''Dangers of the Mail'' is a 1937 mural by

Frank Mechau Frank Albert Mechau (may-show) Jr. (January 1904–1946), was an American artist and muralist. Mechau's aspiration to become an artist began early in his life and developed rapidly. His determination led to a distinguished career that inc ...

installed in the

William Jefferson Clinton Federal Building The William Jefferson Clinton Federal Building is a complex of several historic buildings located in the Federal Triangle in Washington, D.C., across 12th Street, NW from the Old Post Office. The complex now houses the headquarters of the Enviro ...

(formerly the Post Office Department Building), in Washington, D.C. Commissioned by Treasury Department

Section of Fine Arts The Treasury Section of Painting and Sculpture was a New Deal art project established on October 16, 1934, and administered by the Procurement Division of the United States Department of the Treasury. Commonly known as the Section, it was rena ...

, the mural is one of 25

New Deal artwork New Deal artwork is an umbrella term used to describe the creative output organized and funded by the Roosevelt administration’s New Deal response to the Great Depression. This work produced between 1933 and 1942 ranges in content and form f ...

s in the building. ''Dangers of the Mail'' faced criticism and objections at the time of its creation for lewdness and in the 21st century for stereotypical portrayals of Native Americans and depictions of sexualized violence causing a hostile workplace environment. Since the early 2000s the mural has been curtained from public view and is viewable only by appointment.

History

The

mural A mural is any piece of graphic artwork that is painted or applied directly to a wall, ceiling or other permanent substrate. Mural techniques include fresco, mosaic, graffiti and marouflage. Word mural in art The word ''mural'' is a Spani ...

was commissioned through the

in 1935 in a New Deal art project designed to incorporate large works of art in the building. The mural was one of several specified to be "Romantic Subject Matter in the History of the Post" commissioned for the newly constructed headquarters of the Post Office Department. Frank Mechau was recruited for the program by Edward Rowan, then assistant director of the section. ''Dangers of the Mail'' was completed in 1937, installed on the fifth floor of the Post Office Department Building, and unveiled in September.

Description

''Dangers of the Mail'' portrays the

ambush An ambush is a long-established military tactic in which a combatant uses an advantage of concealment or the element of surprise to attack unsuspecting enemy combatants from concealed positions, such as among dense underbrush or behind mo ...

and violent attack by Native Americans on a mail stagecoach and its occupants. Researcher Jessy Ohl describes the main painting as showing three "naked white women (being) scalped in a sexually explicit manner" in the bottom right hand of the painting, where they are shown kneeling and bent awkwardly toward the sky and ground by three Native Americans. ''

The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...

'' in 2000 reported a critic saying of the scene, "That so much plays into the stereotype of the sexually violent savage. He's going to either rape her or scalp her or both". Art historian Karal Ann Marling describes the figures of the women as "clearly female, to be sure, thanks to volumetric mass". Along with the main painting there are five vignettes below the main painting and simpler designs along the top and side borders. The mural is .

Objections

In March 1937, before it had been unveiled, images appeared in a two-page spread in ''

Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, ...

'', which drew "thousands of letters of protest" of the nudity and criticism for historical inaccuracies. Other critics objected to the portrayal of nude female figures being scalped or strangled; some to government-funded portrayals of female nudity and "lewd content". The controversy over the nude female figures eventually required Rowan and Mechau to defend the work, with Rowan making arguments that the nude figures were small and merely "symbolic motifs" and Mechau arguing that the women were being only "roughly handled". Rowan instructed Mechau to finish the work and get it installed as quickly as possible on the expectation that once the mural was in effect a fait accompli, the objections would eventually blow over. He dismissed suggestions that the figures be painted in clothing as likely to result in renewed negative publicity. He recommended Mechau look for historical evidence that Native Americans "actually tore the clothes from their victims" and told him to avoid the press, postal leadership, and legislators. Frank Mechau with Dangers of the Mail

