Start Year: 1938

Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) enrollees from the Mt. Elden Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) camp near Flagstaff worked at Walnut Canyon National Monument from 1938 to 1942. They made several improvements to the monument for public recreational use. One was to build the original visitor center at Observation Point from sandstone blocks cut from a nearby quarry.  The visitor center was completely altered during the 1960s by adding a new floor on top of the original building; the new second floor is where visitors' enter today to find information, displays and the tourist shop.  The lower floor is used for offices and...

Constructed by the Treasury Department in 1938.

The Carmi post office was constructed by the Treasury Department in 1938.

The post office contains a 4' x 24' 1938 Section of Fine Arts oil-on-canvas mural by Ernest Norling entitled "Northwest Logging." The mural was restored in 1994-95. "Norling completed two Washington State Post Office murals during the New Deal period, one in Bremerton and one in Prosser. He also painted documentary images of the state's CCC camps for the Public Works of Art Project (PWAP). During an oral history interview in 1964, Norling reflected on his knowledge of the logging industry and how that helped him with the mural: "I knew pretty well the lumbering industry. I'd work when I went to high...

The Bronx General Post Office houses a set of 13 magnificent mural panels—collectively titled "Resources of America"— by Ben Shahn and Bernarda Bryson Shahn. A Lehman College Guide to Public Art in the Bronx has this to say about the Shahn murals: "In the fall of 1938 Ben Shahn, assisted by his wife Bernarda Bryson Shahn, began work on the cartoons for a major cycle of thirteen egg tempera on plaster frescos for the Bronx General Post Office. The project was created under the US Treasury Section of Painting and Sculpture, a new deal art program which produced public works in federal...

The McGraw Rotunda of the 5th Ave. library building contains a set of WPA murals: "It features The Story of the Recorded Word, a set of four large arched panels by Edward Laning, were executed for the McGraw Rotunda of the New York Public Library Main Branch from 1938 to 1942 as part of a Works Progress Admistration (WPA) Project, with supplies furnished by Isaac Phelps Stokes, author of the Iconography of Manhattan Island. Laning depicted the story of the recorded word across each of the murals. The first mural, to the left of the entrance to the Catalog Room, Moses...

In 1938-9, the WPA built a new station house for the NYPD's 18th precinct on West 54th St. The building was designed to replace the older 18th precinct building on 47th St. The New Deal structure is still in use and is now known as the Midtown North Precinct. Construction of the four-story limestone and marble precinct building cost $558,233. Modern feature details were described in a New York Times article cited below.

The Statue of Liberty was a gift to the United States from France in 1886. It was administered by the United States Lighthouse Board until 1901 and then by the Department of War. In 1937, FDR proclaimed the entire island a National Monument administered by the National Park Service. From 1937-1941, the WPA and PWA carried out extensive renovations of the statue and Bedloe (now Liberty) island. In his history of the Statue of Liberty, Berenson (2012) elaborates on the federal government's role: "the NPS devised an ambitious plan to remove all structures save for the statue itself, shore up the...

Sometimes mis-attributed to the Works Progress Administration (WPA), the historic former Central Fire Station in Saco, Maine was constructed with federal Public Works Administration (P.W.A.) funds. The P.W.A. contributed a $27,000 grant toward the project, whose total cost was $60,928. Construction occurred between Aug. 1938 and Mar. 1939. PWA Docket No. ME W1022. "he Central Fire Station has been a significant landmark in the Saco community from the very beginning. The brick firehouse, designed to reflect an ongoing heritage from an earlier tradition of civic service and public safety, well served its role from its construction until January 2011, when a...

The post office contains a Section of Fine Arts mural entitled "Smoky River" painted by Birger Sandzen in 1938. Smoky River was painted close to Linsborg, KS with the style that he was well known for with strong brush strokes. At the time this work was completed, Sandzen was 67 years old and the brush strokes are not as energetic as his earlier work, but still have a similar quality. Birger Sandzen was born in Sweden and studied under Anders Zorn in Sweden at what became the Artists League. He studied in Paris under Aman-Jean, a contemporary of Seurat who introduced Sandzen...