Playgrounds Sites

Parks received the property for this park from the Department of Water Supply, Gas and Electricity in 1940. It completed this playground, originally called the P.S. 166 Playground after the adjacent school, in June 1941. The press release announcing the playground's opening explained the WPA's work: "New concrete street curbs have been installed along 35 Avenue and Steinway Street and the existing concrete sidewalks have been widened to 18 feet. A 5 foot wide granite block panel extends along the inside of the fence with benches spaced between the new 3 inch calipher pin oaks. A battery of kindergarten swings for pre-school...

The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) built the first toboggan slide. The original toboggan slide was built by the CCC 'boys' for their own recreational use while they were working on the park between 1934 and 1942.   It was so popular with the public that it has since been rebuilt, enlarged and remodeled several times, so the current structure is not the original nor contains any part of it. The toboggan slide is not marked as CCC, but the CCC is commemorated in other parts of Pokagon Park.  A permanent exhibit in the Nature Center lists all the structures they worked on and...

In Battle Creek, Michigan the WPA undertook a $10,000 "project for construction of a playground in back of the Post school." The status and exact location of the then-Post School and the playground are presently unknown to Living New Deal.

The Works Progress Administration (WPA) improved San Francisco's Potrero Hill Playground (the present Potrero Hill Recreation Center) in the late 1930s, when WPA relief workers built the children's play area, tennis courts and a restroom (Healy, p. 66). Both the playground and the tennis courts are still there, but have been completely redone in recent years. We did not find the restroom. It is possible that the quonset hut-style Recreation Center Field House is a later New Deal project, but we do not have confirmation of that.

In 1942, the Washington Post reported the allocation of $21,010 to the Federal Works Agency (FWA) for new construction and improvements to the Powell Recreation Center on 16th Street NW.

Private First Class Thomas Norton Memorial Playground, located on Nostrand Avenue south of Kings Highway, was acquired by the Parks Department in 1940 and completed by the WPA in 1941. The press release announcing the playground's opening described the WPA's work: "The half-acre area has been intensively developed in units designed for various age groups. The kindergarten section contains a sand pit, slides, swings and see-saws together with seating accommodations for mothers and guardians of children. Adjoining this is a space devoted to older children equipped with swings, slides and exercise unit. The central area contains a shower basin and a...

The playground inside Prospect Park, located at the eastern end of 10th Street, was one of 11 Works Progress Administration (WPA) parks that opened April 4, 1936.

In August 1941, the WPA completed the construction of extensive improvements to Prospect Park in Brooklyn. The work was focused along the West border of Prospect Park between Garfield Place and 15th st., where the WPA built "marginal playgrounds, two sitting areas with sand pits, walks and bicycle path" to supplement the new bandshell, which had been added in 1939. Specifically, this work included: “a semi-circular sitting area, 100 feet in diameter,” with “a large central sand pit and a continuous row of benches for guardians of the children“ opposite 13th St., as well as a similar sitting area and sand...

On August 23, 1941, Parks announced the completion of a new WPA playground at Lincoln Rd. and Ocean Avenue (now known as the Lincoln Road Playground): "The playground at Ocean Avenue and Lincoln Road, approximately one-half acre in size, is semi-circular in shape, paved with asphalt so as to provide year round usage and equipped with a shower basin-, a sand pit, kindergarten swings, slides, see-saws and a pipe frame exercise unit. A large open area provides space for general play, skating, and organized games. Around the perimeter continuous benches have been provided for mothers and guardians. A new brick comfort station...

The NYC Department of Parks announced the official opening of Pulaski Park (named in honor of Revolutionary War soldier Casimir Pulaski) on October 11, 1939: "The park was named in honor of Pulaski ten years ago. The reconstruction was done by WPA forces under the jurisdiction of the Department of Parks. Included in the development is a small children's playground, equipped with apparatus and shower basin, a sitting area for mothers and children, and a large paved recreation area containing softball diamonds. There are also four handball courts, four horseshoe pitching courts, four shuffleboard courts, a volleyball and basketball court included in...

Parks acquired this land to the West and the South of the WPA's Queensbridge Housing development in 1939. The press release announcing the completion of a WPA playground on the site in July 1941 explained: "The southerly section lying alongside and under the bridge structure has been developed for specialized intensive forms of recreation adapted to the needs of various age groups. Central to this section is a new comfort station located on the line of 10 Street and surrounded by play apparatus for small children: sand pit, wading pool, swings, etc., and extending to the east a series of game...

