Cheyenne Sites

"Wyoming schools also benefited from the WPA Federal Art Project , which was responsible for a number of murals painted inside the buildings. Although the list of school murals is incomplete, it includes ... a set of murals for the Cheyenne High School library by Robert True ..." "The Cheyenne ... murals are believed to have been destroyed."

The Cheyenne Botanic Gardens were established well after the advent of the New Deal. However, some WPA efforts can be seen at the site. "The site for the Children's Village is centered in what used to be a city parks shop. This site included a large native stone garage (now the classroom/laboratory) and rock wall which now surrounds the Children's Village. The garage and wall were constructed in the early 1930s as part of the Works Progress Administration." (Wikipedia)

"The CWA also supported the Public Works of Art Project (PWAP), a six-month project that was a precursor to later New Deal arts projects. PWAP resulted in only a few works in Wyoming, one of which was the creation of a mural and decorative frieze adorning the library in McCormick Junior High School in Cheyenne. ... Local sign painter Frank Stuart Lewis painted a decorative frieze in the library, comprised of famous personages in Wyoming history." The former McCormick Junior High School facility in downtown Cheyenne is now known as the Emerson Building.

"The CWA also supported the Public Works of Art Project (PWAP), a six-month project that was a precursor to later New Deal arts projects. PWAP resulted in only a few works in Wyoming, one of which was the creation of a mural and decorative frieze adorning the library in McCormick Junior High School in Cheyenne. Two Cheyenne artists, Libbie Hoffman and Jeanette Kaiser, painted the mural." "The mural portrays an episode from the lore of frontier Wyoming — the reading of Shakespeare's work to Scout Jim Bridger. Bridger is reputed to have traded a yoke of oxen for a volume of...

Originally started during the Hoover administration and completed in 1933, Cheyenne's Federal Building was expanded with Treasury Department funds during the New Deal era. GSA: "The fourth story was added in 1937 by dismantling the buildings parapet wall and elevator penthouse, constructing the new story, and reconstructing the salvaged elements. The buildings structural capacity was designed to accommodate four stories above the original three constructed, a unique forethought towards the buildings potential growth needs. This addition consists of brick masonry exterior walls with buff-colored face brick to match the original building. The fourth story has simple brick detailing including lintels, sills...

The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) worked to improve what is now the U.S. Department of Agriculture's High Plains Grasslands Research Station (then Cheyenne Horticultural Field Station), located northwest of Cheyenne, Wyoming. USDA.gov: "1935 – Many inprovements were made to the station; the main road was oiled from the entrance to the buildings. Civilian Conservation Corps camp of 200 men opened on station. They constructed roads, 2 miles of concrete lined ditches, irrigation system, planted thousands of trees and shrubs. They picked up hundreds of tons of stones from the experimental plots. And manure collected from nearby ranches was hauled in and spread over...

The Civil Works Administration (CWA) and/or Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA) constructed a building in Lions Park in Cheyenne, Wyoming, most likely in 1934. "Already a city of beautiful parks, Cheyenne erected a red stone building with relief labor at Lions park to house equipment and a wall was raised as well to shut off any unsightly display of implements." The location and status of this project is unknown to Living New Deal.

The Civil Works Administration (CWA) conducted school improvement work in Cheyenne, Wyoming in 1933-4.

"However reluctant to see their state go on the federal dole, Cheyenne officials accepted, in June, 1933, Wyoming's first New Deal relief allotment. By December some 8000 Wyomingites were at work on jobs financed by the Civil Works Administration. A handful of these people -perhaps a half dozen -were part of the Public Works of Art Project (PWAP), working in Cheyenne. This federal agency lasted only about six months and its work in Wyoming was minimal; a mural in McCormick Junior High in Cheyenne, and some decorative work in the State Capitol Building, but the tasks were the first example...

The Wyoming State Supreme Court building is situated in central Cheyenne, the state capital. It is a restrained example of Art Deco architecture in the neo-classical mode, with elegant bas-relief decorations, inscriptions and brass (-plated?) doorways and surrounding decoration. It was built in 1937 with aid from the Public Works Administration (PWA) and is still in active use. "This structure is immediately opposite the present State Capitol Building and is an important unit of a well-developed plan for the State and municipal group, occupying a square which is landscaped and surrounded by streets.  The building is three stories in height and...