United States Post Office and Courthouse (Knoxville, Tennessee)
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Knoxville Post Office
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| Location | 501 Main St. Knoxville, Tennessee, USA |
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| Coordinates | 35°57′39″N 83°55′8″W / 35.96083°N 83.91889°WCoordinates: 35°57′39″N 83°55′8″W / 35.96083°N 83.91889°W |
| Area | 1.9 acres (0.77 ha) |
| Built | 1934 |
| Architect | Baumann and Baumann |
| Architectural style | Moderne, Art Deco |
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| Added to NRHP | May 31, 1984 |
The United States Post Office and Courthouse, commonly called the Knoxville Post Office, is a state building located at 501 Main Street in Knoxville, Tennessee, United States. Constructed in the early 1930s for use as a post office and federal courthouse, the building contains numerous Art Deco and Moderne elements, and is clad in Tennessee marble. While the building is still used as a branch post office, the court section is now used by the state courts. The building is listed on the National Register of Historic Places for its architecture and political significance.
The Knoxville Post Office is a three-story structure occupying the lot bounded by Main Street, Locust Street, Walnut Street, and Cumberland Avenue. The building measures 250 feet (76 m) by 138 feet (42 m), and contains 123,000 square feet of gross space. The first floor is used primarily for the post office, while the upper floors contain the court room and offices. The lot includes a large parking lot behind the building, mainly for postal service vehicles.
The building was constructed using six different types of Tennessee marble, a locally quarried stone used in monumental buildings throughout the United States. The exterior, clad mostly in Tennessee "pink" marble, includes a facade of imposing columns, Moderne-style cylindrical molding along the roofline, and four eagle statues carved by Candoro Marble Works sculptor Albert Milani (1892–1972). The entrances are located at the corners of the building, while the front of the building contains aluminum casement windows and a sunken courtyard. This courtyard is masked by a retaining wall built of red Tennessee marble, and topped with Art Deco light fixtures.
The interior of the building contains numerous Art Deco elements, namely grillwork with floral motifs, floral patterns in the entrance transoms, aluminum spandrels on the upper floors with floral and zigzag patterns, and a plaster ceiling with aluminum floral and zigzag moldings (this ceiling was later hidden by the installation of a tiled ceiling in the 1960s). The first floor contains a marble floor and marble, aluminum, and bronze paneling. The courtroom floor is made of cork wood.
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