Works Progress Administration (WPA) Sites

In 1936, 550 Works Progress Administration (WPA) workers helped lay 25,000 feet of water pipe around 34th and Adeline Streets in West Oakland, under the auspices of the East Bay Municipal Utility District (EBMUD).  In 1937-38, 400 WPA workers helped the EBMUD lay 15,000 feet of 36" and 30" water main "between 22d and Adeline Streets and Fourth Avenue and East 11th Street", according to a report in the Oakland Tribune.  Since those are both intersections, the implication is that the lines ran from West Oakland across downtown to inner East Oakland; but that needs to be verified. In any case, the newspaper...

"The Old West Palm Beach National Guard Armory (also known as the Palm Beach County Armory) is a historic site in West Palm Beach, Florida, United States. It is located at 1703 South Lake Avenue. On June 11, 1992, it was added to the U.S. National Register of Historic Places. The Armory building was constructed in 1939 in Art Deco style by architect William Manley King with Works Progress Administration (WPA) funds. It was occupied by the National Guard Armory from 1939-1982."

The W.P.A. was responsible for construction of the band shell at West Park in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

"The first West Portal Branch Library was built on a parcel of land which had been transferred from the Board of Education to the San Francisco Public Library in February of 1936. The Branch was opened to the public on May 2, 1936. Just three years later, on May 8, 1939, the Branch was re-opened in a new building designed by architect Frederick H. Meyer and constructed by the Works Progress Administration for a cost of $109,090. West Portal Branch was designed in a Mediterranean style with colorful red, ceramic roof tiles. Inside, delicate paintings grace the ceiling beams." (sfpl.org)

A WPA-FAP stencil from 1939 decorating the children's and main reading rooms.

West Potomac Park lies just below the National Mall and encircles the Tidal Basin.  It is the site of many national landmarks, including the Korean War Veterans Memorial, Jefferson Memorial, Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial, George Mason Memorial, and Martin Luther King, Jr. National Memorial. It is administered by the National Park Service. In the 1930s, Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) enrollees graded, topsoiled, and seeded a one-and-one-half acre hockey field in West Potomac Park. Although nothing remains of the hockey field, that CCC work established the park as a site of sports and athletics. (HABS Survey report).   In 1936, the Works Progress Administration...

"A Seattle sewer project, at West Prospect and Van Buren was allotted $1,140" in WPA funds in late 1937.

The West Pullman School was established in the late 19th century. During the 1930s, the WPA funded two murals for the school auditorium. The roughly 5' x 10' oil on canvas murals, by Ralph Christian Henriksen, are entitled "American Educational System" and "Americanization of Immigrants." The school closed at the end of the school year in 2013. Current status and future plans for the murals are unknown to the Living New Deal.

WPA workers completed several improvement projects at West Queen Anne Playfield between 1936 and 1939. The largest of these projects was the construction of a combination shelter house, grandstand, and baseball backstop near the intersection of West Blaine Street and 2nd Avenue West, at what was then the southwest corner of the playfield. Work on this one-story, concrete structure was completed in 1937. During the following year, WPA laborers painted the shelter house, regraded the baseball field, and added a new layer of top soil. This was followed in 1939 by the installation of a new water and drainage system,...

W.P.A. project description: "West Roxbury Parkway; all the rough work involved in the construction of a road and parking space at the top of Bellevue Hill has been completed. The finished surfacing (bituminous) will be done in the spring of 1938." "Veterans of Foreign Wars, West Roxbury, and Turtle Pond Parkways; the roadsides of these parkways were beautified for their entire lengths by grubbing, grading and seeding. Ten miles, or 176,000 square yards of property was reclaimed."

Works Progress Administration (W.P.A.) workers constructed sewers in West Roxbury, Boston, Massachusetts. From a W.P.A. Bulletin: Keeping pace with the development of Rendal Road and Weld Street district, in West Roxbury, WPA constructed 1200 feet of sewer and pipe drains. Throughout Boston, WPA has laid more than 21 miles of sewer pipe to date.

"The former West Salem City Hall building was a Public Works Administration project, completed in 1936 at a cost of $30,000. This two-story Art Deco style brick building was designed by architect Lyle P. Bartholemew and served as City Hall for the City of West Salem from 1936 to 1949. It is one of only two Art Deco style buildings in West Salem. Until 1949, West Salem was an independent city, in Polk County on the west side of the Willamette River. It's location on Edgewater Street was in the heart of West Salem's business district. After being plagued by...

WPA Official Project No. 65-97-60 allocated $2,267,810 for "repair and reconstruction of the waterfront between 23 and 34 Streets" in the west side of Manhattan along the Hudson River. Another document referred to the project as "modernizing" the area. Much of where the work occurred is now known as Hudson River Park.

