Framed or unframed, desk size to sofa size, printed by us in Arizona and Alabama since 2007. Explore now.
Shorpy is funded by you. Patreon contributors get an ad-free experience.
Learn more.
April 1941. Children jumping rope on the sidewalk of a South Side Chicago street. View full size. Printed from a 35mm nitrate negative shot by Russell Lee.
Mailboxes on the street can be for two separate purposes: a collection box is for the public to deposit their outgoing mail; a relay box is used to store the mail for the next portion of a carrier's walking (as opposed to motorized) delivery route. They look pretty much the same and I believe in olden days were both painted olive drab. Relay boxes are marked, somewhat inconspicuously, "Not For Deposit of Mail," even though that would be impossible even if you tried. They used to be much more common in the days when most mail routes were walked rather than driven, so a marking like that in the photo might be helpful in alerting the public, with just a glance, what kind of box it was. Still, it does seem unusual, and the "Postal Station" marking is kind of a puzzler. I wonder if this was in front of a postal facility?
On Shorpy:
Today’s Top 5