Hinton, West Virginia Owney tag

1888-1897

The small town of Hinton, West Virginia, was well known to employees of the Railway Mail Service. The Chesapeake and Ohio Railway built a line through the town in the 1870s, making it a major terminal point. The clerks who ended their day at Hinton and stayed overnight for their next assignment remember the long, tiring hike up to the railroad hotel located on a high hill above the tracks. Handmade scratches in the tag indicate that it was presented to Owney on September 13, 1894. It is marked on the back with the initials WHP and EOP, but there is no additional information indicating what these initials represent.