Show Us Photos Of Your Post Offices!

Not my home post office, but I can claim some tenuous connection to it and just visited while on a very brief, but quite pleasant vacation, in the "mountains" of western North Carolina. At 3,333 feet elevation, Boone, North Carolina, is apparently the highest county seat and town above 10,000 population east of the Mississippi.

This was a WPA project completed in 1940 and then dedicated by James Farley, Postmaster General. At the time Boone's population was only 1,788 yet an estimated 2,500 showed up for the ceremonies, perhaps in part because Farley had just started to campaign for President against Roosevelt. The post office also appears to have been an anchor for the then community as it is right in the center of town.



The PO is on the National Register of Historic Places and we stopped in to mail postcards and to see the WPA mural by artist Alan Tompkins. I'd just learned Tompkins was my sister-in-law's previous father-in-law. His "Daniel Boone on a Hunting Trip in Watauga County" is on canvas and measures 11' 8" x 4' 6." The town is named for Boone who camped there several times and whose sons settled there, hence the subject for the mural.



While the tones of the mural seem a bit muted, and likely have faded some in 81 years, much of the PO appears to be in a good state of maintenance in its original state. The numerous PO boxes are just lovely.

Only one of the four service windows is still in active use. It's labeled "Stamps" and we enjoyed quick courteous service. Next to it the window "General Delivery/Stamps" is unused, as are the following two which still have sharp clear lettering from the 1940s offering long-discontinued services.

Boone, NC:

What beautiful window signs! It is so nice to see these buildings treasured, restored and maintained.

There are going to be two (or more) dates and possible ceremonies associated with these Depression-era post offices:

The cornerstone laying date.
The opening day a year or two later with a the formal dedication ceremony for the building, very near this opening date.
The mural dedication date (if any).

Issue #17768 of the "Postal Bulletin" dated Sept 1, 1939, notes the Boone, NC post office the moving to the new "Federal Building" effective July 27, 1939, so I suspect Farley was there in 1939, rather than in 1940, as the local lore may suggest.

(Not the best) photo of the West Acton MA "brick cube" PO

Not one of my two usual Post Offices, but it was on my route the other day and so I stopped and mailed an media/book rate package from the Chester Springs, Pennsylvania, USA, Post Office.

Eminently undistinguished architecture, but the package arrived in a couple days at its destination, so it did the job.

We do not have post offices in the Netherlands. But here is a Spanish post office in San Lorenzo de El Escorial (located about 200 metres from the Royal Monastery) where I was on Friday to buy stamps for postcards. Thanks to a post by Roberto (?), I could tell the staff a stamp to Russia costs €2.10 and a 'C' tariff stamp would not suffice. They had not noticed the fourth basic tariff yet.

Domestic (A), European (B) and worldwide except some exceptions (C) tariff stamps are sold in packs of 5. Interestingly, since they did not have € 2.10 stamps, they gave me 'A' tariff stamps from the stock book plus make-up value stamps. So, they do have those other than in packs of five stamps.

Lunenburg MA

Lexington MA

Orange MA

The Post Office at the end of the thoroughfare just outside the town gate in Taormina (Sicily). Italy.



I walked out of there having just bought € 116 worth of stamps to send postcards to friends.

The main post office in Enna (Sicily), Italy. The town of Enna is Italy's highest provincial capital atop a hill at an altitude of 1,000 metres. From the back of the post office you can see a deep gorge with the town of Calascibetta atop a somewhat lower hill on the other side of it.

The post office in Erice (Sicily), Italy, a town about five kilometres from the shore as the crow flies at an altitude of ca. 750 metres. Some Roman Historians claim the town was founded by Aeneas (from Troy), the ancestor of Romulus, founder of Rome.

The main post office facility on Via Roma in Palermo, Sicily's capital.
The post office itself is at the back of the building.

The post office on the island of Ortigia, the ancient city of Syracuse's old town (Sicily). The stock I bought in Taormina was not enough. I spent yet another € 24 on stamps.

Many of the Depression-era designs were re-used in multiple locations. Here is the PO in Marengo, Iowa taken in August 2019:


And here is the PO in Linton, Indiana, also from August 2019:


Both have cornerstones dated 1931 and both have this window above the front door (this one from Linton):


Both have had various degrees of remodeling and updating. No mural in either one.

John - interesting and a good way to show that policy!