The History Fact

The WPA

                                       by Collette

The Works Progress Administration became one of the largest and most successful welfare programs during the New Deal days under President Franklin Roosevelt. Enacted by Congress in 1935, the program provided job for mostly unskilled, unemployed men. At its peak in 1938, more than 3,000,000 men worked at various jobs and projects. The public projects included the building of highways, roads, bridges, courthouses, libraries and schools. The local or state work also included swimming pools, bookmobiles, recreational areas, hospitals, post offices, sidewalks and even hot lunches at schools. Nearly 40,000 new structures were erected and 85,000 were improved.

A much smaller project, but one of the best, was the employment of artists, performers, musicians, actors and writers to bring the arts into areas where people had not been exposed to culture found only in larger cities. Writers chronicled the Depression and wrote instruction or guide books for people’s use.

Artists painted murals on public buildings often depicting the lives and struggles of people in the region. Songs were written and performed across the country, and actors brought plays to the people. Oral history became a part of recorded history as writers travelled around the nation. These recordings stored in the Library of Congress included the only live recordings of what life was like in the South as a slave.

More information about the impact the WPA had on Americans can be found at the following sites:

www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Works_Progress_Administration
www.wpamurals.com
www.vintagraph.com/collections/wpa-posters
http://www.kshs.org/kansapedia/works-progress-administration/15175