Love is in the air ... and the mail ... in the northern Colorado city of Loveland
Love is in the air
LOVELAND, Colo. — Wearing a red sweater with decorative hearts, 89-year-old Joyce Boston is back with a brigade of fellow volunteers in the “Sweetheart City” of northern Colorado to stamp a poem and postmark on Valentine’s Day cards –- just as she has done each year for nearly three decades.
Every year, tens of thousands of people from around the world route their Valentine’s Day cards to get Loveland's coveted postmark. The re-mailing tradition has been going on for nearly 80 years and is the largest of its kind in the world, said Mindy McCloughan, president and CEO of the Loveland Chamber of Commerce.
It’s like North Pole, Alaska, but for Valentine’s Day.
The U.S. Postal Service will put a North Pole, Alaska, postmark on Christmas cards. Valentine’s Day belongs to Loveland.
At its height, program volunteers processed more than 300,000 pieces of mail per year. That number dropped to 100,000 to 125,000 as people turned to email and social media messaging.
“Love is our message — Hearts are our brand. Happy Valentine’s Day from the City of LOVEland,” this year’s cachet reads in part.
Volunteers gather before the big day to stamp thousands of envelopes with the special postmark and cachet. Boston uses two hands to push down on the stamp as she looks down through her glasses, but she loves it as much as when she first started in 1997.
“What do I get out of it? Is a lot of new friends. Friendship. Spreading love. I love spreading love,” she said. ”And I love doing volunteer work. It keeps me, gives me a reason to keep living. Yeah. Keeps me young.”
The program receives mail from all 50 states and 110 countries.
“We've gotten letters from little girls sending their Valentines to their daddy in heaven with
Read more on abcnews.go.com
