Partly-printed DS as president, one page, 18 x 14, October 21, 1921. President Harding appoints Ada B. Koontz as a “Postmaster at Hot Springs, in the County of Sanders, State of Montana.” Signed neatly at the conclusion by Warren G. Harding and countersigned by Postmaster General William H. Hays. The lower left is embossed with the Post Office Department seal. In very good to fine condition, with some light creasing and soiling.
Ada Belle Catlow Koontz (1873-1958), a widow, served as the postmaster at Hot Springs, Montana, during the 1920s when the remote town was beginning to boom due to its natural pools of hot mineral water. Her husband, George, a railroad locomotive fireman and later cattle ranch worker, had died of food poisoning in 1915. Her son, Paul, a rancher and logger, died in 1921 when he was kicked by a horse. She later moved to Los Angeles, California, with her younger son, Dale. She worked there as a waitress for more than a decade.
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