.

One less pleasant experience -- albeit one that provides occasion for some laughs now -- occurred on Feb. 19, 1989, when Justice was injured while delivering mail. A driver ran a stop sign at Fourth and Rice streets and collided with the quarter-ton Jeep that Justice was driving.

The Jeep flipped onto its side, and one of its doors flew off. Justice crawled out the top of the vehicle, and Jeannie Gilbert, his supervisor, called emergency medical services before coming to guard the mail in the postal vehicle.

Emergency medical technicians laid Justice on a board to stabilize him and, because rain had begun to fall, covered his face with a sheet. When several of Justice’s friends who lived nearby saw him covered and being carried to an ambulance, they were disturbed.

“They all thought I was gone,” Justice said.

The mail carrier’s wife, Karon Justice, left her classroom to meet him at Rollins Brook Community Hospital, where he received a splint on his right forearm.

“It wasn’t too funny at the time,” Justice said.

Other memories include the changes -- some good, some more difficult -- he has seen during several decades of postal work. The move from the Second Street post office to the new facility on East Fourth Street, for example, brought increased floor space and better working conditions, Justice said.

“It made it a whole lot easier, because we don’t have to carry things up and down stairs any more,” he said. “It’s a whole lot roomier for everybody.”

Automation also has increased, as exemplified by machines that sort mail in its proper street sequence.

Not all transitions have been easy, though. Position cuts through attrition have accompanied pronounced decreases in mail volume, Justice said.

“For a while, e-mail didn’t affect us much, but in the last year or year and a half it really has,” the longtime mail carrier said.

Within the last few years, routes were adjusted to try to ensure eight-hour working days for carriers, he said.

As a contract carrier, Justice usually starts driving his Mondaythrough Saturday route about 7:30 a.m. He typically finishes traveling his 120 miles of roads by 2 p.m.

With shorter work days, Justice plans to play more golf and spend more time in his woodworking shop. Those hobbies are just temporary diversions, though. Though he has retired, he is not ready to stop carrying mail any time soon.