The Works Progress Administration (W.P.A.) beautified the grounds of what was then known as Jordan High School, now Ramsdell Middle School. "The redeveloped and newly landscaped grounds are on the Old Erie Canal site."

A 1938 report from the Los Angeles Department of Playground and Recreation describes the WPA's role in creating the Rancho Cienega recreation area: "Forerunner of the great regional recreation centers of the future, the Rancho Cienega Playground was the outstanding addition to the Los Angeles recreation system in 1938. The area comprises thirty acres in the southwest section of the city, along Exposition Boulevard near La Brea Avenue. It is the largest municipal playground devoted exclusively to sports and recreation within the city. The site was donated by Mrs. Anita M. Baldwin in response to a request made by the Los...

Randall's Island Park cover more than 400 acres of the 500+ acre island.  It contains dozens of tennis courts, baseball diamonds, soccer fields, playgrounds and other recreational facilities, as well as paths, greenways and a marsh.  Frank da Cruz summarizes the extensive New Deal renovation and expansion of Randall's Island Park: "Randall's Island itself, which (with neighboring Ward's Island, now joined to it) lies in the East River between East Harlem, the South Bronx, and Astoria, Queens... Prior to the New Deal it housed institutions such as an orphanage, a poor house, a reform school, a potters field, a refuge for sick and/or...

The Raymond M. O'Connor Park and the Kennedy Playground within it were developed with federal relief funds in the 1930s. The Works Progress Administration (WPA) completed work on the park in 1935. The NYC Parks site explains that the park "was established as part of the massive expansion of recreational facilities, largely through Federal emergency relief funding, which took place in the 1930s under Parks Commissioner Robert Moses. In 1931 the city purchased property in the Bayside neighborhood of Queens for $95,000 to create a public playground and thoroughfare... the land was landscaped with lawns, shade trees and sidewalks by...

In 1936, the Washington Post reported that Works Progress Administration (WPA)  crews had done unspecified work at the Raymond Recreation Center, which was likely constructing the playground. This work was part of a  nearly $1 million WPA program of park and playground improvements in 1935-36. In 2013, the playground was renovated again; the image shows this construction underway.

Montpelier's Recreation Field was developed as a New Deal project in 1938-9. The Public Works Administration (PWA) provided a $45,000 grant for the project, whose total cost was listed as $100,052. PWA Docket No. Vt. 1088-F. The facility was described in Annual Reports of the City of Montpelier. The 1939 report , detailed the park development's progress at that date: The Recreational Field ... is located on the Worcester Branch road, 1 2/5 miles from the corner of Main and State Street. The project consists of a Swimming Pool approximately 350 feet long, 150 feet wide and about 11 1/2 feet deep in the...

Red Hook Park in Brooklyn was one of several major parks and hundreds of playgrounds created in New York City with Federal funds in the New Deal era. In this 1938 text, Robert Moses describes the work accomplished in New York City parks, including Red Hook, by relief workers: "There are today 372 playgrounds, ranging from small neighborhood plots of a quarter acre to large developments such as Macombs Dam Park in The Bronx, Red Hook and McCarren Parks in Brooklyn, and Randall's Island, adjacent to the East Harlem section of Manhattan, all developed to take care of every type of recreation for both children and...

On December 4, 1941, the NYC Department of Parks announced the start of construction on two new playgrounds in the Bronx, including what is now known as Rienzi Playground. The release explains that the WPA was removing sixteen 1-3 story brick buildings in preparation for the WPA construction of the play area, which would include: volleyball, basketball, tennis, handball and shuffleboard courts; a wading pool; a brick comfort station; slides, swings, seesaws, a sandpit and an exercise unit; and a softball diamond. Though begun by the WPA, however, the work was only completed later. The NYC Parks Department website, as well...

"Repairing and painting of park board buildings, including band shells, bath houses, pavilions, bridges, residences, service buildings and play ground buildings in the following parks...Riverside Park."

