Postmaster Ken Quinn: He’s Got Mail

Postmaster Ken Quinn: He’s Got Mail

Middleburg Postmaster Ken Quinn

Photo by Leonard Shapiro

By Leonard Shapiro

Ken Quinn’s journey to one of the most important jobs in Middleburg began on Long Island, growing up in the suburban town of Hicksville, the same place that produced The Piano Man, iconic singer Billy Joel. Quinn has been Middleburg’s postmaster since 2012, and he’s in charge of making the bustling local post office hum.

Clearly he’s into the rhythm of the place, if only because he’s what he likes to describe as a “working postmaster….My hands get dirty. I work the window, I break down the mail and I put it in the boxes.”

If necessary, he’ll fill in for a sick, tardy or Photo by Leonard Shapiro vacationing carrier and drive around one Middleburg Postmaster Ken Quinn of a series of Middleburg’s rural routes that total 52 miles to make sure the mail is delivered all around. And always, there’s the tedious paperwork. “I’m here at 7 a.m.,” he added, “I stick my hand in wherever I’m needed.” He also gives great credit to his co-workers for making his job that much easier. Peggy Simmons, Trish Hahn, Jackie Montgomery, Maria Angel and Antoine Montfield are all postal veterans, several with many years of experience.

“Some of them have worked together for years,” Quinn said. “When you have the camaraderie and when you have people who really know what they’re doing, it makes it that much easier. Nobody here has to be told what to do. They know.”

Simmons and Hahn are on the job at 4 a.m. to start the sorting process. Carriers arrive at 7 a.m., as does Quinn. Often loaded down with packages,

those carriers are out in their trucks by 9 a.m. and the mail is always stuffed into the 1,800 post office boxes by 10:30 a.m.

“In today’s world, the sole job of this post office is to make sure the money comes in and the mail goes out,” Quinn said. “We want to make the experience in here as pleasant as possible for the customers and make sure the mail is delivered to the post office boxes and the rural routes.”

Quinn, 61, has been with the postal service working all around Northern Virginia for nearly four decades, and he’s seen major changes along the way. In the era of e-mail and Amazon, the number of cards and letters has decreased dramatically, accompanied by an equally dramatic rise in the number of packages that must be delivered, courtesy of the continually increasing amount of on-line shopping.

“I’ve had days where one of my carriers couldn’t see the back of his truck from the front of his truck,” he said. “It was filled up six feet high with boxes and packages.”

But Quinn has no complaints and clearly loves what he’s done most of his life. He and his wife live in Sterling, they have two adult sons and he credits the postal service with allowing his family to enjoy a comfortable existence.

“I wouldn’t trade my life with the post office for anything,” he said. “It gave us a house, we raised two great kids, and we never wanted for anything. And they gave me the opportunity to go in different directions. I’m glad to call myself a postal worker.” He can call himself a few other things, as well. A fine high school athlete himself, Quinn played softball into his 50s and now stays busy in the fall and spring by umpiring girls high school fast-pitch softball. He also handles slow pitch leagues for girls and mixed teams.

His favorite sporting pursuit is golf. He got his first set of clubs at age ten in a Hicksville yard sale and he’s been swinging away ever since. He’s also not all that far from retirement, but he has another job he’d love to try. “I’d like to be a starter at a golf course,” he said. “That’s the dream.” And don’t you know, he’ll keep that place humming, too.