| U.S. Post Office and Mine Rescue Station | |
| Location: | Main and 2nd Sts., Jellico, Tennessee |
| Coordinates: | 36.5897°N -84.1261°W |
| Architect: | Oscar Wenderoth, W. H. Fissell |
| Architecture: | Beaux Arts |
| Added: | February 10, 1984 |
| Refnum: | 84003467 |
The U.S. Post Office and Mine Rescue Station in Jellico, Tennessee, is a historic building built in 1915 to house two U.S. federal government functions.[1] It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1984.
The first floor of the two-story Beaux Arts-style building was a post office and the second floor was devoted to the activities of the U.S. Bureau of Mines and a local mine rescue organization serving the coal mining region around Jellico.[1] Mine rescue stations were outfitted with equipment needed to respond to underground mining accidents and served as sites for conducting training of local mining personnel.[2] Congressman Richard Wilson Austin, who represented the area in the U.S. House of Representatives, was credited with obtaining authorization for the building's construction, which cost about $80,000 (equivalent to about $ today).[1] Design of the building was by the Office of the Supervising Architect; design work was started by James Knox Taylor and completed by Oscar Wenderoth. It was built in 1915 and dedicated the following year.[2] The building was considered to be unusually fine for a small town like Jellico.[1] A contemporary account suggested that it might be characterized as "government pork".[1] The facilities for the Bureau of Mines were described as the "best ... hitherto given to this organization". In addition to offices, a lecture hall, and electrical connections for a "motion-picture machine",[1] these facilities included a smoke room, equipped with an exhaust fan, which was used in training miners in the use of breathing apparatus for mine rescues.[1] [3]
A similar combination post office and mine-rescue station was later built in Norton, Virginia. Norton is the only other U.S. community ever to have had a combined post office and mine-rescue station,[2] [4] although one was proposed for Hazard, Kentucky.[3]