Located in Chicago’s famous Uptown neighborhood at 4850 N. Broadway. It was interesting to research this site.
Interior Murals
Portrait of Carl Sandburg & Portrait of Louis Sullivan, 1943, by Henry Varnum Poor. Each 7'6" x 10'6" Sandburg, Chicago writer and poet, who described the city as "Hog Butcher for the World, Tool Maker Stacker of Wheat..." wrote these words when he lived nearby at 4646 N. Hermitage. Sullivan, principal figure in the Chicago school of architecture, holds a model of the Carson's store (recently renovated) in the mural. He is buried nearby at Graceland Cemetery.
In 1933, the Department of Public Works of Art was created as a relief program for unemployed artists (part of FDR's New Deal.) From that arose the Section of Fine Arts, which sponsored Post Office Murals across the country.
Excerpted from the Uptown site at (
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“In 1943, painter and ceramist Henry Varnum Poor (1887-1970) was hired to create a work of art that would celebrate the people and history of Chicago. Although primarily known for his paintings, after the stock market crash of 1929 he focused on ceramics and murals. His most famous works include frescos at the Department of Justice and Department of Interior Buildings in Washington, D.C. and at Pennsylvania State University. Poor chose as his subject matter Uptown-area resident and poet Carl Sandburg and architect Louis Sullivan, who designed such Chicago classics as the Carson Pirie Scott building. The mural is made of ceramic tile and can be visited during regular post office hours.”
From Gray - Guide to Chicago's Mural's
“Harry Varnum Poor was a nationally recognized artist and ceramist at the time of his selection. The committee chose him over twenty-nine other artists. The tiles for the Uptown Post office were manufactured with a special manganese glaze, then decorated them and realized them in his own kiln in his studio in New York City, New York. The standard New Deal post office had a budget of $650-750: From the allotted funds the artist was required to purchase all the necessary supplies and pay the costs of installation and photographs. Payment to the artist came in three installments: when the initial sketch was approved, when a scale drawing was approved, and when the final panel was verified as in-place by the local postmaster.”
From a Chicago Tribune article dated 12/2/1973:
"Poor did not join the project because he needed the money. He was one of the nonrelief minority who was allowed on the project because many unemployed craftsmen could be put to work executing the murals he designed.”
You can learn more about HV Poor's residence in NY at (
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Building
The inscription to the left of the entrance states that the post office was completed in 1939 and that Howard Lovewell Cheney was the consulting architect. From (
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“Cheney was born in Chicago in 1889 and educated at the Armour (Ill) Institute of Technology and the University of Illinois. Licensed as both an architect and an engineer, he was in private practice for most of his professional career. Cheney did work for the Public Buildings Branch of the Treasury Department from 1934 to 1942, and for the University of Illinois from 1938 to 1940 and again from 1946 to 1948. In addition to the Federal Building in Gary, Indiana, Cheney designed Federal Buildings in Peoria (Ill) and New Orleans, the Federal Building and Court of Peace for the 1939 World's Fair and National Airport in Arlington, Virginia. Cheney was also supervising architect for the construction of the Chicago Tribune Tower in Chicago.”
Entrance Eagles
The exterior entrance is flanked by imposing eagles, sculpted by Croatian-born Paul K. Kufrin. Kufrin immigrated to Chicago and opened an art school in 1910 at Division and La Salle Street. He lived and had his studio in the south Lawndale area until his death in 1973.