The Letter Carriers' Monument in downtown Milwaukee

The Letter Carriers' Monument is a piece of public art by American artist Elliot Offner, located on a triangular plot formed by North 2nd Street, North Plankinton Avenue and West Wells Street in downtown Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Created in 1989, the monument depicts three letter carriers and was commissioned in celebration of the centennial of the National Association of Letter Carriers (NALC). The bronze sculpture features three figures representing letter carriers from across NALC's history: a white man with a mustache wearing a turn of the 20th century uniform, an African American man wearing a 1939 uniform, and a woman in a contemporary uniform. The sculpture is set on a black granite base with an inscription honoring those who have delivered for America in rain, sleet, and snow.

The monument serves as a tribute to the NALC, whose history began when the United States Postal Service gave employment preference to veterans after the American Civil War. Following the refusal of an eight-hour day, veteran Milwaukee postal workers met in a tavern on Plankinton Avenue on August 30, 1889, to form the National Association of Letter Carriers. They demanded an eight-hour work day, a higher pay scale, a pension plan, and service stripes. Elliot Offner was commissioned through the Franz Bader Gallery in New York to create the monument. He built the maquette in Cambridge, England, and worked with the Tallix Foundry in Beacon, New York, to cast the sculpture before it was transported to Milwaukee by truck.

The site, known as Postman Square or Postman's Porch, has undergone renovations to encourage lunch hour visitors and community gathering. The 1989 centennial celebrations included a parade and exhibits, with more than four thousand letter carriers and their families in attendance. The U.S. Postal Service even issued a postage stamp to commemorate the centennial day. Today, the sculpture remains a permanent tribute to the men and women who have served as letter carriers throughout American history.

Sources: Wikipedia, OpenStreetMap, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons