Ard Godfrey operated the area's first post office in the village of Saint Anthony on the Mississippi's east bank during the early 1850s.

[4] Between 1885 and 1946, Magney & Tusler designed the post office, and designed or co-designed the Foshay Tower downtown, the Calhoun Beach Club on Bde Maka Ska, the Lehmann Center on Lake Street, the Young-Quinlan Department Store on the Nicollet Mall and the former home of Teener's Theatrical costume and props store on Hennepin Avenue among other buildings in Minneapolis.

Its interior is unchanged and postal customers still utilize its original bronze teller cages and fixtures, marble terrazzo floor and sandstone walls.

Perhaps the longest light fixture in the world, a 350-foot (107 m), 16-ton (16256.8 kg) bronze chandelier runs the length of the lobby, originally designed to regulate temperature.

The main building contained a three-room suite paneled in walnut for the postmaster, recreation rooms and a hospital unit for employees as well as a rifle range in the basement.