Winchester Sites

Winchester.us: "During the 1930s the channel upstream of the Aberjona Pond was rechanneled, section by section, as ERA and WPA projects. The projects were based on recommendations by Herbert Kellaway, published in 1928. In the Kellaway plan, three ponds for flood expansion were to be created, bordered by solid land and green grassy banks and connected by new channels. The rechanneling was designed to eliminate the mosquito problem by draining the marshes. The Town consulted the State Reclamation Board during these projects. At that time, the entire northern section of the river was lined with industries. While the 1930s improvements...

Winchester.us: "Ginn Field was laid out as a playground and three tennis courts were built. The other main project at that time was grading the field, accomplished by the WPA in 1938-40. The work of improving the field also included continuing the road from Manchester Field, building a road leading out to Bacon Street and creating a walk leading from tennis court to train station at Wedgemere, building an 800-foot-long stone retaining wall, and installing 360 feet of drain pipe at the field and more drains in 1942 to carry off water which made roadway impassable in rainy weather."

Works Progress Administration (W.P.A.) laborers constructed sanitary sewers along Hillcrest Pkwy., Fells Road, and Euclid Ave. in one section of Winchester, Mass. This letter was submitted to the WPA by a local official: "Dear Sir: "We have completed the installation of sanitary sewers in Euclid Avenue, Fells Road, and Hillcrest Parkway. "The work performed by the WPA men has been veiy satisfactory. The total cost of the work including the material, tools, etc. furnished by the Town and the labor furnished by the WPA compares very favorably with the construction costs performed by hand' labor employed by the Town. "The installation of these...

The Winchester Public Library website describes an example of New Deal artwork: The Library's largest work of art is the mural in the main lobby, facing the front door and above the entrance to the Reference Room. Entitled “Purchase of Land from the Indians,” the mural depicts the sale of the land on which Winchester stands to the colonists by the Squaw Sachem. It was painted by Aiden Lassell Ripley (1896–1969) in 1934. Funding for the mural came from the United States Government's Civil Works Administration's Public Works of Art project, which employed artists to paint murals for public buildings during the...

The Middlesex Fells Reservation spans multiple towns north of Boston. The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), Civil Works Administration (CWA), and Works Progress Administration (WPA) were each active in developing the area. Massachusetts Metropolitan District Commission annual reports detail the work of the New Deal over time. 1934 report: "During the first eleven weeks of this year about 2,800 men were employed on Federal Civil Works Administration projects. Most of these men were employed in the Blue Hills and Middlesex Fells Reservations. A large amount of necessary work was accomplished in the various divisions, which consisted mainly of cutting and burning brush, removing dead and...

Description of a W.P.A. project undertaken in 1938: "Middlesex Fells Reservation, Winchester Section; to widen, drain and grade three miles of bridle trails. The trails to be for equestrian, police patrol, fire control and maintenance use." The Winchester section is the far western portion of the park.

The Federal Emergency Administration of Public Works (a.k.a. Public Works Administration, or PWA) sponsored construction of the North Metropolitan Relief Sewer: sections 112, 113, 114, and 115A included work in Winchester. "North Metropolitan Relief Sewer, Section 113: This work is located in Winchester and includes construction of approximately 4,272 feet of concrete sewer together with a two-pipe 36 inch cast-iron siphon, and a relocation of the Aberjona River adjacent to the Boston & Maine Railroad and directly opposite Wedgemere Station. Most of the work involved open cut construction. However, a tunnel approximately 140 feet long was constructed under Bacon Street because of a...