ERVING — When Robert Bitzer was hired as a clerk at the Greenfield Post Office, it cost 2 cents to mail a Christmas card. An extra penny would pay for first class.

“We had some awful busy Christmas rushes because everyone sent Christmas cards by the hundreds back then,” Bitzer recalled. Even with extra help called in, it meant long hours of work to connect people with their loved ones all over the country.

More than seven decades later, a lot has changed about Franklin County, and Bitzer has been here to take it all in. A lifelong Franklin County resident, the 97-year-old was recently recognized as the oldest person in Erving. As such, town officials presented him with a certificate and the Boston Post golden cane.

“I was surprised and very thankful that the town of Erving bestowed that honor on me,” the Lillians Way resident said. “It was a lovely ceremony here in my home. I was surprised I was the oldest citizen of Erving. I thought there would be someone older.”

The Boston Post cane tradition began in 1909 when Edwin Grozier, publisher of the Boston Post newspaper, distributed canes to municipalities across New England. Each cane, crafted using ebony wood from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, was originally given to the oldest male resident of a town, but the tradition was expanded to women in 1930. Each town’s name is inscribed on the 14-carat gold head.

The cane presentation came the day after Bitzer turned 97 years old on Nov. 29. He has been an Erving resident for 35 of those years.

A Greenfield native, Bitzer graduated from Greenfield High School in 1945. Though he was drafted into the Army, he ultimately didn’t go overseas as World War II had nearly come to a close.

Instead, Bitzer took on the Post Office job, a position he held for 44 years. As clerk, he saw five or six postmasters come and go prior to his retirement.

After he moved to Erving from Turners Falls, Bitzer chose to serve the town in numerous ways. He spent 32 years as Erving’s representative on the Franklin County Technical School Committee, contributed to the creation of a tourism brochure (complete with his photo of the French King Bridge on the cover), and was a member of the French King Bridge Rededication Committee that helped plan a ceremony and parade in the 1990s.

For all his efforts, Erving dedicated its Annual Town Report to Bitzer in 2013.

The feeling of appreciation is mutual, with Bitzer singing the praises of Erving’s town officials not only for their work improving the town — a new Erving Public Library and Erving Senior & Community Center are two key changes Bitzer has seen in recent memory — but for recognizing him.

“I’m overwhelmed by the town of Erving giving me the golden cane,” he said simply.

Reach Shelby Brock at sbrock@recorder.com or 413-930-4277.