New Deal Accomplishment: 335,000 projects to construct, improve, or maintain buildings

Above: A firehouse built by the Works Progress Administration (WPA) in Taos County, New Mexico, between 1935 and 1943. Some of the most interesting architecture of the New Deal-era was (and still is, in many cases) located in New Mexico and Arizona. Photo from the National Archives.

Above: Young men in the New Deal's National Youth Administration (NYA) building an addition to the municipal power plant in Murray City, Utah, between 1937 and 1938. "The project entailed razing one wall of the existing diesel plant on Forty-eighth South Street, construction of an addition to the building and installation of a new 840 horsepower diesel engine, complete with auxiliary equipment... Youths working on the project range from 18 to 25 years of age and were taken from families whose income wasn't sufficient to provide basic needs. They are residents of both Salt Lake and Murray. Virtually all unskilled laborers, the youths have been given instruction in many phases of mechanics, electrical engineering, and steel and concrete work. They have also been provided free vocational training at night classes conducted three times weekly" ("NYA Youths Make $50,000 Improvement," The Deseret News (Salt Lake City, Utah), February 28, 1938, p. 3). Photo from the National Archives.

Above: A farmers' market constructed in Austin, Texas, with funds from the New Deal's Public Works Administration (PWA), between 1933 and 1941. The New Deal aided farmers with market buildings, farm-to-market roads, low-interest loans, grants, purchases of surplus production (for distribution to lower-income Americans), soil erosion control projects, wells and irrigation, and tips for better harvesting (e.g., terracing). This assistance helped many farmers recover from the devastation that had been caused by overproduction (and the resulting drop in prices), the Great Depression, drought, and dust storms (see, e.g., "Farmers Face New Decade With Hope: Farm Income Rises From Depression Low Toward Pre-Depression Level," The Bristol Herald Courier (Bristol, Virginia and Bristol, Tennessee), January 1, 1940.) Photo from the National Archives.

Above: The magnificent Oregon State Capitol Building, in Salem, built with PWA funding, 1936-1938. Photo from the National Archives.

Above: Completed in 1935 this council house was "one of the many buildings constructed on the Navajo Reservation with P.W.A. funds." Quote and photo from C.W. Short and R. Stanley-Brown, Public Buildings: A Survey of Architecture of Projects Constructed by Federal and Other Governmental Bodies Between the Years 1933 and 1939 with the Assistance of the Public Works Administration, Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1939.

Above: A PWA-funded jail in Lexington, Kentucky, between 1933 and 1941. New Deal prison and jail projects often replaced cramped, unsafe, and unsanitary facilities. "Many of the jails replaced by new structures have been 'disgraceful,' according to the applications. In Atlanta the city jail was both inadequate and overcrowded. Before the new structure was erected, prisoners slept on the floors of the multiple cells or 'tanks'... One application gave a grim picture of conditions in the old Barton Co., Mo., jail. 'Jail erected shortly after the Civil War, of pine boards laid flat and spiked together. Jail always wet and moldy... Inmates bathe in a washtub and no hot water... Vermin, mice, and rats abound, and rats had to be killed with a target rifle... Jail bars easily cut in two with corset steel handmade files..." (Public Works Administration, America Builds: The Record of PWA, Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1939, pp. 199-200). Photo from the National Archives.

Above: A new building for the Girl Scouts, in Rocky River, Ohio, constructed by the WPA between 1935 and 1943. The New Deal built or improved many buildings for youth: Scouts, 4-H, recreation centers, clubhouses, etc. Photo from the National Archives.

Above: WPA workers cleaning and painting the top of the Washington County Courthouse in Blair, Nebraska, 1936. Other work at the courthouse included "cleaning, painting and varnishing in all rooms of the three-story building, construction of new rear stairs, laying of a new ground floor, waterproofing of the foundation and remodeling of the north front doors of the building" ("Courthouse Is To Be Repaired In $10,000 Job: WPA Courthouse Project Is Approved; Crew Of Men Now At Work," The Pilot-Tribune (Blair, Nebraska), January 16, 1936, p. 1). Photo from the National Archives.

Above: The Washington County Courthouse in 2010. The WPA's repair and improvement of the building (see previous photo) helped preserve it, and it is now on the National Register of Historic Places. Public domain photo, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons (WC) and WC contributor "Ammodramus."

