United States Post Office Annex

About this property

The John O. Pastore Federal Building is a courthouse of the United States District Court for the District of Rhode Island located in Providence, Rhode Island. The building also houses a post office. Post offices in cities such as Providence initially occupied rented quarters in commercial buildings. As the United States became more populous and prosperous, designs for post office buildings were developed. Providence's first federal building and custom house, built in the Italianate style, was constructed 1855-1857. As the city grew, the need for more space became apparent. In 1908, a new courthouse, post office, and custom house building in the Beaux Arts style was erected at the northeast end of Exchange Place Mall (now Kennedy Plaza). Both of these buildings remain on their original sites and are listed in the National Register of Historic Places. By the late 1920s, the need for additional space again became urgent. The city selected a site adjacent to the 1908 Federal Building and U.S. Courthouse. A local architectural firm, Jackson, Robertson & Adams, received the commission to design an annex to the Beaux Arts building. This firm also had designed the Providence County Courthouse, an addition to City Hall, the State Office Building, and the Rhode Island State Airport Terminal at Hillsgrove. Cornerstone laying ceremonies took place in September 1939. The post office annex, as it was then called, was completed by May 1940 at a cost of $896,000. The U.S. General Services Administration acquired the building in 1961. Renamed in 1977 for former Governor and U.S. Senator John O. Pastore, the building was listed in the National Register in 1984 as a contributing building to the Downtown Providence Historic District, and individually in 2017. A product of the New Deal-era Works Progress Administration (WPA), the three-story Pastore Federal Building is an example of Stripped Classical architectural style, with Art Deco elements. The Stripped Classical style features classical design tenets, such as symmetry and historical references in ornamentation, but is simple in its execution. Art Deco is noted for low-relief geometrical designs, accents in terra cotta and glass, and exterior wall coverings such as concrete, smooth-faced stone, and metal. The building's exterior materials are red brick and limestone, with a granite base. A two-story, five-bay limestone frontispiece graces the east facade. A granite balustrade extends between the two entries, while a concrete and granite ramp was added to the south entrance in 1983. Streamlined pilasters are centered between the bays of windows and doors. A simple cornice with square dentils extends along the top of the frontispiece, and is echoed by a streamlined band of limestone along the roof's edge. Bronze-clad double doors are at each entrance. Projecting, gabled brick pavilions are located at either end of the facade. Each has centered windows framed with a limestone surround.

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Property data from the National Register of Historic Places, National Park Service (public domain).

Description adapted from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

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