[[Image:WPA1.jpg|thumb|300px|WPA sewer crew in 1935]]
The '''Works Progress Administration''' (later '''Work Projects Administration''', abbreviated '''WPA'''), was created on May 6, 1935 by Presidential order (Congress funded it annually but did not create a permanent agency.). It was the largest and most comprehensive [[New Deal]] agency, employing millions of people and affecting every locality. The WPA refused to allow any job training (which labor unions strongly opposed),<ref>There was some job training in the NYA, especially for occupations like domestic servants that were not unionized.</ref>, with the result that WPA experience did not lead to better job opportunities. It did reduce unemployment by finding jobs for the least employable and most needy men and women--both women—both black and white--in white—in the country.
WPA continued and extended the [[FERA]] relief programs started by [[Herbert Hoover]] and continued under [[Franklin D. Roosevelt]]. Unlike FERA (which funded state and local programs), the WPA was run directly by the federal government.
===Relief for Blacks===
The share of [[FERA]] and WPA benefits going to blacks exceeded their proportion of the general population. The FERA's first relief census reported that more than two million black Americans were on relief in early 1933, a fraction of the black population (17.8%) that was nearly double the proportion of whites on relief (9.5%). By 1935, there were 3,500,000 blacks (men, women and children) on relief, almost 30 percent of the black population; plus another 200,000 black adults were working on WPA projects. Altogether in 1935, about 40 percent of the nation's black families were either on relief or were employed by the WPA. <ref>John Salmond, "The New Deal and the Negro" in John Braeman et al, eds. ''The New Deal: The National Level'' (1975). pp 188-89 </ref>
Civil rights leaders initially complained that black Americans were proportionally underrepresented. African-American leaders made such a claim with respect to WPA hires in New Jersey: "In spite of the fact that Negroes indubitably constitute more than 20 per cent of the State's unemployed, they composed 15.9 per cent of those assigned to W.P.A. jobs during 1937."<ref> Howard 287 </ref> Nationwide in late 1937, 15.2% were African American. The Urban League magazine ''Opportunity'' hailed the WPA: <ref>February, 1939, p. 34. in Howard 295</ref>
<blockquote>
It is to the eternal credit of the administrative officers of the WPA that discrimination on various projects because of race has been kept to a minimum and that in almost every community Negroes have been given a chance to participate in the work program. In the South, as might have been expected, this participation has been limited, and differential wages on the basis of race have been more or less effectively established; but in the northern communities, particularly in the urban centers, the Negro has been afforded his first real opportunity for employment in white-collar occupations.
==Cultural Programs==
About 10% of the WPA went for cultural programs to support unemployed white collar workers, writers, artists, actors and musicians in four major programs, the Music Project, the Writer's Project, the Arts Project, and the Theatre Project - While providing cultural stimulation, the WPA also had drawbacks. Oftentimes mediocrity was perpetuated by using persons of limited talent; likewise, political rather than aesthetic criterion for judging success and poor editing (in the case of the Writer's Project) led to stifling of creativity. A harmonious working relationship between the artists and the agency was never adequately established. Further, individuals were often subjected to censorship, used as propaganda, and imposed on by Congressional committees seeking political aggrandizement.<ref> Billington, 1961</ref> The ''Federal Theatre Project'' from its establishment in 1935 until its demise in 1939 was directed by Hallie Flanagan. Theatre centers nationwide produced a wide variety of plays independently and simultaneously, including works by Sinclair Lewis, George Bernard Shaw, and Eugene O'Neill. The Federal Theatre Project produced both regional and national projects and struggled against censorship and cuts in funds for four years before it was ended for political reasons. The ''Federal Writers' Project'' directed by Henry G. Alsberg, operated in every state to produce an American Guide Book. It undertook a massive collecting process on a county level throughout the country and produced not only a national guide but also one for each state and numerous localities. The ''Historical Records Survey,'' directed by Luther H. Evans, employed 3400 unemployed librarians, archivists, teachers and others, who located and inventoried the public records of every state, such as county records on births, marriages, and deaths, church and cemetery records, newspapers, schools, and memorabilia. It also created an index to the federal census of 1900, which was used to authenticate the ages of people who had no birth certificate but were eligible for old age assistance. The ''Federal Music Project'' sponsored thousands of concerts across the country. In San Diego the Federal Opera Company made "Cavalleria Rusticana" its first production, with the WPA sewing project making costumes. "Gondoliers" was the second offering and the first to go on the road. By 1937, 73 performances of a variety of shows had been offered to 73,000 people.
