Souvenir penny postcard showing Elizabeth Lake. Color halftone. Postally used; postmarked at Roosevelt on July 27, 1921.

According to Frickstad (1955), the Roosevelt post office was officially established December 26, 1902, in the Lake Hughes area. Teddy Roosevelt was president, but we don't know if that had anything to do with it.

The Lake Hughes post office was established almost a quarter-century later, on June 19, 1925. On August 15 of the same year, the Roosevelt post office merged into the Lake Hughes post office, and the "Roosevelt" name went away.

It was slow going for the Roosevelt postmaster at first. Patera (1994) acknowledges 1902 as the starting year but, for some reason, lists a 1901 salary of $15.35 (for all of 1901). Even if that's an errant notation, the Roosevelt postmaster still earned just $25.87 for the entire year of 1905. Then things started to pick up. Just a guess, but increased postal activity probably resulted from an influx of construction workers on the Los Angeles Aqueduct in the area after 1907. According to Patera, the Roosevelt postmaster earned $84 in 1907, $86 in 1909 and $190 in 1911.

In comparison, at the Surrey (Saugus) post office, which had an aqueduct construction camp right down the road, the postmaster's salary jumped from $227 to $625 and $840 in 1907-1909-1911.

Aqueduct construction had less of an impact on Newhall, where the postmaster earned $453, $639 and $680 in those years.

Our postcard was mailed by someone whose name is illegible to a Mrs. E. Johanson of the Boyle Heights section of Los Angeles. Message reads: