Above: The Osage Nation Museum in Pawhuska, Oklahoma, built in 1938 by WPA workers, many of whom were Osage. At the time of its opening it was described as "The only tribal museum in the United States," and among its collection was "a group of portraits of well-known Osages... done as a WPA project by Todros Geller, Chicago artist" (U.S. Office of Indian Affairs, "Osage Indian Museum Dedicated May 2-3," Indians at Work, June 1938, p. 24). The museum still operates today. Photo from the National Archives.
Above: A new art museum for Boise, Idaho, built by WPA workers (and perhaps NYA workers too), 1937. The building and museum still operate today, larger in size, and creating " visual arts experiences that engage people and inspire learning through exceptional exhibitions, collections, and educational opportunities." Photo from the National Archives.
Above: Tuzigoot Museum, at the Tuzigoot National Monument, Arizona, 1937. This building was built by the WPA and displayed artifacts that had been excavated by the New Deal's Civil Works Administration (CWA) several years earlier. The museum still operates today. Photo from the National Archives.
Above: The Audubon Museum in Henderson, Kentucky, built by the WPA, 1937-1938. This building and museum still operate today, as part of the larger John James Audubon State Park. Photo from the National Archives.
Above: The New Deal not only constructed new museums, but also improved many museums by expanding their facilities, remodeling interior spaces, making repairs, painting, etc. The article above highlights a large new wing added to the Baltimore Museum of Art, with funding from the New Deal's Public Works Administration (PWA). It comes from Museum News (a publication of the American Association of Museums), January 15, 1937, p. 1. Image scanned from a personal copy, and used here for educational and non-commercial purposes.
Above: The New Deal also provided funds for museums to hire unemployed workers to classify, catalog, and index their collections, as this WPA worker is doing with a recent gift to the Natural History Museum in San Diego, California, 1937. These types of workers were often professionals in the field of history, archaeology, museums, etc., who had lost their jobs during the Great Depression. In its first three years of operation, the WPA cataloged 9,498,000 artifacts. Between 1937 and 1942, the New Deal's National Youth Administration (NYA) "catalogued 1,123,000 museum articles." Photo from the National Archives.
Above: WPA workers also created items for museums, such as dioramas, models of ships and buildings, and figurines of historically important people and cultures. These items were displayed in museums, and also loaned out to schools and libraries as part of "museum extension" projects. The description for this photograph--taken in Washington, DC, 1938--reads: "Hand carved wooden dolls representing famous characters of fiction and history are part of the display of the WPA exhibition of skills of the unemployed in the National Museum. These dolls [are from] a Minnesota Handicraft project and are used as visual education models in schools, libraries and museums. In the picture is shown 'Robin Hood.'" Photo from the National Archives.
Above: Pennsylvania had one of the most active WPA museum extension projects. By 1940, it had 33 units, employing 2,000 people, and had created 1.5 million visual aids for public schools, including, "plates of costumes and uniforms, dioramas, architectural models, geological and industrial miniature models, food models, games, maps, native handicraft and handicraft designs, lantern slides, fish plaques, marionettes and puppets, and handbooks and pamphlets" (Museum News, September 15, 1940, p. 2). Pictured above is one of the project's architectural models, "Italian Gothic, 14th Century, Taormina." Photo by Brent McKee.
Above: A WPA worker making a model of the "HMS Discovery" (a ship used in early explorations of America's west coast) for a museum in Washington state, between 1935 and 1943. Photo from the National Archives.
Above: WPA workers arranged exhibit spaces and constructed display cabinets for many museums, like the area and cabinets shown above at the U.S. Army Aeronautical Museum (now called the National Museum of the United States Air Force) in Dayton, Ohio, ca. 1938. Photo from the National Archives.
New Deal-Created Museums
Below is a list of 177 museums created by the New Deal, either through new construction or through the renovation and/or conversion of an existing structure into a new museum (e.g., a historic home). The list is not complete (or perfectly made) and it does not include the large number of existing museums that were expanded, improved, or assisted by the New Deal (recall the 1937 article above on the expansion of the Baltimore Museum of Art). Instead, the list is intended to be a fairly good inventory of new museums created by the New Deal; and perhaps it will spark an interest in further research, as well as more sophisticated and comprehensive cataloging.
