Support Living New Deal Join Our E-Mailing List

Living New Deal NYC

A New York City branch of the LND

Recent Activity Who We Are The NYC Team Videos Contact

If you didn’t know better, you might get the impression that New York City owes its existence to private wealth alone. From NYU Langone Medical Center to Geffen Hall and from the David H. Koch Theater to the Rose Center for Earth and Space, many of the City’s hospitals, cultural institutions, and tourist destinations proudly display the names of private benefactors for all to see. But there was a time—from 1933 – 1943—when the federal government funded and built the city’s public works. The Living New Deal NYC’s Working Group is determined to raise public awareness of that incomparable ten-year period via tours, panel discussions, social and traditional media, and our signage project, which aims to design and mount signs at New Deal legacy sites across the five boroughs of the city.

Recent Activity

Updates & Advocacy

Table of New Deal Projects in New York City

Living New Deal August 14, 2020

By Frank da Cruz, Kermit Project 1939 World’s Fair – WPA Pavilion This is an attempt to list all the tangible New Deal contributions to New York …

Raising the New Deal Flag in New York City

Margaret W. Crane May 22, 2019

Two hundred New Yorkers gathered at the Center for Architecture on May 7 to kick off a Living New Deal initiative to familiarize New Yorkers …

Living New Deal NYC: WPA Pools, Still in Widespread Use in the City, Display New Badges of Honor

Living New Deal August 21, 2020

For immediate release Contact: Peggy Crane, [email protected] WPA Pools, Still in Widespread …

Gordon Parks, “Showing America to Itself”

Jonathan Shipley July 28, 2020

“What the camera had to do was expose the evils of racism, the evils of poverty, the discrimination and the bigotry, by showing the people …

Who We Are

In the spring of 2018, a diverse group of New Yorkers—all ardent fans of the New Deal—came together to form a Working Group charged with bringing public attention to the New Deal’s stunning achievements in the city.

Until the arrival of COVID-19 on our shores, we were meeting once a month at Roosevelt House, a gracious yet modest townhouse on East 65th Street that was home to Franklin and Eleanor during the early days of their marriage. Today, it is part of the Hunter College campus, with Deborah Gardner serving as curator and historian-in-residence. We count ourselves fortunate indeed that Gardner is a member of our Working Group.

All of us dearly hope to meet again in person, once it is safe to do so. But our work continues. In fact, it sustains us.

A special project of the Living New Deal, we’ve built our forces with the help of the organization’s California founders and also through our own networking efforts. The Working Group started out with a half a dozen members, a number that has more than doubled over time, and we’ve also continued to forge relationships with a broad network of like-minded individuals and organizations, including the American Institute of Architects (AIA New York), City Lore, the Museum of the City of New York, FDR Library, and the National Jobs for All Network, among others.

All of us dearly hope to meet again in person, once it is safe to do so. But our work continues. In fact, it sustains us.

As well, we’ve recruited a distinguished group of advisors, who have already helped us advance the cause in important ways. These include:

• Sheila D. Collins
• Teresa Ghilarducci
• Ira Katznelson
• Peter Marcuse
• Ruth Messinger
• Nick Taylor
• Mike Wallace

The Working Group includes people from a wide variety of backgrounds and disciplines, including architecture, history, urban planning, public policy, computer science, journalism, and the arts. What we all share in common is a passion for the New Deal: its physical legacy—visible everywhere you look, if you know where to look!—and its visionary spirit, so urgently needed in our country and our world today.

We invite you to get to know us! Read on for short profiles of today’s New Dealers in a city that’s home to more than 1,000 New Deal legacy sites.

The NYC Team

Deborah Gardner, Working Group Member

Deborah, a founding member of the NYC Working Group, grew up in a New Deal-oriented household. Her mother went to Hunter College and her father went to City College, which were tuition free back then. Both came of age during the 1930s, and both benefited from the institutions of higher learning that helped many first- and second-generation immigrants move up in the world. Read more

Jeff Gold, Working Group Member

Jeff Gold is an urbanist who has earned his living as an acquisitions editor, a partner at new media partnership JIA, and director of the Institute for Rational Urban Mobility (IRUM), an eco-transport nonprofit. He also chairs the steering committee of the Metro New York Health Care for All Campaign and serves on the board of the National Jobs for All Network. And he’s active in electoral politics at the local, state, and national level. Read more

Ruth Messinger, Advisor

Born and raised in New York City, Ruth Messinger imbibed her parents’ passion for FDR and especially for the New Deal as a model for what government could and should do. Her long career as a social worker, celebrated New York City politician, and honored social justice leader reflects and magnifies that passion.

At Harvard University, she was inspired by one of her professors, who started every class saying, “I told Franklin….”—a phrase that seemed to connect her to a living past. Read more

Videos

Contact

To join our efforts as an adviser, institutional partner, supporter, or active member of the NYC working group, please contact us at [email protected].

Watch for our posts on Facebook.

Living New Deal NYC

A New York City branch of the LND

Recent Activity

Updates & Advocacy

Table of New Deal Projects in New York City

Projects

Raising the New Deal Flag in New York City

Events

Living New Deal NYC: WPA Pools, Still in Widespread Use in the City, Display New Badges of Honor

New York Interest

Gordon Parks, “Showing America to Itself”

Who We Are

The NYC Team

Deborah Gardner, Working Group Member

Jeff Gold, Working Group Member

Ruth Messinger, Advisor

Videos

Contact

A New York City branch of the LND

Recent Activity

Updates & Advocacy

Table of New Deal Projects in New York City

Projects

Raising the New Deal Flag in New York City

Events

Living New Deal NYC: WPA Pools, Still in Widespread Use in the City, Display New Badges of Honor

New York Interest

Gordon Parks, “Showing America to Itself”

Who We Are

The NYC Team

Deborah Gardner, Working Group Member

Jeff Gold, Working Group Member

Ruth Messinger, Advisor

Videos

Contact

New Deal Maps