Above: A winter sports arena for Crookston, Minnesota, built by the WPA, 1938. This fantastic building served the community for about 72 years before being demolished in 2011. Photo from the National Archives.

Above: A community building in Williamsport, Maryland, constructed by WPA workers, ca. 1938. The WPA and other New Deal agencies built thousands of city halls, town halls, community buildings, recreation centers, and similar buildings for the American people to gather together for business or pleasure. Photo by Brent McKee, 2011.

Above: The CCC built this lodge in Cacapon State Park, West Virginia, 1936-1937, one of the many thousands of structures the Triple C's built in our nation's parks and forests from 1933 to 1942. The CCC's cabins and pavilions, especially, are still used by tourists and vacationers today. Photo by Brent McKee, 2012.

Above: A new hospital in Guayama, Puerto Rico, approved by the Civil Works Administration (CWA), and carried out with funding from the Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA), 1934. This is one of the many buildings that the New Deal constructed or improved on the island - hospitals, schools, university buildings, housing, etc. Photo from a 1935 report of the Puerto Rico Emergency Relief Administration (PRERA).

Above: FERA-funded homes under construction in Arecibo, Puerto Rico, 1934. Inset photo shows a completed home. A model for today's homeless problem? Photo from a 1935 report of the Puerto Rico Emergency Relief Administration (PRERA).

Above: A Farm Security Administration (FSA) home for migratory laborers at Visalia, California, 1940. "Sanitary steel cabins are provided for each family." Could inexpensive homes like this be part of the solution to the lack of affordable housing that has plagued America for decades? Photo by Arthur Rothstein, FSA, courtesy of the Library of Congress.

Above: The main post office in Santa Barbara, California, constructed in 1936, and one of the hundreds of post offices built by the New Deal. Photo by Richard Walker, 2019, Creative Commons.

Above: A new state highway building for Montgomery, Alabama, courtesy of the WPA, 1938. Photo from the National Archives.

Above: A postcard of the WPA-built highway building in Montgomery, Alabama (see previous photo). The back credits the post card to "The S.D. Winn Cigar Co., Montgomery, Ala.," and also "Colourpicture Publication, Cambridge, Mass." Image used here for educational and non-commercial purposes.

Buildings, Buildings, and More Buildings

Here are some statistics from most of the major work and construction programs of the New Deal:

CCC: 51,160 projects to construct new buildings, and 30,019 projects to maintain existing buildings - barns, cabins, lodges, fire lookout towers, etc. (CCC final report, p. 104, not including "latrines and toilets").

PWA: 12,597 projects - educational buildings, hospitals, other public buildings (America Builds: The Record of PWA, 1939, p. 291).  

CWA: 33,810, and Work Division of FERA: 43,500 projects to to construct or improve buildings (Works Progress Administration, Analysis of Civil Works Program Statistics, June 1939, p. 27). These numbers may include mutliple buildings within a single project, e.g., 1 project to paint 3 county schools, because earlier in the report it is noted that the CWA repaired or constructed 60,500 buildings (p. 10).

WPA: 36,256 projects to construct new buildings; 4,972 projects to create additions to buildings; and 88,081 projects to reconstruct or improve existing buildings. These buildings included schools, airport buildings, garages, warehouses, courthouses, firehouses, hospitals, etc. (WPA final report, pp. 131-132).

NYA: 35,180 projects to construct new buildings, add to buildings, or reconstruct or improve buildings - schools, libraries, gymnasiums, armories, etc. (NYA final report, p. 139).  

In addition to these, there were buildings constructed by other programs, for example, the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), the United States Housing Authority (USHA), the Puerto Rico Reconstruction Administration (PRRA), and the Farm Security Administration (FSA). Also, the WPA and other agencies built 2.8 million sanitary privies (there is a separate blog post for them, and so they're not included here).

Adding up the CCC, PWA, CWA, FERA, WPA, and NYA numbers we get 335,575. Some of these projects crossed over from one agency to another, for example, a school started by CWA and completed by FERA (but this might still be considered two projects, depending on one's viewpoint), but again, we're not counting a number of other building projects, so the 335,000 figure still seems a reasonable one.