San Diego Sites

The "Guardian of Water" is a granite sculpture, with a mosaic and frieze around the base. It was created by Donal Hord in 1939, with support from the WPA. The sculpture is a 23' high figure of a woman holding an olla on her left shoulder, symbolizing the need for water conservation in southern California. She is surrounding by a mosaic of kneeling nudes- symbolizing clouds- pouring water from jars over a dam into a citrus-fruit orchard. The San Diego Historical Society Museum has on display a small scale plaster maquette and a film about the creation of this work.

From the archive photo descriptions of this WPA built station: "The fire station was a new construction project, building forms, placing reinforced steel and pouring concrete. The ground floor of the building measures 50x85 feet. The main part of the building is 34 feet high with a tower rising to 70 feet. This is a two-company station with one hose truck and one hook and ladder truck. Dormitory accommodations provide for eight firemen."

In 1938, artist Belle Baranceanu painted two large murals "Building Padre Dam" and "Portola's Departure" on the sides of the stage at Roosevelt Junior High (now Roosevelt Middle School) in San Diego for the WPA Curriculum Project. The San Diego Historical Society notes: "For Roosevelt Junior High she was asked to use the theme of the "Four Cornerstones of American Democracy" for which she prepared some working drawings. Finding the concept terribly dull, she switched to historical subjects: Building Padre Dam and Portola's Departure (1937-38)." The school was remodeled in the 1970s, but "the Roosevelt Junior High murals were done on canvas...

These two 10' x 20' murals "San Diego Harbor" and "San Diego Back Country" by Charles Reiffel were originally installed in the Russ Auditorium at San Diego High School. They were painted in 1936 under the auspices of the WPA Federal Art Project.

"Owing to radical cuts in its budget, the museum was able to afford no curator of insects until WPA project 597 came to the rescue by providing a college trained entomologist who is equipped to take complete charge of more than 175,000 insect species contained in Natural History Museum, Balboa Park, San Diego, CA."

"Many have been the favorable comments on this spectacular mount of the "sea devil" of giant ray, which now stands near one of the main entrances of the museum. The preparation of the exhibit was very difficult and required taxidermy ability of higher order, both as to form and color of the finished product. This is another outstanding example of work done on Project #597, Natural History Museum, Balboa Park, San Diego, CA."

"When the museum's curator of shells was retired on a pension, her WPA assistant on Project 597 was capable of stepping into a vacant place. This aid came at a time when three large shell collections were received by gift, that required immediate attention for cataloging and scientific classification at the Natural History Museum, Balboa Park, San Diego, CA."

The WPA worked extensively with the City of San Diego to build this sewage disposal plant. Structures built included an emergency sludge storage and detritor building, a pump house and sludge drying building, and three flocculator-clarifiers.

In the 1920s and 30s, SDSU transitioned from a a small women's teachers school to a co-ed teachers college with a progressive curriculum. The old location in University Heights could no longer support the enlarging student body. The current site in Mission Palisades was a gift from LA oil tycoon Alphonzo E. Bell through his Bell-Lloyd Investment Company. Building began in the Mission Palisades location in 1930, but due to the depression, Bell-Lloyd pulled out of the project in 1936 (The Bell-Lloyd/Mission Palisades housing tract was experiencing slow sales). WPA money was essential to continuing the development of the college....

In 1931, the San Diego Teachers College moved to a new site on Montezuma Mesa northeast of the city. The college changed its name to San Diego State College in 1935.  The Works Progress Administration (WPA) did major development work on the site to accommodate the new college and improve the site.   WPA relief workers built a sewage disposal system, drainage facilities, roadways, walls, walkways, and gutters, and completed grading, landscaping, excavation for the college.

WPA tennis courts in San Diego County.

A large Spanish style structure, with arches and a red tile roof.

WPA construction in San Diego Zoo, Balboa Park, San Diego, CA.

Among its many projects at the zoo, the WPA built these aviaries.

SERA began constructing the Aztec Bowl in 1933, spending $260,000 on excavating, filling, leveling, and removing rock. The WPA provided another $216,863 for the labor for filling in the canyon, seating for 10,000 people, as well as a flood lightening system, turfed playing field, a press box, and restrooms on either sides of the stadium. The stadium was dedicated on October 3, 1936, right before a football game against Occidental College (San Diego State won the game).

The WPA built three classrooms, a lecture hall, basement, and an arcade (which provided a covered walk between the administration building and the science buildings). This classroom addition forms a quadrangle, and is part of the original design for SDSU. It was lined by approximately 50 wooden benches also made by the WPA. The college had experienced a 40 percent enrollment from 1936 to 1938, and the classrooms were finished in time for the fall 1939 semester. Later, in 1942, the WPA built extensions to the library and science buildings, and a music building.

"Two Works Progress Administration (WPA)-era murals from the 1930s, long thought to have been destroyed during subsequent building renovations, were uncovered in San Diego State Universitys (SDSU) Hardy Memorial Tower in August of 2004. Local student artists Genevieve Burgeson Bredo and George Sorenson completed these murals in 1936 at the entrance and in the hallway of the old library at SDSU, known at the time as San Diego State College. Although portions of the murals were obliterated during construction from 1957-59, some of the artwork remained intact. Non-destructive tile maintenance during the summer of 2004 exposed the murals, which have...

The Open Air Theater is a Greek-style amphitheater. Originally it was used for commencement, daytime speakers, and summertime plays, and in the 1960s housed the San Diego Symphony summer concerts. Today it is still used for graduation events and rallies.

These white and teal, wood and concrete benches, many of them with "WPA" stamped on the side, can be found throughout the campus.

Originally called the Power Plant Building, it was repaired and expanded as a WPA project in the 1940s.

This 5' high black diorite sculpture "The Aztec" was carved by Donal Hord and his team in 1936, a project that took a year to complete.  The one-ton block of stone they sculpted was quarried locally from Escondido. Previously in front of Heppner Hall, it was moved from its original location to make way for the San Diego Trolley Project. It currently stands in the University's Prospective Student Center. From the San Diego Travel Tips website: "In 1936, San Diego sculptor Donal Hord was commissioned to carve a statue for the campus of San Diego State University. He completed the work,...