"To commemorate British gold medal winners at the 2012 Summer Olympics and 2012 Summer Paralympics, postal companies including Royal Mail painted a number of post boxes gold. Each gold medallist had a post box painted in recognition of their achievement, usually in their home-town. It marked the first occasion in modern times that the colour of post boxes in the United Kingdom had been changed from their traditional red. The project was launched on 24 July by painting the pillar box at Westminster Abbey, whilst the first athletes' boxes to be painted were in Lossiemouth, Moray, Scotland, and Penzance, Cornwall, England to commemorate the victory by Heather Stanning and Helen Glover in the women's coxless pair rowing. In addition to the post boxes a first class stamp depicting each medal winning individual or team was produced. On 2 November 2012 it was announced that the gold postboxes would retain their new colour permanently and would be marked with their associated athlete on a plaque."
link
"Anna Rose Watkins MBE PhD (née Bebington, born 13 February 1983), is a British rower.
Double Olympian, Watkins won a bronze medal at the 2008 Summer Olympics, and a gold medal at the 2012 Summer Olympics, both in the double sculls. She has also won four medals in the World Championships, winning gold in successive years, in 2010 and in 2011.
Watkins was born and raised in Leek, Staffordshire, where she attended Westwood College. She studied Natural Sciences at Newnham College, Cambridge, where she started rowing in 2001.
She took her first strokes with Newnham College Boat Club and was captain of lower boats and then secretary for the club. Watkins represents Leander Club in rowing events.
At Cambridge, her college crew were Head of the Cam in 2003, before she moved onto the World Class Start talent identification programme run by UK sport, and based at Rob Roy Boat Club. In 2004, she made her international debut, winning a gold medal in the Coxless IVs at the World Under 23 Regatta in Poznan, Poland with crewmates Natasha Page, Beth Rodford and Alison Knowles.
In 2005, Watkins made her senior international debut with the Women's Eight, achieving a fifth place at the World Championships in Gifu, Japan. She also won an Under 23 bronze medal at the World U23 Rowing Championships in Amsterdam.
In 2006, Watkins switched to sculling and began competing in the double scull, a boat class she has remained with since then. The World Championships in 2006 were on home water at Eton Dorney. Watkins partnered Annabel Vernon, and they came in fourth place, having won the World Cup series earlier that season.
For the next two years, Watkins's partner was Elise Laverick. In this combination, they won bronze medals at both the World Championships and at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. The Olympic medal came after a difficult season battling with glandular fever, and at the time was the closest any British oarswoman had come to an Olympic gold with the three medal winning crews separated by 0.23 seconds.
In 2009, Watkins once more partnered Annabel Vernon and won a silver medal at the World Championships in Poznan, Poland.
In 2010, Watkins joined forces with Katherine Grainger for the first time. In their double scull they had an unbeaten season, culminating in their victory at the World Championships in New Zealand. They were named World Rowing Female Crew of the year and also "The Sunday Times Women's Sports Team of the Year" for 2010. Individually, Watkins became Champion of the Thames in the annual championships, the Wingfield Sculls.
In 2011, Watkins beat Grainger in the British Rowing Team trials. They joined forces again in the double scull and continued their unbeaten run, finishing the season with another World Championships gold. Watkins retained her title in the Wingfield Sculls, setting a new record time.
At the 2012 London Olympics, Watkins and Grainger broke the Olympic record in the semi-final of the double sculls. Subsequently, they won the final to take the gold medal.
Watkins was appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the 2013 New Year Honours, for services to rowing.
In August 2015, six months after the birth of her second child, Watkins announced her intention to return to competition, and to target the 2016 Rio Olympics. Had she been successful, she would have been the first mother to represent Great Britain in rowing, and possibly the first woman to compete in consecutive Olympics whilst having two children in between.
In February 2016, she announced that she was pulling out of the British Olympic rowing programme for Rio 2016, citing her performance, saying 'This is not a decision that I've taken lightly. I guess I would have always wondered about what might have been if I hadn't given it a go.'"
link
The plaque on this post box is as follows.
This post box has been painted
gold by Royal Mail to celebrate
Anna Watkins
Gold Medal winner
London 2012 Olympic Games
Rowing Womens' Double Sculls
The plaque also has the same text in braille.
This post box is situated on Derby Street outside the Henry Moor Institute.