- City:
- Hattiesburg, MS
- Site Type:
- Forestry and Agriculture, Resettlement Communities
- New Deal Agencies:
- Housing Programs, Resettlement Administration (RA)
- Completed:
- 1935
Description
The Hattiesburg Homesteads was one of five “industrial communities” established in Mississippi as part of the Resettlement Administration, and was the smallest project in the state. Twenty four frame clapboard units were built at a cost of $3,152 per unit. Industrial communities were “…established for industrial workers and located in the outskirts of cities and large towns…” (Smith, p. 89).
Source notes
Flynn, K. A. (2008). The New Deal: A 75th Anniversary Collection. Layton, UT: Gibbs Smith, Publisher. Holley, D. (1975). Uncles Sam's Farmers: The New Deal Communities in the Lower Mississippi Valley. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press. List of New Deal Homesteads and Resettlement Communities. (n.d.) National New Deal Preservation Organization. Retrieved from https://www.newdeallegacy.org/table_communities.html. Smith, F. C. (2006). The Tupelo Homesteads: New Deal Agrarian Experimentation. The Journal of Mississippi History, 68. Retrieved from mdah.state.ms.us/pubs/homesteads.pdf.Site originally submitted by Susan Allen on February 9, 2014.
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Jeff kresge
Susan Allen
I stumbled across your website while researching WPA projects for our historic neighborhood Park haven here in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. This is a very cool idea. I have looked at the map and I doubt that the homestead would have been located at those coordinates. It would have put the homestead between the railroad tracks and the courthouse. This is in the business district and definitely not a place they would have put 26 units. I know some historians at the University of Southern Mississippi here in town and will do some looking around. Keep up the great work!
There is a historic photo of one of these houses at the Library of Congress at https://www.loc.gov/pictures/resource/fsa.8b26691/
According to the Mississippi Department of Archives and History, Historic Resources Inventory, the Hattiesburg Homesteads were located in the current Pinehills neighborhood, 31.29474524; -89.33481336. The architect was documented at Juan G. Landry and Builder/Contractor documented as W. L. Phillips. The original buildings were constructed 1934-1937. Per MDAH, some original buildings are still extant.