LYNN — It may be only temporary, but Swampscott’s Brenda Martin still relishes her next opportunity with the U.S. Post Office.
Martin, who has been with the Post Office for 34 years, will be the interim postmaster in Lynn, effective today. She has no idea how long she’ll be in this assignment, but she’s excited even if it lasts only two weeks.
“I’m excited for the opportunity, however short it might be, to work in my hometown, and in the Lynn Post office.
“This is really the most important position I’ve had since I joined the Post Office,” she said Monday.
Martin will replace current Lynn Postmaster Dean Baker, who is being temporarily reassigned as a plant manager for training purposes, said Steve Doherty, a spokesman for the Post Office.
Martin, who also coaches outdoor and indoor track at Lynn English, has served as the postmaster in Danvers, but for the last two years she’s been in the district office at Fort Point in Boston.
She’s done it all, as far as post office duties go. She carried mail in Peabody “for a few years,” and became postmaster in North Reading for her first management assignment.
“Those (North Reading and Danvers) are small offices,” she said. “Lynn is considered a big office, as it covers West Lynn, Swampscott and Saugus too.”
Martin, who grew up in East Lynn, and attended Eastern Junior High (now Marshall Middle School) and English, says the Post Office has been good to her.
“They’ve always allowed me to coach,” she said. “When you’re a postmaster, it’s a long day. But they’ve allowed me to adjust my schedule so I can coach.”
After graduating from the University of New Hampshire, Martin began as a substitute teacher in the Lynn school system.
“This was in the days of Proposition 2½, and no one was hiring teachers,” she said. “I needed something with benefits. Someone suggested I take the civil service exam and I passed it.
“I just needed security for my family.”
Martin is married to Vernon Dinnall and has three children, Nathan, Adrienne and Olivia.
She said life at the Post Office has been good.
“For me, it’s a great place to work,” she said. “I’ve had close friends there for 25-30 years. They’re good people. The carriers work hard. It’s not a place where people slack off.”
And that goes double for the next month.
“These guys are going to be working their tails off,” she said. “They’ll be handling 200 parcels a day. But I say to people ‘this is our time to shine.'”
Martin said the focus has shifted during her time at the Post Office, with more parcels than letters.
“Letter mail has gone way down because of the Internet,” she said. “Now, we deal mostly in packages. Amazon, FedEx and UPS give us all their packages.”
