U.S. Custom House, Court House and Post Office, Cincinnati, Ohio

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The subject here is an architectural drawing of the U.S. Custom House, Court House and Post Office in Cincinnati, so the photograph records a design on paper rather than the building itself. The federal government put one roof over customs, courts and mail in many American cities in the decades after the Civil War, when Washington was funding large public buildings in the Second Empire style with heavy masonry and mansard roofs. The record gives no date, but drawings like this usually served to present or publicize a proposal and to guide construction. Looking closely at the drawing shows how architects of the period used ornament and scale to signal federal authority in a growing commercial city.

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