Miss O'Connell was a stenographer at the American Railway Association, but she was not responsible for the artwork she is propping up. The artist behind this design was actually Martin H. Gambee (1905 - 1969) who was attending the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, New York at the time.

The contest attracted 5,000 poster entries and 20,000 slogan entries. The announcement of his win was in February 1924, but the award presentation was not made until May 10, 1924 in Washington, D.C. The poster was used in a safety campaign from June through September 1924. Gambee's photo and more details of the contest are below.

Where it all began (NYT link):

I give you my crude and amateurish attempt at colorization. It shouldn't take long to see that I am inept at Photoshop so I cheated with a quick cut & paste.

[Certainly an improvement on her boring gray poster! - Dave]

"Railroad crossing, look out for the cars. Can you spell that without any R's?" Wish I had a nickel for every time I heard it in the '50s.

One of those Shorpy moments I regret the monochrome - I would love to see the colours in Miss O'Connell's dress. The Futurist sleeves could have come straight out of the film "Metropolis" and must have been the cutting edge of fashion in 1924.

This may be a watercolor painted on an illustration board or watercolor board. Note the hand lettered headline. The subhead (Cross Crossings Cautiously) looks to be typeset and could have been pasted onto the artwork. The next step would be to take it to the engraver for printing plates (if this was meant for reproduction)!