Motto of the Postal Service

Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.

This is commonly misidentified as the creed of our mail carriers, but actually it is just the inscription found on the General Post Office in New York City at 8th Avenue and 33rd Street.

Here's how the official Web site of the U.S. Postal Service describes the origin of the inscription.

This inscription was supplied by William Mitchell Kendall of the firm of McKim, Mead & White, the architects who designed the New York General Post Office.

Kendall said the sentence appears in the works of Herodotus and describes the expedition of the Greeks against the Persians under Cyrus, about 500 B.C. The Persians operated a system of mounted postal couriers, and the sentence describes the fidelity with which their work was done.

Professor George H. Palmer of Harvard University supplied the translation, which he considered the most poetical of about seven translations from the Greek.

Source: http://www.infoplease.com/askeds/post-office-motto.html

"Neither rain, nor sleet, nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds," explained Vice President, Delivery, Henry Pankey, referring to the postal tribute chiseled in stone at the New York City Post office and the Smithsonian's Postal Museum, former home of the Washington, DC post office. "However, unsafe conditions such as unshoveled snow, icy sidewalks, or even snow plowed against mailboxes can slow or delay delivery."

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