Above: This comes from the 1936 WPA publication Jobs (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office). WPA parks were part of a broad array of recreation projects designed to get Americans exercising, socializing, and using their free time in fun and productive ways.
Above: WPA workers building a greenhouse at Roger Williams Park, Providence, Rhode Island, 1936. Between 1935 and 1943, the WPA created 1,668 new parks, and had 6,524 other projects to improve existing parks. "Many of these projects have provided parks for small communities for the first time" (Report on the Progress of the WPA Program, June 30, 1942, p. 46). Photo from the National Archives.
Above: The completed greenhouse. Photo from the National Archives.
Above: Another view of the completed WPA greenhouse. Photo from the National Archives.
Above: The description for this photograph, taken ca. 1936, reads, "Women WPA workers clearing the grounds at the Bird and Wild Flower Sanctuary in Lee Park, Petersburg, Va., one of the first outdoor projects to employ women." Lee Park is now called "Legends Park" and lately there has been renewed interest in the WPA's work there (see, e.g., "Women's Work: Remembering a forgotten wildlife sanctuary in Petersburg," WVTF Public Radio, September 16, 2024). Photo from the National Archives.
Above: Many of the WPA's parks are still in use today, such as Taylor Park in Keedysville, Maryland. Most have certainly been renovated and modernized, but their New Deal foundation is still there. Photo by Brent McKee, 2013.
Above: Two workers in the New Deal's National Youth Administration (NYA) plant a tree and look over a map with a supervisor, in Hoyt Park Arboretum, Portland, Oregon, between 1935 and 1943. Across the U.S., NYA youth built 281 new roadside parks, carried out 292 other projects to improve existing roadside parks, and created or improved over 190,000 acres of other types of parks (source). Photo from the National Archives.
Above: The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) created or developed about 800 state and national parks, including many of the parks that are most visited by Americans today. Pictured above are members of CCC Company 510, one of several CCC companies that created the popular Mammoth Caves National Park in Kentucky (see, "Tourism to Mammoth Cave National Park contributes $73,238,000 to local economy," National Park Service, September 29, 2025). Photo from the National Park Service.
Above: This historical marker--located at Swallow Falls State Park in Maryland--highlights the value of the CCC's groundbreaking work. Photo by Brent McKee, 2011.
Above: Laborers in the Civil Works Administration (CWA, 1933-1934)--one of the earliest New Deal work-relief programs--improved many parks across the nation, such as the one pictured above. Bonnie Fox Schwartz credits the CWA with the creation or improvement of "3,500 parks, playgrounds, and athletic fields" (The Civil Works Administration, 1933-1934: The Business of Emergency Employment in the New Deal, Princeton University Press, 1984). Photo from: Henry G. Alsberg, America Fights the Depression: A Photographic Record of the Civil Works Administration, New York: Coward-McCann Publishers, 1934, used here for educational and non-commercial purposes.
Above: The Work Division of the Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA) served as a work-relief bridge between the CWA and WPA. Between 1934 and 1935, FERA workers constructed 882 new parks and improved another 2,639 (source). Transient workers in FERA, like those shown above, were men who wandered the countryside looking for work. The New Deal created work camps for them (voluntary of course) where they could receive food, shelter, work, a paycheck, and camaraderie with folks in similar situations as themselves (some camps even had their own newsletters, sharing both humor and practical information and advice). In return, the men created many public works that Americans still utilize today. Photo from the Work Division's final report.
Above: CWA and FERA work crews, numbering in the hundreds, built Ala Moana Park in Hawaii, 1934-1935 (later, the WPA did some additional work). CWA and FERA projects included an artificial lake (shown above), tennis courts, bowling greens, a baseball diamond, benches, flower pots, a bridge, and several buildings (learn more about some of these projects by visiting the Living New Deal's Ala Moana project pages and also this Historic American Landscapes Survey). Writing for the Honolulu Star-Bulletin in 1936, journalist Jan Jabulka wrote, "Rising from what was once a formless, unsightly garbage dump, Moana park is already assuming its ultimate aspect as one of the most magnificent mile and a quarter waterfront and recreational developments in the world" (March 7 edition). This mirrored a statement made two years earlier by FERA Administrator Harry Hopkins: "Ala Moana Park is destined to become one of the finest waterfront recreational developments in the world" (Honolulu Star-Advertiser, May 31, 1935). The Photo above was taken by the Honolulu Star-Bulletin newspaper and was featured in its April 21, 1934 edition. Image from newspapers.com, and used here for educational and non-commercial purposes.
Above: "Central Park," an oil painting by Carl Gustaf Nelson (1898-1988), created while he was in the New Deal's Public Works of Art Project, 1934. This is one of several New Deal artworks depicting New York's famous park. Image from the Smithsonian American Art Museum.
Places for Americans to Relax, Play, Exercise, and Enjoy a Bit of Nature
From the statistics in the captions above, we see that the New Deal created, developed, or improved over 13,000 parks. This is a conservative estimate because we are not counting, for example, the 190,000 acres of NYA other-than-roadside park work (because we don't know the number of parks in those acres), the park projects of the CWA (see statistical note below), and the work of some of the other New Deal agencies, such as the Puerto Rico Reconstruction Administration (PRRA).
If the New Deal's park work were replicated today, adjusted for population growth, we would see the creation, development, or improvement of more than 32,000 parks between now and 2036.
(Statistical note: Due to a variety of factors--such as (a) single work projects that spanned over the course of multiple work-relief agencies, (b) more than one agency working on the same project at the same time, and (c) inadequate reporting--calculating the total New Deal work product for any category of projects can range from mildly challenging to extraordinarily difficult. I therefore use several methods--for example, leaving out the work product of one or more agencies--to keep the estimates modest, as opposed to overblown. My earliest blog posts go into these difficulties and methods in more detail.)
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