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Jim Casey
Former Army postal clerk is a man of the people
By R. Kurt Osenlund, BucksLocalNews.com
Jim Casey calls himself a “people person,” a trait his resume clearly confirms. In one way or another, be it his time as a postal clerk with the U.S. Army, his decades-spanning career as a bus driver, or his more recent deeds as an active member of Newtown's American Legion Post 440, this 69-year-old Newtown resident has long been a faithful public servant, a true man of the people.
Born and raised in Port Richmond, Philadelphia, Casey is the eldest male in a family with seven children. His parents, James and Regina, bore two other boys and four girls. (Casey's brothers – Richard, who passed away last year, and Joe – are also veterans.) Casey graduated from Philadelphia's Northeast Catholic High School for Boys in 1958 and, that same year, he attempted to join the Navy.
“I wanted to go into the Navy in the worst way,” Casey says in an interview at Post 440, “but they turned me down because of a trick knee [one susceptible to locking in place]. It gave out during my physical. So, the Army got me.”
Casey says he ended up in the Army via a “push-up draft,” a process by which one branch of the military adopts would-be soldiers from another. At 19, he headed off to Fort Hood, Texas for basic training. There he was part of the “B Company” of the 2nd Armored Division tank unit, a.k.a. “Hell on Wheels.” After eight weeks he left for Fort Benjamin Harrison in Indianapolis, where he attended postal school for a little over a month and received his certification as a military postal clerk.
On October 25, 1959 in Oakland, Califonia, Casey boarded a four-engine, PC-6 commercial airliner that would put him on a path to Korea (he still has his boarding pass, which is scrawled with the sentence: “I'm leaving my country”). It took three days for the plane to arrive at Tachikawa air base in Japan, though Casey says it felt like three months. Following a brief debriefing, he soon landed in Seoul, Korea, home of the 19th Army Postal Unit.
It was Casey's responsibility to monitor incoming and outgoing mail. He and/or his colleagues would take daily, two-hour trips down a dirt road to Korea's Kimpo Air Force Base. There they'd pick up bundles of letters and packages, load up their truck, haul everything back, sort it and pass it on to delivery men for distribution (the reverse process would take place for U.S.-bound items, which would be flown out of Kimpo and into San Francisco). Once a month, Casey and company would also need to pick up “boat mail,” considerably larger packages that arrived by ship at the nearby port of Incheon. Though these jobs included heavier cargo, Casey says the most burdensome deliveries were those of the dreaded “Dear John” letters – break-up notifications from girlfriends back home.
“When guys got 'Dear John' letters,” Casey says, “they'd often come looking for the mailmen. They'd blame us for delivering them. In fact, we used to have a sign on one of the mail trucks that said 'Dear John Express.' The guys would get really upset about it, but (the letters weren't) our fault.”
Another duty of the 19th Army Postal Unit was transporting classified material from Seoul's 8th Army Headquarters to the Kimpo base. Though Casey only did it twice for training drills, soldiers from the postal unit would drive armored trucks containing the sensitive items, which would then be flown out of the country.
When his 13-month tour of duty ended, Casey hit a couple of snags trying to get home. First, the man who was set to replace him didn't show, and he had to stick around longer than anticipated. Then, when he finally got on the USS Mitchell (the ship that would bring him back to the States), it collided with a British vessel not far from shore, forcing it to re-dock and undergo repairs. Casey says if he had stayed in Korea, he would have been given a promotion, but that wasn't enough to persuade him.
“There was no way I was gonna spend a second Christmas in Korea,” he said. “I wanted to get home.”
Getting home took 19 days. Casey got back to America in November of 1960. Waiting for him there was Ann, his grade school sweetheart who's still with him today. The couple got married in 1962, moved to Mayfair, and eventually had three children: Maureen, Jim and Mary Beth. Also in 1962 (three years before he was officially discharged from the Army), Casey got a job as a Septa bus driver, a job he'd keep for the next 38 years.
He and Ann moved to Newtown in 2000. Almost immediately after they arrived, Casey got involved with Post 440. He started as the First Rental Chairman (putting him in charge of renting out the Post hall), moved up to Junior Vice Commander, then Senior Vice Commander, then Post Commander, a position he held from 2005 to 2007. Today, he's the liaison to the Boy Scout troop that meets at the Post; he runs the Post's Memorial Day parade; he hosts a Veterans Day ceremony at Council Rock South; and he's also the president of an association for retired Septa bus drivers. Usually, though, he can be seen poking around Post 440. He's technically known as the head of the house committee, but he prefers a much more serve-the-people-type title.
“I call myself the janitor,” he says.
By R. Kurt Osenlund, BucksLocalNews.com
Jim Casey calls himself a “people person,” a trait his resume clearly confirms. In one way or another, be it his time as a postal clerk with the U.S. Army, his decades-spanning career as a bus driver, or his more recent deeds as an active member of Newtown's American Legion Post 440, this 69-year-old Newtown resident has long been a faithful public servant, a true man of the people.
