America's smallest post office |
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Ochopee, Florida Back in 1932, Ochopee was a thriving community with 8 sawmills and a tomato packing industry, and a post office located in the general store. When that store burned down in 1953, a steel building - formerly used as an irrigation pump shed - was pressed into "temporary" service, just until a permanent post office could be built. |
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That steel shed - about 7x8 feet, has been in service ever
since! It's documented by the US Postal Service as their smallest, and listed as an
official historic site. About 400 local patrons, most of them Miccosukee Indians and employees of the Big Cypress National Preserve, call for their mail. The postmaster works in the post office daily. Whenever a tour bus pulls up, European tourists buy postcards and mail them home, with the coveted "Ochopee" postmark affixed. In 1928, the highway known as Tamiami Trail was completed through the Everglades and what is today Big Cypress Preserve. The highway made the region accessible for timber companies, and by the 1940s, lumber camps and sawmills were set up in towns like Jerome, Copeland, Monroe Station, and Ochopee. The cypress was used to built PT boats, and shipped around the world for things like gutters and coffins. By the time Big Cypress National Preserve was created, most all the huge cypress trees had been cut down. Big Cypress National Preserve has some great hiking trails; alligators and hundreds of species of birds can be spotted. Plus free campgrounds - and don't forget to visit the post office! -L.E.
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Except where
otherwise noted, all text and all photographs were created by Loren Eyrich. No
portion of this website may be reproduced without written permission.
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