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93-year-old still delivering mail after decades

Posted at 4:09 PM, Aug 08, 2017
and last updated 2017-08-08 17:09:06-04

In this small town, the mountains are a constant and comforting sight. But one man may have them beat.

Emory Townsend delivers mail to the people in this community and he knows them all by name. He should. The 93-year-old has been on this route for the last six decades.

"I remember them all for the last 60 years," Townsend says.

These days he and his dog Molly make their rounds twice a week. But for the majority of his time, it wasn't Molly by his side.

"She has went with me the last two years delivering mail," Townsend says. "That's when my wife passed away."

Townsend and his wife Beebe started the route together as a way to make grocery money. But over time it became much more.

"We just kept renewing the route getting ties a little closer," Townsend says. "And we are part of the community."

Those ties push Townsend to keep going above and beyond.

"He's a really good guy yeah," says one of Townsend's customers Glenn Griffin. "He walked down here in the snow down the driveway."

And to pass his years of knowledge on.

Matt Davis is Townsend's postmaster. And even though Townsend has been doing his route more than twice as long as the 25-year-old has been alive, they learn a lot from each other.

"He has so much information and has lived in this area for so long everything is enjoyable," Davis says. "Especially the memories of him and his wife you know sharing the mail route together it's just a very inspirational time."

Even after 60 years the end of Townsend's storied postal career is nowhere in sight.

"A lot of people ask why do you keep on?" Townsend says. "But it gives me something to do. So I just have fun doing it."