Riverside Park is a 6.7-mile long waterside public park in Manhattan's Upper West Side, running between the Hudson River and Riverside Drive. Its origins go back to Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux,  the designers of Central Park in the 19th century.  In the 1930s the park was completely redeveloped and expanded, in part in conjunction with the Henry Hudson Parkway, with the help of the New Deal. Researcher Frank da Cruz describes New Deal involvement in the park: "By 1934, the park was in terrible shape; Robert Moses and the NY City Parks Department, using New Deal funding, designers, and labor completely...

Researcher Frank da Cruz explains that: "By 1934, the park was in terrible shape; Robert Moses and the NY City Parks Department, using New Deal funding, designers, and labor completely leveled the original park and replaced it with a new one in which the railroad ran beneath ground level and which, unlike the original park, was full of playgrounds, ball fields, and game courts... The construction of Riverside Park...was a mammoth undertaking supported mainly by PWA, CWA, and WPA from 1934 to 1941, such a huge undertaking that the records don't even bother to mention individual features like specific playgrounds, ballfields,...

The Works Progress Administration and the National Youth Administration renovated the Rosedale Playground in Washington DC in 1937.

Rudd Playground, located at Bushwick Ave. and Aberdeen St. in Brooklyn, was one of seven Works Progress Administration (WPA) playgrounds opened in New York City on November 22, 1935.

The Sara Delano Roosevelt Park on Manhattan's Lower East Side was named after F.D.R.'s mother. The NYC Parks Department website reports: "The parkland was acquired by the City in 1929 for the purpose of widening Chrystie and Forsythe Streets and building low-cost housing but was later set aside for "playgrounds and resting places for mothers and children." The construction of the park in 1934 was the largest park project on the Lower East Side since the acquisition of Tompkins Square Park a century earlier. Parts of four streets were closed (Hester, Broome, Rivington, and Stanton) to accommodate seven distinct play areas...

On July 9, 1941, the Department of Parks announced the completion of what is now the Eugene Sarsfield Playground in Brooklyn. The press release announcing the park's opening reported: "To provide a flat play surface it was necessary to construct a concrete retaining wall of variable height along the north property line with a short stairway access provided from Avenue "M". An 8' chain link boundary fence has been placed on top of this wall and along the entire property line. A second entrance leads from Flatlands Avenue near the corner of Ryder Street. Seventeen 2½-3" diameter Norway maples have been planted...

This site was acquired by the city through condemnation in 1929 and 1930 and became parkland shortly thereafter. In August 1935, the Department of Parks announced the opening of a new playground at the site, which included "a wading pool and the usual play apparatus." It used to be known as the Lafayette High School Playground after the nearby school and was renamed the John S. Scarangella Playground in 1992. The playground was renovated in 1997. As researcher Frank da Cruz explains here, almost all New York City Parks Department projects between 1934 and 1943 were accomplished with New Deal funds...

The Department of Parks issued a press release on April 19, 1939 announcing the opening of Schmul Park on Staten Island. Park Commissioner Robert Moses presided over the ceremonies. The release explained that: "Approximately one-half of this 8½-acre plot has been developed by the Works Progress Administration under the supervision of the Park Department into a recreational area, equipped with playground apparatus, for the children of the adjacent community. There is also a one-story brick comfort station. Later, when sufficient fill is available, the remaining portion of the park will be developed to provide facilities for baseball and other types of group...

In 1935 the county commissioners of Marshall County, KS approved the construction of a school playground at Waterville, financed with $4492.80 in Kansas Emergency Relief Committee (KERC) grant in aid and $968.50 from the KERC material fund. It is unclear whether this funding was for the one grade school in Waterville, or if this funded playgrounds at various one-room schools in the area. The KERC was an arm of the Reconstruction Finance Corp.

The Civil Works Administration (CWA) developed school playgrounds in Keeline, Wyoming in 1933/4. Cassity: "School life appears to have been significantly upgraded by the CWA workers at schools in the towns and countryside alike. Playground facilities, often taken for granted, came now where there were none previously. At Keeline, five schools added playground equipment like teeter-totters, merry-go-rounds, and swings."

This five-acre playground in Brooklyn was first established in 1924. In 1941 the WPA completed an extensive reconstruction of the main area of the park as well as the addition of a new 1/4 acre sitting area (Bealin Triangle) separated from the rest of the park by Stillwell Ave. The Department of Parks press release announcing the opening described the WPA's work: "The kindergarten area has been reduced in size and resurfaced. The existing seesaws and swings were relocated and... the school has been provided with new swings, slides and an exercise unit. The wading pool and comfort station area required minor...

