The Post Office was promoting National Air Mail Week, which was towards the end of 1946. It was a way to promote the sale of more Air Mail stamps. The Post Office needed a clever gimmick to attract the media. They decided to rig a mailbox with a speaker and a microphone. When the downtown Milwaukee pedestrians passed by the mailbox, located at the southeast corner of Wisconsin Street & Water Street, the mailbox would start talking to the unsuspecting person / persons. The mailbox would make suggestive (1946 style of suggestive) comments to the young ladies, which got a response of giggles from the teenaged women. The same comments given to old ladies would receive a stony stare.

Children loved the voice coming out of the mailbox. The voice said that he was a midget (1946 word for Little Person) stuck inside the postal receptor. Widgie the Midget entertained the young children so much that mothers had a hard time trying to get them to leave.

All of the tomfoolery went on for 18 hours. Finally, somebody figured out where the voice was coming from. The jig was up. In the style of The Wizard of Oz, the man behind the two-way communication device was located directly above the pedestrians. 

It doesn't surprise me that the people couldn't figure it out. I have found that most people think on a two dimensional scale. It probably never occurred to the people to look up. 

I have posted old photographs of the 1946 encounters with Widgie, and I have also posted current photographs of the same building. On that street corner, 3 of the 4 buildings are new. The only old building that is still standing is the same building where the alter ego voice of Widgie was hiding.


YOUNG LADIES HUNTING FOR THE HIDDEN COMPLIMENTARY VOICE
   

OLDER PEOPLE WONDERING WHAT IN THE WORLD IS GOING ON



PEOPLE STARING IN DISBELIEF AT A TALKING MAILBOX


THE MAN BEHIND THE "WIZARD OF OZ" CURTAIN - VOICE BEHIND THE MAILBOX


2011 PICTURE OF THE MAILBOX HOAX. NEWSPAPER BOX IS WHERE THE MAILBOX WAS LOCATED


65 YEARS AGO, PEOPLE WERE LISTENING TO A VOICE COMING FROM A MAILBOX









Tweet