Preserving the Past 1100 PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE
The massive granite Old Post Office building was completed in 1899 to house both the U.S. Post Office Department and the city post office. Designed by U.S. Treasury Department architects under Willoughby J. Edbrooke, it was Washington’s first steel-frame building. Three decades later, the building almost fell to the wrecking ball. Its Romanesque Revival architecture did not match the Beaux-Arts style planned for the Federal Triangle, and it stood where construction of a wing of the IRS building and a circular court on 12th Street was planned. Demolition was delayed, however, following the 1929 world eco- nomic crash. In 1934 the Post Office Department moved across 12th Street, making way for other federal agencies here. Another attempt to raze the building in 1971 was opposed by the citizens’ group Don’t Tear It Down (later DC Preservation League). Two years later, the building was listed in the National Register of Historic Places. The DC city council subsequently adopted the DC Historic Landmark and Historic District Preservation Act of 1978, one of the nation’s stronger local preservation laws. In Washington only the Washington Monument and the Shrine of the Immaculate Conception are taller than the Old Post Office tower. The statue of Benjamin Franklin in front of the Old Post Office originally faced the Washington Post building at Tenth and D Streets (replaced by the FBI Building). Although Post founder Stilson Hutchins commissioned the statue to honor Franklin as a publisher and printer, Franklin also served as America’s first postmaster general, making this is a fitting spot for the tribute.
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