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Social Science and History Department

The WPA and AmericaUSA Work Program WPA

Franklin D. Roosevelt created the Works Progress Administration in 1935 as part of his New Deal, an effort to rebuild the economy of the U.S.  Between 1935 and 1943, the year it ended, the WPA employed over 8.5 million Americans. But what exactly did the WPA accomplish? According to the Columbia Encyclopedia, "WPA's building program included the construction of 116,000 buildings, 78,000 bridges, and 651,000 miles (1,047,000 km) of road and the improvement of 800 airports."  

 

The New Deal and the WPA: General Web Resources

A concise explanation of the WPA is available in The American Experience - Surviving the Dust Bowl: the Works Progress Administration. The article points out that "for an average salary of $41.57 a month, WPA employees built bridges, roads, public buildings, public parks and airports." 

EH.Net's Works Progress Administration 
An economics professor offers an interesting and objective analysis of the WPA.

Final Report on the WPA Program 
Published in 1946 and running more than 150 pages, here is the report assessing the achievements of the WPA. Among its most impressive outcomes was the employment of more than 3 million people in 1939.

Gilder-Lehrman Institute of American History - the WPA: Antidote to the Great Depression? 
Nick Taylor is the author of American Made: the Enduring Legacy of the WPA: when FDR Put the Nation to Work (New York: Bantam, 2008). In this article, he offers an overall assessment of the WPA.

The Library of Congress has made available a number of outstanding photographs in The Great Depression and the New Deal, part of its American Memory project. 

How Stuff Works: 12 WPA Projects that Still Exist focuses on some enduring accomplishments of the WPA. Among them are the American Guide Series, LaGuardia Airport, Camp David, and Jackson Pollock's Male and Female.

WPA Night School 
Kenner, Louisiana, 1936; WPA night school for African Americans, Courtesy of the WPA  

Sponsored by the Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt Institute, the New Deal Network offers documents, photographs, and lesson plans. Check out "The Magpie Sings the Great Depression: Selections from DeWitt Clinton High School's Literary Magazine, 1929 - 1942."

For serious researchers, the National Archives and Records Administration has compiled the Records of the Work Projects Administration (WPA) as a finding aid to its holdings. 

Works Progress Administration is NationMaster's evaluation of the WPA. Topics discussed include types of projects, worker profiles, relief for African Americans, employment, and criticism.

Find out how the WPA was significant for African Americans at WPA: the African-American Mosaic.

 

WPA Federal Art Project

WEBDuBois Haiti

By the People, for the People: Posters from the WPA, 1936-1943 offers us a great opportunity to view the Library of Congress' collection of more than 900 posters produced under the auspices of the WPA.

During the years of the WPA, the Federal Art Project sponsored artists and art-related activities throughout thousands of communities throughout the U.S.   

If you would really like to get a sense of how much art was produced during the WPA, take a look at New Deal Art during the Great Depression.

Depression/New Deal Art Photograph Links provides easy access to several online exhibits of photographs from the New Deal era.

WPA poster for WEB Du Bois' "Haiti"
Courtesy of Library of Congress 
 

 

WPA Federal Music Project

The U.S. Works Projects Administration Federal Music Project Collection at the Library of Congress states that the main goal of the Federal Music Project and subsequent WPA Music Program was "to give employment to professional musicians registered on the relief rolls."  Among the interesting subsets is Florida Folklife from the WPA Collections.

WPA California Folk Music Project - California Gold: Northern California Folk Music from the Thirties offers us a multi-media collection including documents, photographs, and recordings spanning a variety of ethnic groups in Northern California during the 1930s.

Chicago Musicians

 

Musicians at tavern on the south side of Chicago
Courtesy of Library of Congress 

 WPA Federal Theatre Project

Horse Eats Hat
WPA Federal Theatre Project "Horse Eats Hat," Courtesy of Library of Congress

 

"Black theater and Yiddish, French, German, Italian, and Spanish language presentations. There has been nothing comparable to it since." - American Treasures of the Library of Congress: Federal Theatre

New Deal Stage: Selections from the Federal Theatre Project, 1935-1939 
This amazing online repository includes thousands of documents, photographs, posters, and costume and stage designs.

Visit George Mason University's Federal Theatre Project Materials Collections to see theatrical posters and set and costume designs for more than 500 Federal Theatre Project productions.

 

WPA Federal Writers' Project

American Life Histories: Manuscripts from the Federal Writers' Project, 1936-1940 
Recordings of thousands of stories of people from various ethnic groups and occupations

Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers' Project, 1936-1938 
This American Memory collection provides access to first-person accounts of slavery and photographs of former slaves.

Do You Speak American? - Power of Prose: the WPA 
On this PBS web site, Christa Smith Anderson discusses how the Federal Writers' Project "nurtured talent and collected voices coast to coast."

National Public Radio - "America Eats" - a Hidden Archive from the 1930s offers audio files featuring commentary on one of the more unusual WPA Writers' projects: America Eats, an exploration of American foodways in the 1930s.

New Deal Programs: Selected Library of Congress Resources - Federal Writers' Project contains a useful article on the Federal Writers' Project, information about manuscript collections and online resources.

NYC American Guide
New York City, American Guide Series, Courtesy of Library of Congress

 
The WPA and Maryland

Maryland WPA workers

Maryland Digital Cultural Heritage - selection of WPA photographs furnishes a look at WPA activities in Maryland.

New Deal/WPA Art in Maryland provides a list and some views of New Deal/WPA Art in Maryland. Check out the Bel Air Post Office's "First Performance of Edwin Booth." 

WPA and CCC: Catoctin Mountain Park tells the fascinating story of how the Works Progress Administration and the Civilian Conservation Corps teamed up to create the beautiful Catoctin Mountain Park.

CCC at a farm, Beltsville, MD, 1933, Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum 



Ask Us

If you would like more information, e-mail us, or contact us through mail or phone:

Social Science and History Department
Enoch Pratt Free Library
Central Library/State Library Resource Center
400 Cathedral Street
Baltimore, MD 21201
Telephone: (410) 396-5321
Fax: (410) 396-1431

 

 

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