Dessie Newell, perhaps the longest-running newspaper carrier in the history of The Independent, has died. She was 91.

Mrs. Newell began her paper route when the newspaper was the Ashland Daily Independent on Jan. 1, 1950, according to records in the circulation department.

She delivered the paper to 130 subscribers in the Carter County-Rowan County area daily until suffering a fall on Christmas Eve.

“She was a sweet, sweet lady,” said Nat Speaks, the circulation department director. “Always dependable, always reliable.”

David Fraley, one of Mrs. Newell’s sons, said the paper route meant a lot to her. She especially enjoyed it when the newspaper was printed in the afternoon because she used that time to visit with neighbors.

“One of her biggest disappointments was when the newspaper went to the morning edition and she couldn’t see everybody all the time,” he said.

Fraley said he did his share of deliveries over the years as well. “I was on that paper route for 18 years before I left home,” he said. “There was a couple of generations involved with her in some capacity.”

Mrs. Newell started her delivery route with a Chevrolet pickup truck but said in a story in December 2007 that she had other Fords and Chevies that helped her get the job done. Most recently, she and her husband, Gene, used a 1996 Oldsmobile with more than 200,000 miles on the odometer.

“We’ve had three Oldsmobiles, all of them got over 200,000 miles,” she said in that story. Over the years they went through more than 30 cars, she said.

Glenn Holbrook, an independent contractor hauler, has been taking bundles of papers to Mrs. Newell for the past two years.

“I’ve known her and Gene both for years,” Holbrook said. “Good people all the way around. You’d never ask for a nicer person ever. They treated you like you were family.”

Holbrook said they were also always there waiting for him with candy in their hand. “They brought me candy every day,” he said.

Fraley, who lives in Lexington, remembers when the paper route was at its peak with about 400 newspapers to deliver. “I would guess we would leave the house around 1 (p.m.) and get back around 6:30 or 7 (p.m.),” he said. The route went into Morehead, through Soldier, Dry Branch and then back to Olive Hill.

Mrs. Newell grew up on 986 in the Clifty Creek community and was married to Tom Fraley until his death from cancer. They raised two sons, Tom David Fraley, who died in December 2006, and David Earl Fraley. She also had two stepsons, twins Jim and Jeff Newell.

Carrie Mobley of Carter County said she knew Mrs. Newell “all my life” and praised her dedication to the paper route and her customers.

“She worked hard all of her life,” Mobley said. “She was funny, jolly. She was a nice person.”

Mobley remembered Newell’s abilities as a gardener and farmer who once raised tobacco, and continued to plant a few tomatoes in her flower beds after giving up the practice of keeping a large garden.

“She had every kind of flower that could be mentioned,” she said, later adding Newell was experienced at canning the foods they raised in their garden.

Most of all, Mobley said she will cherish the memory of their time together playing rummy during regular weekend card games.

Randy Zeigler of Carter County said he came to Kentucky in 1950 and soon met Mrs. Newell as his paper carrier.

“She was a very faithful person,” Zeigler said, citing fond memories of traveling behind Newell on the road and watching her “dodging back and forth like a hummingbird at a rose bush, going zip, zip, zip across the road,” as she made her deliveries.

David Fraley said his mother loved delivering the newspaper because it kept her active and involved in the community.

“It’s what she enjoyed the most,” he said.

MARK MAYNARD can be reached at mmaynard@dailyindependent.com or (606) 326-2648. Staff writer Tim Preston contributed to this story.