(It's interesting to note that many New Deal structures that did not start out as museums, for example post office buildings constructed in the 1930s and 40s, are providing museum space today. See, e.g., the Living New Deal's project page, "Sturgis Motorcycle Museum (Old Post Office) - Sturgis SD.")
For sources of information on any particular museum, or if you see any errors, please email me at bmckee383@gmail.com.
Museums 1-88:
Before the New Deal, there were no more than 27 museums operated by the National Park Service. By the end of fiscal year 1941, there were 115, an increase of 88 (this progression is detailed in the Dept. of Interior's annual reports, 1934-1941). These new museums were constructed with public works funds (e.g., PWA and CCC) and constructed at places such as Morristown National Historical Park (New Jersey); Colonial National Historical Park (Virginia); Ocmulgee National Monument (Georgia); White Sands National Monument (New Mexico); Mesa Verde National Park (Colorado); and Vicksburg National Military Park (Mississippi).
Museums 89-177 (organized by state; description starts with New Deal agency responsible for construction):
Alabama: CCC, Moundsville Museum, new construction
Arizona: CCC-Indian Division, Kinishba Ruins museum building, Gila County, new construction
Arizona: CWA, FERA, Smoki Museum (now called Museum of Indigenous People), Prescott, new construction
Arizona: CWA, FERA, WPA, Sharlot Hall Building (main museum bldg in 11 bldg complex), Prescott, new construction
Arizona: PWA, University of Arizona Museum, Tucson, new construction
Arkansas: WPA, Museum of Fine Arts, Little Rock, new construction
California: CCC, Summit Museum, Mt. Diablo, Contra Costa County, new construction
California: WPA, Asistencia Mission museum bldg, Redlands, reconstruction project
California: WPA, Lakeport Museum, Lakeport, new construction
Colorado: PWA, University of Colorado Museum of Natural History, Boulder, new construction
Connecticut: CCC, Peoples Forest Museum, Barkhamsted, new construction
District of Columbia: PWA, Interior Museum, part of the new U.S. Dept. of the Interior bldg, new construction
Florida: CCC, Fort Clinch State Park, museum area in restored building
Idaho: WPA, Boise Art Museum, Boise, new construction
Illinois: CCC, Blackhawk State Park museum, Rock Island, new construction
Indiana: CCC, Jackson-Washington State Forest Museum Building, new construction
Indiana: PWA, Indiana World War Memorial (with areas designed for museum space when
funds available), Indianapolis, new construction
Kansas: PWA, Wichita Art Museum, Wichita, new construction
Kentucky: WPA, Audubon Museum, near Henderson, new construction
Kentucky: WPA, home of Ephraim McDowell, Danville, restoration into a house museum
Kentucky: WPA, McDowell-Crawford Memorial Shrine, Danville, restoration into a house museum
Louisiana: PWA, Louisiana State Exhibit Museum, Shreveport, new construction
Maine: WPA, Nylander Museum, Caribou, new construction
Maryland: CCC, Fort Frederick State Park museum building, new construction
Maryland: WPA, Flag House, Baltimore, restored into a house museum
Maryland: WPA, Rossborough Inn, historic house museum, College Park, restored into a house museum
Michigan: WPA, Grand Rapids Furniture Museum, Grand Rapids, new construction (within existing bldg)
Michigan: WPA, Grand Rapids Public Museum, new construction
Michigan: WPA, Niles Historical Museum, Niles, new construction (altering an existing barn)
Minnesota: PWA, Minnesota Museum of Natural History, St. Paul Campus, University of Minnesota, new construction
Minnesota: WPA, Lindbergh home converted into museum, Little Falls
Missouri: PWA, Soldiers’ Memorial Building (with two interior museums), St. Louis, new construction
Missouri: WPA, Mark Twain Museum, Hannibal, new construction
Montana: NYA, log cabin museum and tourist information, Billings (HWY 87, near Midlands Empire Fairgrounds), new construction
Montana: NYA, Montana Cowboys Association Museum, Great Falls, new construction
Montana: PWA, “library-museum,” Montana School of Mines, new construction
Montana: PWA, Museum of the Plains Indians, Browning, new construction
Montana: PWA, University of Montana Art Museum, Missoula, new construction
