Merchant Exchange Building

Before it went up, merchants conducted business in taverns and coffee houses along the Delaware riverfront. Rising on a triangular plot bounded by Dock, Third, and Walnut Streets, the building brought operations together under one roof, housing marine insurers, the Board of Trade, and a post office that was the first in the country to sell stamps. Its design features classical orders and a lantern modeled on the Choragic Monument of Lysicrates.

The structure now serves as National Park Service headquarters, but anyone can step through the Third Street entrance to browse a first-floor public exhibit on the building's history.