BOROUGH OF POMPTON LAKES
HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMISSION
REPORT TO THE PLANNING BOARD AND BOROUGH CLERK RECOMMENDATION FOR DESIGNATION AS A LOCAL LANDMARK UNDER LOCAL ORDINANCE No. 90-08

April 2, 2003 RECOMMENDATION

The Commission held a public hearing at its regular meeting on November 26, 2002, to consider designation of the Pompton Lakes Post Office located in the Borough as a local landmark. After due consideration of the requirements of Local Ordinance No. 90-08 and the report by Sullebarger Associates entitled The Borough of Pompton Lakes Cultural Resources Survey completed in September 1992, the Commission respectfully recommends that the Pompton Lakes Post Office be designated a local historic landmark in the Borough of Pompton Lakes.

REASONING

The Commission considered the following factors in reaching its conclusion:

• Local Ordinance No. 90-08
  It is the judgment of the Commission that the Pompton Lakes Post Office meets the criteria of§ 27-7:A (4) of the Local Ordinance. The Pompton Lakes Post Office was designed in 1936 by Louis A. Simon, Supervising Architect for the Department of the Treasury, and built in 1937 by Shurman Construction Corporation of Passaic, New Jersey. Simon is also the designer of US Post Office buildings in Bronx, New York, the Madison Square Station in Manhattan and a group of governmental structures known as The Triangle in Washington, DC. The Sullebarger report concluded that the Pompton Lakes Post Office meets Criteria C for inclusion on the National Register of Historic Places. Criteria C corresponds to the criteria of § 27-7:A (4) of the Local Ordinance.

• Significant Artistic Content
  The lobby of the building contains a cast stone portrait of Benjamin Franklin by the artist Stirling Calder. Calder was a student of Thomas Eakins and Thomas Anshutz at the Pennsylvania Academy and was instrumental in organizing the sculptor program for the 1915 Panama-Pacific Exposition in San Francisco. Calder's son, the sculptor Alexander Calder, is recognized as making a significant contribution to the development of sculpture in the twentieth century.