Start Year: 1939

The airport which began service July 1st 1941 carried both passengers and mail. According to the Youngstown Vindicator: "In the mid 1930s, the chambers of commerce of Warren, Youngstown, Niles, Hubbard and Sharon, Pa., decided to make the airport project a community effort. In January 1937, a committee that included William F. Maag Jr., then-publisher of The Vindicator, went to Washington to secure Works Progress Administration funds. Eventually, Youngstown took over the whole $2.6 million WPA project. Land for the airport was obtained with the help of Maag and construction began in June 1939. Once again it appeared Youngstown would...

A low masonry headwall rises above a sidewalk on the west side Chorro Street in a residential area south of downtown San Luis Obispo. Spanning a small creek, the Chorro Street Bridge was constructed under a WPA street and drainage improvement project. In 1939-40, the WPA paved eight blocks of Chorro Street between Pacific and High streets. This followed an earlier improvement of a different section of the street in 1937. The wall (14’-long, 32”-high, 20”-thick) is made of square-cut stone laid in regular courses. Embedded in the center is a sandstone tablet documenting the WPA project. The stonework continues below the street...

The park's swimming pool and bathhouse were constructed by the WPA in 1939-1940, and are still in use. According to the Oklahoma Landmarks Inventory Nomination, "The bathhouse has three rooms and is a single-story, rectangular...structure constructed of uncut native stone of auburn and buff colors with beaded mortar... The swimming pool is constructed of concrete and is rectangular... A stone wall lining was built around this pool. A new fence has been added."   (https://www.okhistory.org)

This park commemorates the first major American victory of the Revolutionary War in 1777. "Establishment of a national park to commemorate the Saratoga battles, authorized by Congress in 1938,  came about largely due to the direction provided by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The National Park Service accepted 1,430 acres from New York  State, although the area remained under state  administration. A Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) camp was established at the park in 1939.  Although the program by then was past its peak and was terminated in 1942 due to U.S. participation in World War II, the CCC performed the first methodical...

The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) worked to construct Olympic National Park Headquarters beginning in 1939. The Public Works Administration (PWA) provided funds for the construction of the Headquarters district, which is now listed to the National Register of Historic Places. HistoryLink.org: "Like national and state parks around the country, the newly created Olympic park relied heavily on the CCC and other Depression-relief agencies of Roosevelt's New Deal for funding and labor. A headquarters was obviously a top priority, and nearly half the $470,000 that the federal Public Works Administration (PWA) allocated to the National Park Service in 1938 for the new park was...

The Stewart Lee Udall Department of the Interior building contains one of the largest collections of New Deal art in Washington DC, by some of the finest American artists of the time.  Two large bas-relief panels are mounted on either side of the stage of the auditorium, one by Heinz Warneke and one by Ralph Stackpole.  Warneke's was commissioned in 1937 by the Treasury Section of Fine Arts and installed in 1939; Stockpole's was commissioned in 1938 and installed in 1940.   The panels are 10' high by 4' wide.  Warneke's is cast stone and Stockpole's is Indiana limestone.  Heinz Warneke treats...

The Stewart Lee Udall Department of the Interior building contains one of the largest collections of New Deal art in Washington DC by some of the finest American artists of the time.  Millard Sheets produced a four-panel, oil-on-canvas mural, “The Negro’s Contribution in the Social and Cultural Development of America”, featuring The Arts, Education, Science and Religion. This imposing set of murals was commissioned by the Treasury Section of Fine Arts in 1939 but not installed until 1948, owing to disagreements over the original subject matter. While Sheets was white, he sought to express "my high regard and feeling for the...

The Stewart Lee Udall Department of the Interior building contains one of the largest collections of New Deal art in Washington DC by some of the finest American artists of the time. Several Indian artists were invited to Washington in 1939-41 to study mural art and paint murals for the Interior Building. Kiowa artist Stephen Mopope painted "Ceremonial Dance (Indian Theme)" in 1939, with funding from the Treasury Section of Fine Arts.  It is a large (6' x 50') oil-on-plaster lunette on the east wall of the main cafeteria in the basement. The Department of Interior Museum offers regular mural tours; check their website...

William C. Palmer painted a three panel mural entitled "Iowa Landscape" for the Monticello post office in 1939-1940. He was given this commission based on his entries in a big ($29,000) St. Louis competition. The postman's creed is in the left panel, the Iowa state motto in the center, and the state song of Iowa in the right.

Effingham, Illinois's historic junior high school building was originally constructed as the city's high school in 1939. Sometimes attributed to the Works Progress Administration (WPA), the building was constructed with federal Public Works Administration (PWA) funds. The building bears a Federal Emergency Administration of Public Works (PWA) plaque and a 1939 cornerstone. The building was designed by Royer, Danely, and Smith, and the general contractor was E. C. Childers Construction Co. PWA Project No. Ill. 1977