Elvis, mail and love: Ventura's Post Office Bill still sells stamps after 55 years
When Bill Pendergrass, then 20 and sporting a mustache to look older, started working at a downtown Ventura post office, Richard Nixon had just been elected president. The Beatles were still together. Stamps cost 6 cents.
It was Nov. 30, 1968. More than 55 years later, everything has changed, except for the time capsule that is Pendergrass who is known to thousands across Ventura County. He is Post Office Bill.
Now 75, he still works as a clerk at the office on Santa Clara Street, selling Forever stamps by the roll and explaining the difference between registered and certified mail at a corner window decorated with pictures of San Francisco Giants.
Wearing a blue button-up sweater, tattered badges and a tie clip that bears his first name, he calls out people who cut in line, helps customers open post office boxes and greets almost everyone by name. He teases customers like the old friends they are and asks about their families.
He calls Darren Borgstedte “Dusty,” a decades-old nickname now used only at the post office. Borgstedte, co-owner of The Wharf store, has been going there for 40 years.
“He is the Santa Clara post office. Are you kidding me?” she said. “Very few things stay the same, but Bill at the post office does.”
He reached his 55th anniversary with the postal system a few days after Thanksgiving.
“Few employees have been able to make their mark on the Postal Service as you have,” says the letter he received from Postmaster General Louis DeJoy. It sits next to his front counter station, near the photo of his late wife and the congratulatory balloons his co-workers brought him.
“He finally got acknowledged,” said James Grubb, a window clerk who has worked alongside him for 15 years. “It means a lot to him. He goes beyond dedication, the way he treats customers and the way customers treat him. It’s almost like family.”
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'I was a flunky'
On a Wednesday night, still in his work uniform, Pendergrass sat in the living room of his small Ventura home filled with AARP bulletins, photos of his wife and gourds called ipus, the Hawaiian percussion instrument he plays Sundays with an ukulele band.
He's a native who graduated from Ventura High School in 1966. He worked for a plastic manufacturing firm, then for the city water department. At age 20, married and with a baby daughter, he was drifting without a career plan.
“I was a flunky. I had no skills,” he said. His dad convinced him to take the civil service exam and apply for a job with the postal system. He was hired as a clerk for $2.95 an hour.
Then with shoulder-length hair, he was part of an assembly line feeding a processing machine that marked envelopes with cancellation stamps. He relocated to an Oxnard station and then returned to Ventura. By 1989, he had gained enough seniority to move to the front window permanently. He’s been there ever since.
“He’s an institution,” said Bill Kearney, a longtime customer and board co-chair for the Museum of Ventura County. It's planning on creating a tile bearing Pendergrass's name as part of a courtyard display.
Pendergrass sees his job as a navigator guiding customers through a complex system, explaining the best and most cost-efficient way of getting their Christmas package to Maine, Texas or Belize. He’s a salesman who asks every customer, every visit, if they want stamps.
Back in 1993, he started promoting the new Elvis Presley stamp weeks before it was issued, suggesting his customers buy 40-stamp sheets. He sold 6,000 stamps the first day they were released, at a price of 29 cents apiece.
“There were 80 people in line,” he said. “I’ll never forget it. There were no packages mailed, only Elvis stamps sold for two full hours.”
'She was his life'
Even after he joined the Postal Service, Pendergrass was drifting. He went through a divorce. He drank too much. His job carried purpose. His life didn’t.
One night 51 years ago he went to the Trade Winds nightclub in Oxnard to meet a woman in a date set up by his father. Before he met her, he saw someone else sitting alone. She was beautiful with long dark hair. They talked and danced all night.
Eight months later, he married her – Juanita Kaimana Rubin Pendergrass. She was Hawaiian, born on the running board of her family’s car in the Hanalei Valley, according to the obituary Pendergrass wrote decades later.
They lived together in a small home in Ventura and raised her three children. The front yard is still filled with plumeria trees, stephanotis vines and birds of paradise flowers Pendergrass still cultivates.
She was a musician who for years led the Ukulele Club of Ventura County. They competed in contests in Las Vegas and played every year at the Ventura County Fair. Pendergrass accompanied on the ipu, decked out in a Hawaiian shirt and a lei made by his wife.
“I didn’t have any direction until I met her,” he said. “It’s like the Lord gave me her.”
She was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease about three years ago and everything went downhill. When he could no longer care for her, Pendergrass placed her in a residential care home in Oxnard. A friend helped set up a GoFundMe that raised more than $30,000 to help with the costs.
She died in her sleep on Nov. 16, 2022, two weeks before their 49th wedding anniversary. Her photos, doll collection and presence still stamp their home.
“She was his life,” said the Rev. George Golden, the Baptist pastor who officiated their wedding and also her funeral. “He worshipped her.”
The man who knows everyone
Almost everyone owns a Post Office Bill story. Ventura County Supervisor Matt LaVere remembers one of the first times he met Pendergrass. As he approached the service window, before he even offered his name, Pendergrass greeted him.
“He said, ‘You’re Marty LaVere’s son, aren’t you?’” said LaVere, who learned Pendergrass had known his father for decades. Mention the supervisor to Pendergrass and his eyes glistened. When his wife died, the Board of Supervisors adjourned their meeting in her name. LaVere sent Pendergrass a condolence note.
Similar connections define Pendergrass’ life at the post office.
“He’s known generations of people coming in,” said Jessica Vasquez, post office manager. “He knows all about their family. He knows how many kids they have. He knows the community.”
There are a few things about Pendergrass people don’t know. He was a longtime bowler who rolled five perfect 300 games. He plays bingo at the Chumash Casino Resort in Santa Ynez. Every Sunday afternoon, he plays his ipu with his wife’s friends in a ukulele group at the Q&Q Hawaiian BBQ in Ventura.
At work, Pendergrass keeps a list of new customers at his station so he can greet them by name. He doesn’t own a computer and uses a flip phone. He won't be hurried and is sometimes abrupt, especially when rules aren’t followed or a story is interrupted.
“I’m not done yet,” he says, picking up the tale exactly where he was stopped.
He has earned a pension his friends encourage him to use. Instead, he works overtime and, when asked, on Saturdays. He parks in the slot marked by the sign that says “Parking for Postal Employees 50 years of service ONLY.”
It’s a pattern and a schedule not likely to change.
“I don’t think I’m ever going to retire,” he said. "I have a purpose. I have something to get up to every day."
Tom Kisken covers health care and other news for the Ventura County Star. Reach him at tom.kisken@vcstar.com or 805-437-0255.
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This article originally appeared on Ventura County Star: 55 years later, Ventura's Post Office Bill is still going strong