Mechau arrived for the installation with documentation about scalping techniques and, according to art historian Marling, "Indian preferences in the matter of costuming appropriate for victims". The painting was installed in September 1937, after which Bureau of Indian Affairs commissioner John Collier ridiculed Rowan's and Mechau's earlier statements defending the depictions, calling the painting "a slaughter against pioneer women". Washington's ''Evening Star'', without mentioning the nude women, immediately called the mural "Art at its Worst", said it had "shocked all who have seen it", accused "government doles" of "foster ng..radicalism in art", and accompanied its review with a recounting of

Phoebe Atwood Taylor Phoebe Atwood Taylor (Boston 18 May 1909–Boston 9 January 1976) was an American writer of mystery novels. She graduated from Barnard College in 1930 and married surgeon Grantley Walder Taylor in December 1951. Phoebe Atwood Taylor wrote mystery ...

's ''

Octagon House Octagon houses were a unique house style briefly popular in the 1850s in the United States and Canada. They are characterised by an octagonal (eight-sided) plan, and often feature a flat roof and a veranda all round. Their unusual shape and app ...

'', a story of a town so scandalized by an offensive post office mural that members of the community broke in after hours and painted over it. In the aftermath of the early objections to the mural, the Treasury Department Section of Fine Arts developed a new review policy for mural designs that might be controversial. New objections to the mural arose after 2000 when the

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is an Independent agencies of the United States government, independent executive agency of the United States federal government tasked with environmental protection matters. President Richard Nixon pro ...

(EPA) made the building its headquarters. This time a number of EPA employees argued that the mural, along with five others in the building, conveyed stereotypical portrayals of women and Native Americans and contributed to a hostile work environment. A 2005 complaint, filed on behalf of EPA employees regarding six murals in what was then called the Ariel Rios Federal Building, asserted that the various murals depicted Native Americans in a racist manner. As the controversy wore on, ''Dangers of the Mail'' became the primary issue (most of the original complaints were about the ''Dangers of the Mail'', another Mechau mural entitled ''Pony Express,'' and Ward Lockwood's ''Opening of the Southwest'' and ''Consolidation of the West''. Dangers of the Mail by Frank Mechau 1937

Dangers of the Mail by Frank Mechau 1937

In 2007, the

General Services Administration The General Services Administration (GSA) is an independent agency of the United States government established in 1949 to help manage and support the basic functioning of federal agencies. GSA supplies products and communications for U.S. gover ...

, which is responsible for the management of

federal buildings in the United States Federal buildings in the United States house offices of the United States government that provide services to state and city level population centers. These federal buildings are often literally named Federal Building, with this moniker displayed ...

, agreed to install a movable screen in front of ''Dangers of the Mail'' and to "incorporate revised interpretative materials to address the history of the art and the controversy associated with the mural". A "comprehensive interpretive program" was developed for all 22 murals in the building, including Mechau's ''Dangers of the Mail'' and ''Pony Express'', Lockwood's ''Opening of the Southwest'' and ''Consolidation of the West,'' William C. Palmer's ''Covered Wagon Attacked by Indians'', and Karl R. Free's ''French Huguenots in Florida'', which were the ones named in the filing.

Access for viewing

Researcher Jessy Ohl recounts learning of the mural's existence through a colleague at the EPA who told of "a ritualistic practice of viewing the painting for new members of the agency". As of 2019, access for viewing requires scheduling an appointment with a General Services Administration employee.

Critical analysis

In 1982 art historian Marling pointed out that the women in the bottom right of the painting were the only figures in the painting without faces or clothing and that they "(existed) solely to be preyed upon and maimed". In 2015 the '' Colorado Springs Business Journal'' called it possibly "the nation's most dangerous painting". In 2010 Sandra Starr, writing in Smithsonian's ''American Indian'' magazine, called it "easily the most controversial of all these (images of Native Americans in New Deal commissioned post office art)". Ohl in 2019 wrote, "Far from reflecting an impartial or even faintly recorded 'History of the Post', ''Dangers of the Mail'' instead condenses titillating imagery of Western expansion epitomized in early American literature, film, television, and theatrical performance."

References