Sunday, January 02, 2011

New York's Great Post Office

The National Public Radio website features a four-minute audio segment about Manhattan's Farley Post Office titled A Hidden World Inside New York's Great Post Office.

Designed in 1912 by the famous architecture firm of McKim, Mead and White, the Farley building covers two square city blocks is almost completely empty and has been transformed into a "train hall."
 
Tim Gilchrist, president of the Moynihan Station Development Corp. has been working for more than 15 years to turn the abandoned post office into a train station that will take some of the load off of Penn Station.
 
The article points out, "The Farley Post Office was a self-contained city within a city, with a medical wing, photo studio, cafeteria, fitness room, even a jail for any miscreants who tried to meddle with the mail."
 
The building prominently bears the inscription: Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds, which is frequently mistaken as the official motto of the United States Postal Service and once held the distinction of being the only Post Office in New York City open to the public 24 hours a day, seven days a week according to an entry on Wikipedia.
 
To read the entire article and listen to the broadcast, click here.
 
For more on the history of the Farley Post Office, click here.
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posted by Don Schilling at 12:01 AM