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Tryouts Held For Delivering Mail By Boat

Lake Geneva Keeps Old Tradition

POSTED: 8:44 am PDT July 1, 2008
UPDATED: 11:57 am PDT July 1, 2008

It is unlike any other summer job.

Every summer, a few lucky teens are given the privilege of delivering the mail to the residents of Lake Geneva, Wis. -- on a continuously moving boat, reported WISN-TV in Milwaukee.

"It's rock 'n' roll for two and a half hours around the lake," said employee Jenn Edwards.

The mail jumpers make a standing jump from the moving boat, sprint through obstacles on the docks, deliver and pick up mail, and then make a mad dash and a last leap for the back of the boat.

"The worst is when the phone books come out," Captain Neill Frame told CBS News. "That's a bad day."

Although the mail jumpers make it appear graceful and easy, the job is not for everyone.

"It's a lot harder than it looks," Edwards said.

As a result, two-hour tryouts are held every year to limit the team to three regular jumpers, two special ones and a pair of alternates.

"I'm a little nervous, but I think it will be exciting if I get to do it, so I have my fingers crossed," said Elle Vogt, one of the teens trying out for the job.

The lucky few who are hired are proud to be a part of the long-lived practice that started on Lake Geneva in the 1800s, when there weren't any roads around the water. Back then, residents had to get their mail delivered by boat.

Even though times have changed, the tradition stuck.

These days, the mail delivery is as much a spectator sport as a daily job. Not only do the employees of the Walworth II, the name of the infamous steam yacht, deliver the mail, but they also provide entertainment by reading a script explaining Geneva's history to tourists.

Tourists buy tickets to ride along, watch and listen while observing the lakefront mansions that were built by Chicago's business barons.

Occasionally, the idiom "missed the boat" takes on a literal meaning and further amuses the gathered crowds.

Amanda Ames, a past jumper, said the public speaking is the hardest part.

"People are listening to the tour the whole time," she told Lake Geneva Regional News. "They might watch the first few jumps, but after that, not as much."

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