Edgar Britton Sites

"Occupational Studies and Their Application" This fresco of six 9' x 4'6" panels was painted with the help of New Deal funds.

The PWAP funded "nine murals titled “Scenes of Industry” at Highland Park High School in Highland Park, Illinois. The murals were painted on board by Edgar Britton in 1934.  The building was torn down and replaced.  No one knew about the murals until Hana Field, as an eighth grader, did a history project on New Deal art.  She called High Park High School.  A custodian found them, when he decided to look at some things in the attic.  The boards had been saved to cover broken windows.  They are now cleaned and restored and are in the media center." The 9...

Among the New Deal artworks at Lane Tech High School are several frescoes in the school lunchroom, each depicting a different period of "Epochs in the History of Man." These large (12' x 14') frescoes were painted by Edgar Britton in 1937 under the Federal Art Project (FAP), a branch of the Works Progress Administration (WPA).

Two New Deal murals by Edgar Britton adorn the walls of the Waterloo Public Library (the former post office and federal building). The murals entitled "Exposition" (located on the wall over the Youth Office) and "Holiday" (located in the Fiction Department) were painted in 1940.

"Located at the East Moline post office is a mural entitled “Early Settlers of Moline along the Mississippi” by Edgar Britton. Created in 1936, this mural is considered a “fresco." Britton was born in 1901in Kearney, Nebraska. He studied at the University of Iowa from 1918-1920 and was a student of Grant Wood’s from 1920 to 1924. Britton completed seven mural projects for both the WPA and the Section, including a mural in the Department of the Interior in Washington, D.C. While he is best known for his murals—and was, in fact, Director of the mural division of the Illinois Art...

The Decatur post office contains several Treasury Section of Fine Arts murals by Edward Millman, Mitchell Siporin and Edgar Britton. The murals were completed in 1938. Three different halls in the post office contain murals by each artist respectively. Edward Millman Murals: One hall contains a series of three murals, consisting of two panels each, by Edward Millman. The murals are titled “Early Pioneers,” Social Consciousness,” and “Growth of Democracy in Illinois.” The murals show early pioneers and the development of social consciousness, but do so by showing the suffering of soldiers, Indians, blacks, and the common man. A judge or politician dressed...

The Stewart Lee Udall Department of the Interior building contains one of the largest collections of New Deal art in Washington DC, by some of the finest American artists of the time. Edgar Britton painted "Petroleum Industry: Production" and "Petroleum Industry: Distribution and Use" in 1939, with funding from the Treasury Section of Fine Arts. These frescoes to recognize the Petroleum Division of the Bureau of Mines are hung in the 4th floor main corridor, north of the elevator lobby. The Department of Interior Museum offers regular mural tours; check their website for information and registration.  For more information on the Interior building,...