Born and raised in Port Richmond, Philadelphia, Casey is the eldest male in a family with seven children. His parents, James and Regina, bore two other boys and four girls. (Casey's brothers – Richard, who passed away last year, and Joe – are also veterans.) Casey graduated from Philadelphia's Northeast Catholic High School for Boys in 1958 and, that same year, he attempted to join the Navy.
“I wanted to go into the Navy in the worst way,” Casey says in an interview at Post 440, “but they turned me down because of a trick knee [one susceptible to locking in place]. It gave out during my physical. So, the Army got me.”
Casey says he ended up in the Army via a “push-up draft,” a process by which one branch of the military adopts would-be soldiers from another. At 19, he headed off to Fort Hood, Texas for basic training. There he was part of the “B Company” of the 2nd Armored Division tank unit, a.k.a. “Hell on Wheels.” After eight weeks he left for Fort Benjamin Harrison in Indianapolis, where he attended postal school for a little over a month and received his certification as a military postal clerk.
On October 25, 1959 in Oakland, Califonia, Casey boarded a four-engine, PC-6 commercial airliner that would put him on a path to Korea (he still has his boarding pass, which is scrawled with the sentence: “I'm leaving my country”). It took three days for the plane to arrive at Tachikawa air base in Japan, though Casey says it felt like three months. Following a brief debriefing, he soon landed in Seoul, Korea, home of the 19th Army Postal Unit.
It was Casey's responsibility to monitor incoming and outgoing mail. He and/or his colleagues would take daily, two-hour trips down a dirt road to Korea's Kimpo Air Force Base. There they'd pick up bundles of letters and packages, load up their truck, haul everything back, sort it and pass it on to delivery men for distribution (the reverse process would take place for U.S.-bound items, which would be flown out of Kimpo and into San Francisco). Once a month, Casey and company would also need to pick up “boat mail,” considerably larger packages that arrived by ship at the nearby port of Incheon. Though these jobs included heavier cargo, Casey says the most burdensome deliveries were those of the dreaded “Dear John” letters – break-up notifications from girlfriends back home.
“When guys got 'Dear John' letters,” Casey says, “they'd often come looking for the mailmen. They'd blame us for delivering them. In fact, we used to have a sign on one of the mail trucks that said 'Dear John Express.' The guys would get really upset about it, but (the letters weren't) our fault.”
Another duty of the 19th Army Postal Unit was transporting classified material from Seoul's 8th Army Headquarters to the Kimpo base. Though Casey only did it twice for training drills, soldiers from the postal unit would drive armored trucks containing the sensitive items, which would then be flown out of the country.
When his 13-month tour of duty ended, Casey hit a couple of snags trying to get home. First, the man who was set to replace him didn't show, and he had to stick around longer than anticipated. Then, when he finally got on the USS Mitchell (the ship that would bring him back to the States), it collided with a British vessel not far from shore, forcing it to re-dock and undergo repairs. Casey says if he had stayed in Korea, he would have been given a promotion, but that wasn't enough to persuade him.
“There was no way I was gonna spend a second Christmas in Korea,” he said. “I wanted to get home.”
Getting home took 19 days. Casey got back to America in November of 1960. Waiting for him there was Ann, his grade school sweetheart who's still with him today. The couple got married in 1962, moved to Mayfair, and eventually had three children: Maureen, Jim and Mary Beth. Also in 1962 (three years before he was officially discharged from the Army), Casey got a job as a Septa bus driver, a job he'd keep for the next 38 years.
He and Ann moved to Newtown in 2000. Almost immediately after they arrived, Casey got involved with Post 440. He started as the First Rental Chairman (putting him in charge of renting out the Post hall), moved up to Junior Vice Commander, then Senior Vice Commander, then Post Commander, a position he held from 2005 to 2007. Today, he's the liaison to the Boy Scout troop that meets at the Post; he runs the Post's Memorial Day parade; he hosts a Veterans Day ceremony at Council Rock South; and he's also the president of an association for retired Septa bus drivers. Usually, though, he can be seen poking around Post 440. He's technically known as the head of the house committee, but he prefers a much more serve-the-people-type title.
“I call myself the janitor,” he says.
posted by BucksLocalNews at
10:53 AM
2 Comments:
Janitor??? No way, No how. Jimmy Casey is the heart and soul of the Morell Smith Post 440. He is everywhere all the time. Talk about Hell on Wheels. They don't make them like Casey any more and it's a crying shame.
When they made Casey the broke the mold and shot the mold maker. Jim never rests on his laurels and is always trying to keep Morell Smith Post 440 the best in the nation. Also a super Irishman.
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