The Works Progress Administration funded improvements at the Seventh and H Streets SW Playground in Washington DC between 1935 and 1936. The crews graded 1,000 cubic yards.

When the recreation area in Seward Park first opened in 1903, it was "the first permanent, municipally built playground in the United States" (NYC Parks). The park was significantly redeveloped during the New Deal. In April 1935, relief workers completed the reconstruction of the section of the park as a setting for the Jacob H. Schiff fountain, which had formerly been located in Rutgers Park. On November 26, 1940, Parks announced the completion of a good deal of this work: "This recreation area, one of the oldest and most extensively used in Manhattan, has been redesigned, reconstructed, and landscaped to provide wider all...

This modest playground near the Northern edge of Brooklyn was developed under the New Deal. A Department of Parks press release from April 1, 1935 announced the opening of this playground "constructed with Work Relief Funds" and went on to describe the park's development and new facilities: "The playground at Vandervoort Avenue and Cherry Street has an area of nearly an acre. The land was acquired by the Sinking Fund Commission by purchase at a cost of £22,500 and it was turned over to the Department of Parks on April 3, 1924, for development as a playground, but the land lay...

The Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA) and the Works Progress Administration (WPA) funded improvements at the Sherwood Playground in Washington DC. The work consisted of the following improvements: FERA, 1934-1935, “Wrecked two houses; remodeled garage into shelter house (50 percent complete).” (Report of the Government of the District of Columbia 1936) WPA, 1935-1936, “grading 1,000 cubic yards.” (Report of the Government of the District of Columbia 1936) WPA, 1936-1937, “Continued grading 1,000 cubic yards, renovized two small houses for temporary use as (1) playground shelter and (2) marionette workshop.” (Report of the Government of the District of Columbia 1937) WPA, 1937-1938, “Grading, filling, fencing.” (Report of the Government...

The early development of Silver Falls State Park can be credited to several of the New Deal programs. A significant portion of the land for the park was purchased by the federal Resettlement Administration (RA) c. 1935, and developed for recreational use through the work of the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) and Works Progress Administration (WPA) between 1935 and 1942. During that period, a distinction was made between Silver Falls Park, which was accessible to the public, and the area designated as the Silver Creek Recreation Development Area (RDA), which was a special federal program designed to allow urban youth...

On July 28, 1937, the Department of Parks announced the opening of "five playgrounds, constructed by the Department of Parks with relief labor and funds," noting that "These playgrounds are five of the twenty-four sites in neglected areas selected by the Commissioner of Parks and acquired by condemnation after authorization by the Board of Estimate and Apportionment on July 15, 1936." One of these five playgrounds was the South Pacific Playground. It is still extant. Although the 1937 press release does not mention which New Deal agencies were involved, researcher Frank da Cruz explains here that almost all New York City Parks...

The land for St. Albans Memorial Park in Queens was first acquired by Parks in 1914 and received its current name in 1932. A Department of Parks press release announced the opening of a new playground in St. Albans Park on July 17, 1934. At that time, the playground contained "facilities for softball and basketball, besides see-saws, swings, horizontal bars and ladders. Here too, benches and shade trees are part of the layout." Although the release does not mention the WPA or other New Deal agencies, researcher Frank da Cruz explains here that almost all New York City Parks Department projects...

In June 1941, the Department of Parks announced the completion of the reconstruction of the St. Catherine's Park playground in Manhattan: "This 1 1/3 acre recreation area is fenced in with a 6' chain link fence and bordered with rows of benches and shade trees. The easterly half of the area has been set aside for children and besides a large wading pool which can also be used as a volley ball court, it contains a sand pit, see saws, slides, swings, and a small sitting area for guardians of children. The westerly portion adjacent to the High School has two soft...

"St. Mary's Park, the largest park in the southeast Bronx, bounded by East 149th Street, St. Ann's Avenue, St. Mary's Street, and Jackson Avenue, June 22, 2015. This park was totally reconstructed by the WPA at the same time as Crotona Park, and reopened in October 1941. The Parks Department press release of October 13, 1941, says: St. Mary's Park consisting in large part of steep and rocky terrain had fallen into a state of shabbiness and disrepair owing to hard usage, outmoded design and erosion due to failure of old drainage systems. The large size of the area made it...