A Look Back: Arlington's First Post Office
By O.K. Carter, Landmark Preservation Commission
Posted on May 10, 2019, May 10, 2019

Worthington National Bank

Some would argue that a pioneer outpost becomes a town – or at least a village – when it becomes big enough to have its own post office.

Early post offices tended not to be a free-standing building of their own, but rather were housed in somebody’s store. That’s also true for Arlington, though there’s been considerable debate over the decades as to what constitutes the history of a post office presence in the city.

That said, the National Archives and Records Service in Washington D.C. notes that the official Arlington, Texas, post office was established on July 29, 1875 – except that it was in nearby Hayter, Texas, east of Downtown. Hayter no longer exists. And it wasn’t called Arlington at that moment, the moment being shortly before the Texas and Pacific Railroad came through and people who had previously lived in Johnson Station – or Hayter – moved to take advantage of rail proximity. The Hayter Post Office, the archives indicate, had a name change to Arlington on Jan. 22, 1877, a name apparently suggested by the Rev. A.B. Hayter himself. 

The first 1875 postmaster? S.A. Daniel, succeeded in 1877 by James Ditto. The list of early Arlington postmasters reads like a roll call of founding fathers – Thomas Spruance, James Hammack, Benjamin Mathers, James Carter (Carter Junior High namesake), and P.B. McNatt being the earliest. 

The city’s first permanent post office? That didn’t take place until 1939, downtown at 200 W. Main St. The building is still there and has a historical marker, serving as a school district tax office for a number of years. It is currently Worthington National Bank.

This article was written by Arlington author and historian O.K. Carter, who serves on the Landmark Preservation Commission.

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