Glendale Community College – Glendale CA

Description

Glendale Community College (formerly Junior College) relocated to its present campus in 1937. Several of the campus’ original buildings—including the John A. Davitt Administration Building—were constructed between 1936 and 1937 with the support of a bond election and funds matched equally by a Public Works Administration (PWA) grant.

“The initial campus would consist of four buildings: a 24,000 square-foot Administration Building, a 12,000 square-foot Science Building and men’s and women’s locker rooms, together totaling 6,960 square feet. This plant would have 32 classrooms and laboratories. Space would be set aside for a student-funded student union, auditorium, liberal arts and classroom buildings. […] Construction of the new campus ran a little over budget and a bit behind schedule, which wasn’t bad since planning for these federally-subsidized Depression-era projects tended to be wildly optimistic. The proposed $355,000 price tag grew to $398,000, with the extra costs being split between the federal government and the school district. While some of the federal money paid for outside contractors, much of the federally-subsidized help consisted of laborers from the county relief rolls. Among other things, these workers built retaining walls, excavated the athletic fields, graded the lawns, cleared brush, planted shrubbery, installed sprinklers and built a sidewalk in front of the college” (see Eberts, “Part 4: Glendale Junior College: The First Decade, 1927-37”).

The laborers who graded, landscaped, and developed the grounds did so under the auspices of the Works Progress Administration (WPA) with $276,850 in federal funding (and $327,932 total).