All anyone seems to want to talk about is The Queen. Thus, today’s Buzzyblog will do likewise and talk about “our Queen” as in Queenie Willis, Scotland Post Master for a number of years. I found her obit in a 1989 edition of the Enterprise.
At one time, the Scotland Post Office was situated in our Store. First Store owner Nathan Schuman ran the Store and his wife ran the Post Office. My Grandparents Anna and Harry Raley did likewise when they bought the Store from Mike Schuman (Nathan’s son) in 1945. Harry ran the Store; Anna was the Post Master.
Ms. Queenie then took over from my Grandmother who left the position, and the whole area for that matter, following her divorce from my Grandfather in the late 40’s.
I recall Buzzy telling me in response to my asking him how the Scotland post office got moved out of our Store and down the road “Ms. Queenie wanted it down there so she had it moved.” I remember thinking “Wow, Queenie must have had some pull to make that happen.”
Years later I heard that a law or something was enacted back then mandating that Post Offices could not be co-located in businesses that also sold alcohol. When that mandate took effect, all the old country stores selling booze lost their post offices. Thus, my assumption about Queenie’s connections and influence may not have been entirely correct
But back to that other gal also known as the Queen. To level with you, I never thought nor cared much about her until Pam made me watch all 4 seasons of the Netflix series The Crown. Having sat thru and watched those episodes, I came to realize that Queen Liz was one tough cookie particularly the way she handled Churchill, and all those stodgy old boys that she had to deal with thru the years. So, I will give her her due and concede that she was a very remarkable person who did her thing and did it very well for a number of years.
One other semi-related matter and then I’ll let the Queen be (sorry couldn’t resist saying that) and it has to do with Camilla’s official title of Queen Consort (click here for related story on this.) Consort just does not sound right to me. (Phillip as the Prince Consort didn’t sound right to me either.) The word Consort makes them sound more like they’re shacking up or having an affair with the real King or Queen. Shouldn’t Camilla be called something more down to earth and accurate like Queen Wannabe or Queen on the Side? (Then again, since she was the chick on the side for all those years, maybe that title has been done.)
Musically, as with the Queen herself, at first I didn’t care much for Freddie and the boys mostly because I always regarded Bohemian Rhapsody as one of the worst rock songs ever and maybe even THE worst. However, thru the years, I have come to appreciate the rest of their non-BR stuff including this one that features a cool video with it: