Post Office/Ostermeier Hotel Site

The site chosen for the location of the "new" post office in 1960 was that where many farmers and hungry teamsters sought refuge after having unloaded their livestock at the depot. The old Potosi Hotel founded by John "the Baker" Grosser, whose outdoor brick, stone, and clay Dutch ovens built in 1855 produced countless loaves of bread for the hotel, tavern, and customer deliveries. When Grosser died, his wife married John Ostermeier and continued the hotel business until 1930. A billiard parlor operated in the building in the 1940s, but the once-beautiful Potosi House with Mrs. Grimm's Hat Shop next door gave way to the U. S. postal department -- an arm of government present in Potosi since 1837 and served by three generations of Kaltenbachs as postmasters.