| The Carthage Post Office is the most signficant of the major public buildings in Carthage, and its prismatic quality, inherent in the rigid, punctured outer walls, can be traced to the Art Deco style. The amalgamation of this attribute with a hipped roof and cupola, typically Georgian Revival features, is distinctive. Overall, the proportions and detailing are refined and carefully designed. This building was designed and built under the direction of Louis A. Simon (1867-1958), Supervising Architect of the Treasury from 1933 to 1939 and subsequently Supervising Architect for the Public Buildings Administration of the Federal Works Agency, and was it built under the auspices of the Federal Works Agency. As was common for small-town post offices in the late 1930s, this building was built from standardized plans that were used for other post office buildings elsewhere in the United States. This design was used for post offices in LaGrange, Indiana; Hawarden, Iowa; Carthage, Mississippi; Bethany, Missouri; Rugby, North Dakota; Tillamook, Oregon; Beresford, South Dakota; and Hudson, Wisconsin. The post office in Carthage was individually listed on the National Register on 21 April 1983 (as a component of the "U.S. Post Offices, 1931-1941" thematic group), and it was later included as a "previously listed" element (element #98) in the Carthage Historic District, which was placed on the National Register in 2012. It is included in "Buildings of Mississippi" (2020) (p. 209, within the listing for the Leake County Courthouse, EM1). |