LOOKING BACK

Young Chang

We started with a simple question -- who was Newport Beach’s first

postmaster? But what we found was that in this city, it’s even unclear

which post office was the first main one. (We did find Costa Mesa’s first

postmistress though . . . a subject we’ll bring you next week.)

So instead, we’ve decided to take a trip through the annals of post

office past, highlighting some of the postmasters of yesteryear who

helped deliver mail in our city by the sea.

Payne Thayer served as postmaster at the Riverside Avenue office in

1955. He supervised Don Crocker, who is still an employee at that office

today. He wore suits to work and wasn’t very strict nor quite laid back.

He lived on Balboa Peninsula.

“He just cared that you did the job,” Crocker said.

Rewind to 1948, enter Herb Kenny. He worked at the Balboa Station on

Balboa Peninsula and was known as a pretty strict, pretty tight sort of

guy. His wife was also a special messenger during that time.

Travel even further back and meet Bill Adams. The ultimate old-timer,

the one who was around in the 1930s at the main Newport Beach Post Office

located then on McFadden Place. He wasn’t the city’s first postmaster,

but locals confirm he was one of the best liked.

The position was a politically appointed one at the time. Adams

received his job through the Democratic Party, according to Vance

Roberts, a retired assistant postmaster.

“Originally he was a redhead, but then he turned white-haired,”

Roberts said. “He was very abrupt, but pleasing.”

The two became good friends working together, and Adams would take

Roberts up to Los Angeles to inaugurations of highway post offices and

other happenings.

The late postmaster lived in Newport Beach -- on Cliff Drive -- and

everyone knew him. He was friendly, kept himself in excellent shape and

oversaw the post office’s every operation, from the hiring and firing to

window-box services.

“And he was in the chamber and other things,” Roberts said.

Adams died in 1952 in a traffic accident. According to Roberts, he had

gone to the dentist, been injected with too much Novocain and then drove

into a tree.

“He lived right down here on Cliff Drive, at the corner of Cliff and

Aliso,” Roberts said. “People knew him.”

* Do you know of a person, place or event that deserves a historical

Look Back? Let us know. Contact Young Chang by fax at (949) 646-4170;

e-mail at young.chang@latimes.com; or mail her at c/o Daily Pilot, 330 W.

Bay St., Costa Mesa, CA 92627.