• Bryant Park - New York NY
    Bryant Park was redesigned and rebuilt between 1933 and 1935 with the help of New Deal funding and Civil Works Administration labor. The project was supervised by the Parks Department, led at the time by Robert Moses. The central role of the New Deal in the reconstruction of the park has received little recognition, with most of the credit going to Moses' Parks Department. Yet, New Deal support was substantial. Moses himself stated for the NewYork Times that " the projects of 1934, with the exception of the parkways, were done almost entirely with relief labor," mentioning the reconstruction of Bryant...
  • Central Park Zoo - New York NY
    The Central Park Zoo was built over the course of eight months in 1934 by workers employed by the Civil Works Administration and, after that program’s demise, by the Federal Emergency Relief Administration. It succeeded the old Central Park Menagerie, a once popular attraction that by the early 1930s was so severely dilapidated that Parks Department officials feared its lions and tigers would break out of the rotted wood structures that housed them. Newly-appointed Parks Commissioner Robert Moses set about replacing the menagerie, not with a full-sized zoo, but with what he called a “picture-book zoo”—a smaller-scale facility meant as...
  • Central Park: Arsenal Improvements - New York NY
    The Central Park Arsenal was built 1847-51, but served only briefly in that function.  After 1853, it was a police precinct house, the American Museum of Natural History, a menagerie, an art gallery, the Municipal Weather Bureau, a restaurant, and, finally in 1914, the Manhattan Parks Department. In 1934, the five borough Parks Departments were consolidated into a unified New York City Parks Department. Then, the Arsenal was overhauled by Depression-era relief labor paid for by New Deal programs.    The architect for the project was Aymar Embury II, who was the chief designer for New Deal/Parks Department projects around the city (the Wikipedia entry on Embury says that, "it is...
  • McCarren Park Improvements - Brooklyn NY
    The sizeable McCarren Park in Brooklyn (Williamsburg) dates to the early 20th century, but received several additions in the 1930s with New Deal support. The best known of these is the WPA pool that opened in 1936.  But the Department of Parks also announced the reconstruction of the park's play facilities in August 1935 and the addition of sixteen handball courts and a roller skating rink in December 1936. As researcher Frank da Cruz explains here, almost all New York City Parks Department projects between 1934 and 1943 were accomplished with New Deal support. From April 1935 on, the WPA quickly...
  • McCarren Park Pool - Brooklyn NY
    The New York City Department of Parks & Recreation explains that: "McCarren Pool was the eighth of eleven giant pools built by the Works Progress Administration to open during the summer of 1936. Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia attended the dedication on July 31, 1936. With an original capacity for 6800 swimmers, the pool served as the summertime social hub for Greenpoint and Williamsburg. The building’s vast scale and dramatic arches, designed by Aymar Embury II, typify the expansive and heroic spirit of New Deal architecture. The pool was closed in 1984 but in 2005 the site was resurrected as a performance space,...