Paperboy Has Delivered Papers, 365 Days/Year - For 28 Years

<snip>

To call Eric Smith a legend is probably unfair ... to other legends. They'd never be able to keep up with him.

In some ways, he has a simple job. He delivers The Chronicle, roughly 1,000 issues every morning in the Berkeley hills. That means getting up about 2 a.m., getting on the road before 4 a.m. and tossing newspapers for the next two to three hours. Sound tough?

We haven't gotten to the hard part yet. Check this out.

Smith, who turns 65 next month, has delivered papers seven days a week, 365 days a year for the past 28 years -- without a day off. That works out to about 10 million deliveries.

"It is labor intensive and detail intensive,'' Smith says. "You've got to put your heart and soul into it.''

He has. And that is why it is such a laugh that a couple of cheap scam artists thought they could fool his customers with a Christmas card, seeking holiday tips. They slipped fake cards -- complete with their home addresses -- into the papers of several of his customers last week after Smith delivered them, hoping no one would notice.

Here's the problem. Subscribers up on Grizzly Peak Boulevard know their newspaper carrier. Their newspaper carrier is a friend of theirs. And these guys were not their newspaper carrier.

Frankly, in the annals of crime, you'd have to say that these two are unlikely to go down as criminal masterminds. For starters, just as a general rule, you don't want to provide your address at the scene of the crime.

Second, if you are going to rip someone off, you might be better off not to pretend to be taking the place of one of the icons of the neighborhood.

I don't want to tip anybody off or anything, but if the guys who tried to pull this Grinch-like trick are reading along, this would be a good time to make a run for it. The police have been notified, and because you left your addresses -- one in Pinole and one in Richmond -- on the back of the card, I'm guessing it won't be that hard to locate you.

The authorities are looking forward to seeing you guys, though, because this is a first, according to police in Berkeley and circulation bosses at The Chronicle.

"I've never seen it,'' says Berkeley Officer Shira Warren, the department spokeswoman. "I've been here six years, and I have never heard of it. But I have heard of that newspaper carrier.''

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2005/12/20/BAGJEGAILA1.DTL&type=printable