Start Year: 1940

The post office contains a Section of Fine Arts oil-on-canvas mural entitled "Wheat Workers" painted in 1940 by Martyl Schweig. This is a classic regionalist portrayal of wheat workers in the fields during the transition from hand work to a mechanized harvest. The motion and hard work is palpable and in the background are the oil derricks that western Kansas is also known for. Martyl was born to Aimee Schweig, a well-known artist in St. Louis and one of the organizers of the Ste. Genevieve artist colony that thrived from 1930-1940. Martyl was a prodigy, studying with her mother and the other...

The Dover-Foxcroft post office features this mural, "River Driving", by Barrie Barstow Greenbie (1920-1988). Greenbie was trained at the Corcoran School of Art in New York, and this was his first job.  Painted in 1940, it made Greenbie possibly the youngest artist ever commissioned by the Work Projects Administration (WPA), according to a University of Massachusetts website entry on his life.  However, it is more likely that the mural was painted under the auspices of the Treasury Section of Fine Arts, not the WPA.  

The Brazilian Room in Tilden Park began as the Brazil Pavilion at the Golden Gate International Exposition on Treasure Island in San Francisco Bay in 1939. The interior wood was used to reconstruct a new building in Tilden Park, using the labor of relief workers in the Works Progress Administration (WPA). It was completed at the present site in 1940 or 1941. The Berkeley Historical Society recounts the building's history: "The Brazilian Room derives its name from its rich hardwood paneling. These walls were once part of the Golden Gate International Exposition's 'World's Fair' famed Brazilian Pavilion, displayed on Treasure Island in...

The 1940 oil-on-canvas mural, "Cattle Round-Up," by Polly Duncan depicts several cowboys guiding cattle into a shed while the bulk of the herd is being driven in from the broad expanse of the Nevada landscape.  It is a typical New Deal era post office mural in that it depicts a theme from the locality and its history and is done in American Regionalist style. The Treasury Section of Fine Arts funded this mural, probably at the same time as the old post office was expanded in 1940.   The mural at the former post office was moved to the city's modern post...

Constructed by the Treasury Department in 1940.

The Santa Barbara Maritime Museum was constructed as a Naval Reserve Armory by the Works Project Administration (WPA) in 1940-42. In 1939, the City of Santa Barbara deeded the land to the Navy, because city leaders thought that a Naval Reserve Armory would be beneficial to the city. The Armory was almost complete when WW II broke out and construction was stopped. The building was boarded up. Then, in 1942, the City of Santa Barbara leased part of the harbor to the Navy for a wharf and the following year Naval Reservists were ordered to finish the building, which was designated a Small...

In 1940-41, the Works Projects Administration (WPA) made major improvements to the Long Beach Airport, then known as Daugherty Field. WPA relief workers constructed a new terminal and control tower building. The two-story terminal was designed by Horace Austin and Kenneth Wing in the Streamline Moderne style, with a nautical touch. The mosaics inside the building are the work of WPA-artist Grace Richardson Clements. "In the late 1930s, the council approved plans to purchase 255 acres adjoining the municipal airport and the construction of a three-story administration building and tower at the east side of the airfield. The airfield was improved...

The Work Projects Administration (WPA) built a new runway for the Santa Monica Municipal Airport in 1940-41. It was one of many WPA airport projects completed in the run-up to the Second World War. Santa Monica was, at the time, a key locale for aircraft development and production. "Designed especially for the heavier and faster craft of today, the new WPA-built runway, from which the famed B-19 took off on her maiden flight, was a certified national defense project sponsored by the city of Santa Monica. Begun December 30, 1940, the runway project more recently was classified as an 'expedite'...

The cornerstone of this 1940 New Deal post office lists John M. Carmody as the Federal Works Administrator and W. Engelbert Reynolds as the Commisioner of Public Buildings.

A 1940 edition of the Fresno Bee reported that Porterville had received $15,000 from the federal government for the Olive School Building. This was apparently a Works Progress Administration (WPA) project, finished in either 1940 or 1941. The New Deal portion of the building is now used as an annex to a newer school building.