Montana: WPA, Indian Caves Museum, Billings, new construction
Nebraska: NYA, Bridgeport Museum, Bridgeport, new construction
Nebraska: NYA, D.A.R. Museum, Kelley Park, McCook, new construction
Nebraska: WPA, Franklin City Park Museum, Franklin, new construction
Nebraska: WPA, Hastings Municipal Museum, Hastings, new construction
Nebraska: WPA, Old Settlers Park Museum, Scottsbluff, new construction
New Jersey: Cheesequake State Park Museum, new construction
New Jersey: CWA, Dey Mansion, Wayne, restored into a house museum
New Jersey: CWA, FERA, WPA, Trent House Museum, Trenton, restored home into a museum
New Jersey: WPA, Steuben House, River Edge, restored into a house museum
New Mexico: WPA, Coronado Museum, Coronado State Monument, new construction
New Mexico: WPA, Lincoln County Courthouse, restored with exhibition of relics from Billy the Kid era
New Mexico: WPA, Roosevelt County Museum, campus of Eastern New Mexico College, Portales, new construction
New York: FERA, Staten Island Historical Society Museum, New York City, renovation and restoration of an existing bldg into a new museum
New York: FERA, WPA, Stony Point Museum, Stony Point, new construction
New York: On land donated by FDR and his mother, FDR Presidential Museum & Library, Hyde Park, new construction
New York: WPA, NYA, Schenectady Museum, remodeling donated buildings into new museum
North Carolina: CWA, FERA, WPA, Mint Museum Randolph, Charlotte, new construction (a reconstruction of a soon-to-be demolished building)
North Carolina: PWA, Hall of History, Winston-Salem, new construction
North Carolina: WPA, Highlands Museum and Biological Laboratory, Highlands, new construction
North Dakota: CCC, Fort Abraham Lincoln State Park, near Mandan, new construction
North Dakota: CCC, Fort Lincoln State Park Museum, new construction
Ohio: NYA, Schoenbrunn Park Museum, New Philadelphia, new construction
Ohio: WPA, Fort Recovery Museum bldg (part of larger restoration project), new construction
Ohio: WPA, Hanby House Museum, Westerville, restoring into a house museum
Oklahoma: WPA, Osage Nation Museum, Pawhuska, new construction
Oklahoma: WPA, Sequoyah’s Cabin Museum, Sallisaw, new construction (stone bldg around historic cabin)
Pennsylvania: NYA, Caledonia State Park museum, new construction
Pennsylvania: NYA, Martin’s Cabin – Nature Museum, Schenley Park, Pittsburgh, reconstruction of historic cabin
Pennsylvania: WPA, William Penn Estate restoration, Bucks County, restoration
South Dakota: WPA, Rapid City Historical Museum, new construction
South Dakota: WPA, School of Mines Museum / Library / Admin. Building, Rapid City, new construction
Texas: NYA, La Villita, San Antonio, restoration of area into a “permanent museum” village, including the Bolivar Museum building
Texas: PWA, Big Bend Memorial Museum, Alpine, new construction
Texas: PWA, Dallas Museum of Natural History, Dallas, new construction
Texas: PWA, Gonzales Memorial Museum, Gonzales, new construction
Texas: PWA, San Jacinto Monument (including museum area), Houston, new construction
Utah: WPA, Pioneer Museum, Provo, new construction
Utah: WPA, Springville Art Museum, Springville, new construction
Virginia: PWA, Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, new construction
Washington: CCC, Ginkgo Petrified Forest State Park trailside museum, Ellensburg, new construction
West Virginia: CCC, Hawks Nest State Park, Ansted, new construction
West Virginia: NYA, West Virginia State College Museum of Negro History, Institute, new construction
Wisconsin: WPA, Children’s Museum (part of Milwaukee Public Museum), Milwaukee, remodeled existing building into a new museum
Wisconsin: WPA, Door County Historical Museum, Sturgeon Bay, new construction
Wisconsin: WPA, Douglas County Historical Society Museum, Superior, new construction (altering an existing non-museum bldg)
Wisconsin: WPA, Kenosha Historical and Art Museum, Kenosha, moved and remodeled post office bldg into a new museum
Wisconsin: WPA, NYA, Villa Louis Museum, Prairie du Chien, restoring old structure into a museum
Wyoming: CCC, Guernsey Lake Museum, new construction
Wyoming: CCC, Guernsey State Park museum bldg, new construction
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