Once upon a time, in the hours before a blizzard that never even flurried, I ran to my local post office to drop off a package and found handwritten notes taped on the doors: CLOSED DUE TO INCLEMENT WEATHER.
First of all, there was no inclement weather.
Secondly, didn't their motto explicitly boast how they were impervious to inclement weather? Especially snow! It's the first one!!
"Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds."
The truth? There is no official motto for the United States Post Office. What people endlessly recite just happens to be engraved on the entablature of the General Post Office Building in New York which opened on Eighth Avenue across from Pennsylvania Station in 1914. William Mitchell Kendall, who worked for McKim, Mead and White (the firm who also designed Penn Station) chose a quote by Herodotus regarding Persian couriers who faithfully kept the messages moving during an expedition by the Greeks in 500 B.C.
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