You could say that 18-year-old Sid Pearl has a typical young person’s job: He delivers newspapers in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin. What’s unusual about Sid’s job is that he delivers the papers—as well as U.S. mail—by jumping out of a moving boat!
On the shores of Lake Geneva is a summer resort town that bears the same name. About 60 of the houses surrounding the lake have their newspapers and mail delivered by boat during the summer. To make deliveries, mail jumpers like Sid leap from the boat to the dock, run to the mailbox to make their delivery, then jump back onboard. But they don’t always stick the landing—in his three years as a mail jumper, Sid has fallen in the lake nine times.
Sid Pearl delivers newspapers. That’s a pretty normal job for an 18-year-old like him. But there’s something unusual about Sid’s delivery route in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin. He delivers the papers and other mail by jumping out of a moving boat!
Lake Geneva is a summer resort town. About 60 houses around the lake have newspapers and mail delivered by boat. Sid is one of several “mail jumpers.” To make a delivery, he leaps from the boat to a dock. He runs to the mailbox and drops off the mail. Then he jumps back onto the boat. But mail jumpers don’t always stick the landing. In three years, Sid has fallen in the lake nine times.