What happened to the campaign signs?

By Globe Staff

On most election days, voters approaching the polls encounter a colorful array of candidates’ signs. This morning, that scene was absent many polling stations across the state, an odd sight even for a primary election.

At the O'Connell Public Library, in East Cambridge, which usually sports a scrum of placards on voting days, not a single candidate sign waved as of 9 a.m.

Ditto for the polls at Winthrop High School. "I have not had a single person outside with a sign," said election warden Michael Diluiso, a Winthrop police dispather.

The scene stood in sharp contrast to previous Winthrop elections, when voters have had to run a gauntlet of signs touting various candidates for local and state offices. Indeed, after a brief 7 a.m. rush, when the polls opened, the 10 poll workers set up at folding tables in the school auditorium outnumbered voters for much of the morning.

There were a scattering of signs at polling stations in the region.

Outside the Foley Apartments this morning in South Boston, a lone sign holder hoisted a Michael Capuano placard on a wooden stick. A month ago during the municipal election, more than a dozen campaign workers jockeyed for position outside the polling place, forming a gantlet of campaign literature and stump promises.

It was unclear whether candidates and their supporters decided to put there energy elsewhere today or they simply had trouble mustering sign-bearers in the chilly weather.