"WPA’s legacy is visible today in those and many other ways" in Wilkes-Barre. "Travel was made easier when the East End Boulevard was straightened out and crucial highway links in the Back Mountain and West Side areas were constructed, all by WPA workers."

Then known as West Texas State Teachers College, the campus of what is now West Texas A&M University (WTAMU) was greatly impacted by the New Deal. Notably, multiple sizable construction projects were accomplished with the aid of Public Works Administration (P.W.A.) funds. Many students were involved with various New Deal agencies: In the 1930s, "Frustrated by the parsimony of the Texas Legislature, WTSTC leaders turned to the federal government for help. By conservative estimates, approximately 25 percent of the student body worked for such New Deal agencies as the National Youth Administration (headed in Texas by Lyndon B. Johnson), the Civil Works Administration and...

Thirty men working for the federal Works Progress Administration (WPA) worked to improve West Union Street in Newark, New York, a road which had been previously described by a local newspaper as a "dangerous and hardly passable unimproved road."

The Works Progress Administration built retaining walls for the West Virginia Industrial Home for Girls in the vicinity of Salem, Harrison County.  

The Work Projects Administration (WPA) built the office of the West Virginia Road Commission in Buckhannon. A building plaque states that the project was built by the WPA in 1940 and sponsored by the State Road commission of West Virginia. The gable stone inset bearing the 1939 date suggests that construction begun that year and was completed sometime in 1940. The parcel is listed as district 02, map 2, parcel 19, although parcels 17 and 18 located behind the site are also now state property. The portion of the 1940 building is recorded in deed book 0096, page 313 for 0.82 acres. The...

The WPA partially demolished and reconstructed the West Whittier School in the 1930s. From the photo below: "The West Whittier Grammar School constructed by the WPA in California is a far cry from the little old 'red schoolhouse', of a few decades ago."

"According to a Maryland Historical Trust report, "Westbrook Elementary School (1939) is an important architectural landmark in the history of Montgomery County and its public school. It is the only Federal Public Works school in the county. A plaque in the school's main hall identifies the building as a project of the Federal Works Agency, Public Works Administration and includes the names John M. Carmody, Federal Works Agency and Franklin Delano Roosevelt, President of the United States." Also, according to the school's history page (https://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/schools/westbrookes/about/westbrookhistory.aspx) Westbrook was built with the assistance of WPA labor."

The WPA allocated $149,064.73 to conduct repairs along Westchester Avenue in the Bronx during the 1930s. They conducted work specifically along the 0.6-mile stretch of the avenue between Metcalf Ave. and Grant Circle. WPA Official Project No. 65-97-442.

The Works Progress Administration (WPA) conducted a massive improvement and development project at what was then a municipal airport (now Westerly State Airport), in Westerly, Rhode Island. Description: "Excavate, grade, surface runways install lighting and drainage at the Westerly Airport." WPA Project No. 165‐1‐16‐135; $1,149,411. Sponsor: State of Rhode Island

"Simpkins Hall is located just west of Sherman Hall, on the campus of Western Illinois University, and opened in 1939.   The building at that time was called the “Training School” or “Lab School.”  It was here that Western student teachers, under supervision, practiced teaching in classrooms with actual students.  It served as a training school, until the school moved to Horrabin Hall in 1968.  Today Simpkins Hall houses the Department of English and Journalism. ...What is historically unique about the construction of Simpkins Hall is that it was built during the Great Depression, a time when unemployment was rampant and construction...

Western Kentucky University received money from the PWA for the construction of the Kentucky Building and of Cherry Hall in the late 1930s. WPA and PWA assistance also helped build a new music building. Henry Hardin Cherry Hall, named in honor of the then-recently deceased president of Western Kentucky State Teachers College (now Western Kentucky University), was project number KY 1043-R of the Federal Emergency Administration of Public Works. The building was dedicated in September 1937, the month after Dr. Cherry's death and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1979. The architect was Brinton B. Davis. The contractor...

The Western Promenade is an historic promenade, 18.5 acres (7.5 ha) public park and recreation area in Portland, Maine's West End neighborhood. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and includes a number of historic properties, including the Adam P. Leighton House. The WPA was involved in constructing retaining walls.

W.P.A. Bulletin, 1937: "ew projects will build two huge dikes in Springfield and its sister community, West Springfield, at a cost to the government of $304,000. At its peak, next spring, the projects will employ about 500. ... The West Springfield project will begin near the Eastern States Exposition grounds (inundated during the '36 flood) and extend in a southeast direction to the Agawam bridge embankment. It will include 6000 tons of rip-rap."

