She Applied for a Daredevil Job. The Letter Was Lost for 48 Years

Taza Hodson ended up working as a stunt pilot instead
By Rob Quinn,  Newser Staff
Posted Oct 7, 2024 5:12 PM CDT
She Applied for a Daredevil Job. The Letter Was Lost for 48 Years
A vintage British motorcycle.   (Getty Images/the_guitar_mann)

Taza Hodson applied for a job as a motorcycle stunt rider in 1976, and she wondered for many years why she never got a reply. "I was very careful not to let people who were advertising for a stunt rider know that I was female, or I thought I would have had no chance of even getting an interview," the 70-year-old Lincolnshire, England, resident tells the BBC. "I even stupidly told them I didn't mind how many bones I might break as I was used to it." She now knows why she never heard back: The letter was stuck behind a drawer in a post office for 48 years.

Hodson says she recently received her original letter in the post with a handwritten note added: "Late delivery by Staines Post Office. Found behind a draw [sic]. Only about 50 years late." Hodson says she used to look for a response to her application every day, "but there was nothing there and I was so disappointed because I really, really, wanted to be a stunt rider on a motorcycle." Still, the following decades weren't short of excitement: Hodson had a successful career as an aerobatic pilot and flying instructor, the Guardian reports. She also worked as a snake handler and horse whisperer.

Hodson says she was living in London when she sent the letter, and "how they found me when I've moved house 50-odd times, and even moved countries four or five times, is a mystery." She tells the BBC that it "seems incredible to get the letter back after all this time. If I could speak to my younger self, I would tell her to go and do everything I've done. I've had such a wonderful time in life, even if I have broken a few bones." (More United Kingdom stories.)

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