A letter sent from a Maine woman to her mother was delivered by a local post office this week — 83 years after it was sent.
The Portland Press Herald reported Wednesday that the nine-page letter from then-23-year-old Miriam McMichael, a schoolteacher, to her mother, Dollena McMichael, just 150 miles away, recently turned up at the post office in Pittsfield, Maine. It bore a 2-cent postage stamp and a postmark indicating it had been received long ago from the post office in Houlton.
Pittsfield postal workers said they have no idea how the letter ended up in the incoming mail, but guessed that it might have been stuck in the sorting equipment all these years. The workers asked around about the family's name, and someone remembered they had all moved to Skowhegan, so they forwarded it on to the postmaster there, Bill Sylvain.
Urgent: Do You Approve Or Disapprove of President Obama's Job Performance? Vote Now in Urgent Poll
The yellowed envelope was then delivered by hand to the sender's nephew after it was discovered that both Miriam and her mother Dollena had passed away. Red MacMichael then gave it to his sister, Ann MacMichael.
"We were really, obviously flabbergasted by it so I've spent the last two or three days backtracking around, trying to figure out where it came from," MacMichael
told ABC News. "I went to the Pittsfield, Maine, post office and they said they just got it in the incoming mail with no explanation, no — no nothing."
Fittingly, the letter itself begins with an apology from daughter Miriam, who says she's sorry for not writing to her mother sooner.
"I’m just getting around to write. I imagine you have been anxiously waiting for a letter all week. I have no excuses, but that I just didn’t get to it and there are lots of things to tell you, too," part of the letter reads.
It goes on to describe the life of the 23-year-old Miriam, and even mentions a boyfriend — one who had asked her to a dance. The mention became an object of intrigue for the family, who had never heard anything about him.
"None of us know who it was — it wasn’t my uncle," MacMichael said with a titter. "It must have been before she met my uncle."
Urgent: Assess Your Heart Attack Risk in Minutes. Click Here.
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.