Works Progress Administration (W.P.A.) labor worked to develop what is now Westfield-Barnes Regional Airport, then Westfield Air Base. Project details: "Make improvements at airport" Official Project Number: 165‐1‐14‐237 Total project cost: $1,178,513.00 Sponsor: Mayor, City of Westfield "Improve field by clearing, grubbing, and landscaping" Official Project Number: 265‐3‐14‐78 Total project cost: $1,140,506.00 Sponsor: War Department, Corps of Engineers, District Engineer, Providence

The Works Progress Administration (WPA) paved 34 streets in Hartford, Connecticut, including Westland Street, as part of a $2.5 million, two-year paving project begun in 1937. The federal government contributed $1 million.

The Works Progress Administration completed street improvements on Westminster Street in Bellows Falls.

In 1935, the City of Portland Bureau of Planning approved the development of a city park to serve the Westmoreland neighborhood, which had rapidly developed during the previous twenty years without the benefit of any park or playground facilities. The City acquired forty-two acres for the park’s development from the Oregon Iron & Steel Co. (a business owned by Ladd Estate Company, the developer of Westmoreland) in January 1936. Since Crystal Springs Creek ran through the flat rather marshy site, water features were incorporated into the park’s design by Francis B. Jacobberger, a principal in the architectural firm Jacobberger &...

"President Roosevelt signed a $750,000 Works Progress Administration (WPA) project bill for the air base's construction in November 1939. Fourteen hundred WPA and Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) workers cleared the land, and actual construction was started in February 1940." W.P.A. project information: "Construct and improve facilities and grounds" Official Project Number: 165‐3‐14‐23 Total project cost: $4,197,055.00 Sponsor: War Department, District Engineer, Corps of Engineers "Construct telephone system" Official Project Number: 165‐3‐14‐340 Total project cost: $98,526.00 Sponsor: Commanding General, 1st Corps Area, U.S. Army "Construct and improve facilities and grounds" Official Project Number: 65‐3‐14‐715 Total project cost: $1,497,384.00 Sponsor: Commanding Officer, Northeast Air Base, Constructing Quartermaster, Westover Field, U.S. Army

The Works Progress Administration built the Westport School in Westport MN. The structure has a simple, Moderne exterior. Most windows have since been bricked up. Minnesota Historical Society has a photo from initial construction from the Works Progress Administration Collection. That collection "provides numerous views of WPA projects around the state of Minnesota" along with very old photographs (clearly not the case for the relevant imafge here). The town peaked in population in 1940 (104) and since declined to half that amount by 2010, with its post office shutting down in 1966.

An 8' x 6' black granite sculpture of "St. Francis on Horseback" by Beniamino Bufano located in the central courtyard of the project. It was made in 1935 but not placed here until 1945.

Constructed by federal Works Progress Administration (WPA) labor in 1936, the "Westville School is made of gray limestone with an attractive red brick, sheltered, entrance way. The building serves as the high school and is a large, rectangular building. Visible on the porch are two stained glass windows with a large W in the center of each."

The federal Works Progress Administration (WPA) worked to improve what was known as the "Merchantville borough park" in Merchantville, New Jersey ca. 1936. The park in question is most likely what is known as Westwood Park.

Also known as State Road Commission District 6 garage, the structure was built by the Works Progress Administration and sponsored by the Department of Highways. Across West Virginia, the Department of Highways sponsored district headquarters and garages constructed by the Works Progress Administration. All utilized a similar airfoil design, a variation on the Quonset hut design. The structures were built of stone. Although the Wetzel County Garage is not marked with a metal plaque, and there is a gable date is covered by the DOH signing, it is believed this is part of the same design used at other locations ca. 1939-1941. Other garage...

"The high school in Wewoka is of another type of stone and had a large addition as a WPA project. The addition has a WPA marker, but is such a perfect match, it blends with the older portion of the building." --Leaning on a Legacy

Works Progress Administration (W.P.A.) labor constructed a water main along Wharf Rd. in Rockport, Mass.

Between World War I and World War II, the economy of New Bedford changed dramatically. The city’s whaling industry disappeared and textile manufacturing plummeted. In 1937, the city’s unemployment rate was a staggering 32.5 percent. New Bedford was down and out, with many families struggling to survive. The WPA's intervention in New Bedford was intended to boost the city's fishing industry. In 1925, New Bedford fishermen still had to sell their catches at Fulton Fish Market in New York because New Bedford did not have its own fish auction house. Eventually buyers began to come to New Bedford to buy...

"The road improvement project in Whatcom County calls for an investment of $9,955 by the WPA, $7,963 by the Whatcom County Commissioners and will put the roads in the vicinity of Ferndale in the best of condition. Fifteen WPA workers are slated to start clearing, grubbing, grading and surfacing the road the day following Armistice Day anQd will complete the pork in about two months."