PBS to Highlight 'Barefoot Mailman' Murals at West Palm Beach MO

By LuAnn Warner

Meredith Porte, Television Host/Producer from WLRN-Miami recently took film of the Barefoot Mailman murals that are located in the West Palm Beach Main Office.  The station is producing a documentary on statues in South Florida, and the producer became intrigued when she became aware of the Barefoot Mailman story. The story is told in a six-panel mural entitled “James Edward Hamilton, Mail Carrier,” the most well-known of the barefoot mailmen.

From 1885 to 1892, the Barefoot Mailmen delivered mail each week between Palm Beach, Florida, and Miami, Florida. Because no road existed linking the two communities, the carriers traveled by boat or by walking along the shoreline. The six-day trip followed a desolate path that was fraught with danger. Their fascinating story has been immortalized in paintings, a novel, and a film.

Three of the six panels have studies in the Smithsonian American Art Museum. The panels were commissioned in 1939 by the Us Dept of Treasury fine arts as part of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal Program. The contract was awarded to well-known Postal Artist Stevan Dohanos of Connecticut and was completed in 1940.

The documentary will air in the near future on the Public Broadcast Station.