After spending 36 years delivering the mail, David Hanlon of Escalon can finally take a break.

He officially retired from the USPS, working his last shift on Friday, May 31.

A 1978 Escalon High graduate, he also served in the Army and continues to serve in the Army Reserves, though looking at leaving the service soon as well.

“When I got out of the military, I was pursuing an electronics degree,” Hanlon explained of his career choice after active duty. “But it was a time when a lot of people were in electronics.”

It was one of his associates in the Army Reserves that suggested he apply at the post office. The rest, they say, is history.

“I went to Patterson first,” Hanlon said.

After a short stint there as a clerk/carrier, he was able to transfer to Escalon and has been happy to serve his hometown ever since.

“I deliver mail in the same area where I used to deliver newspapers as a kid,” he said, chuckling. “It’s over by El Portal, City 3; I deliver to the house I grew up in.”

Hanlon said he has enjoyed watching his hometown grow and now delivers mail to the kids of the kids he went to school with.

He also said he is grateful that he was able to stay on with the Army Reserves and he will retire from there later this year just one month shy of putting in 42 years.

“The community and the post office here have been very supportive of my military career,” he said, adding that he nominated the local post office for a Freedom Award because of that support.

Hanlon already has retirement plans, he will be moving to Texas, where he and his wife bought three acres of land previously and where she is already taking care of their horses.

“It will be a new chapter in my life,” Hanlon said.