==NYA==
The ''National Youth Administration'' was the WPA's youth division. Work study projects provided jobs for high school and college students. Unlike the CCC it enrolled women. The NYA ran training programs--even programs—even alternative high schools run outside the public school system--to system—to provide training in skills that would not compete with labor unions.
[[Image:Nya3.jpg|thumb|320px|NYA employment]]
[[Lyndon Johnson]] was the NYA director in Texas, Aubrey Williams was national director; Mary McLeon Bethune, Director, Division of Negro Affairs .
Reporters visited one site in Arkansas:<ref> Lindley and Lindley (1938) pp 92-93</ref>
:"in Russellville, Arkansas, 31 NYA boys... are working on a complete campus for out-of-school, unemployed Arkansas youth. We saw some of these young men building dormitories and a supervisor's house. The plans call for four dormitories to house 96 youth, a recreation hall, a dining hall, athletic grounds, and, adjacent to this campus, a poultry house, barn, and machinery repair shop. The boys may also choose work and related training in auto mechanics, power plant operation, or diversified agriculture. In these four Arkansas Resident Centers that we visited, boys and girls do NYA work 100 hours a month to earn $25 each, of which they pay $18 for board and room and 50 cents into a co-operative medical fund."
[[Image:Nya2.jpg|thumb|275px|; this WPA poster was not well proofread, as the first line shows]]
The WPA's enemies ridiculed the weak work habits it encouraged, by cruel jokes, calling it "We Poke Along," "We Piddle Along" or "We Putter Around." This is a sarcastic reference to WPA projects that sometimes slowed to a crawl, because foremen on a government project devised to maintain employment often had no incentive or ability to influence worker productivity by demotion or termination. This criticism was due in part to the WPA's early practice of basing wages on a "security wage," ensuring workers would be paid even if the project was delayed, improperly constructed, or incomplete.
[[Image:Wpa-Lean.jpg|thumb|270px|left|The WPA Theatre project produced a play that satirized the common "leaning on a shovel" criticism. ]]
==Evolution and termination==
===Kentucky===
In the 1938 election Senator [[Alben Barkley]] was being opposed for the Democratic nomination in the primary in Kentucky by "Happy" Chandler, then governor of the state. During the election grave charges were made in the ''Scripps-Howard'' Republican newspapers about the manner in which WPA workers in Kentucky were being forced to support the administration candidate. A special Senate committee investigated the charges. <ref>Facts relating to the 1938 election activities of the WPA are taken from the official report of the U. S. Senate Committee on Campaign Expenditures, quoted in ''The Roosevelt Myth'', John T. Flynn, Fox and Wilkes, 1948, Book 1, Ch. 6, [http://www.rooseveltmyth.com/book/fdrmyth_Chapter_Four___Harry_the_Hop_and.htm ''Harry the Hop and the Happy Hot Dogs'']</ref>
In the first WPA district of Kentucky, one WPA official went to work on Governor Chandler. He took his orders from the administration political headquarters in Kentucky. He put nine WPA supervisors and 340 WPA timekeepers on government time to work preparing elaborate forms for checking on all the reliefers in the district. Having done this they then proceeded to check up on the 17,000 recipients who were drawing relief money to see how they stood on the election.
In Pennsylvania, where Senator Joe Guffey presided over the destinies of the Democratic party, the story was much the same. Men who supplied trucks to WPA were solicited for $100 each in Carbon County. The owners of the trucks were requested by WPA officials to visit representatives of certain political leaders at their homes. Ten or twelve at a time went and many of them contributed. In Lucerne County it was the same. They were told to call at Democratic headquarters and make their contributions. In Montgomery County, the WPA workers got letters stating that at the direction of the senator from Pennsylvania (Guffey) and the state committeeman, a joint meeting of WPA workers would be held on a certain date and they were told "there will be no excuse accepted for lack of attendance."
The evidence showed that WPA workers in this county, including timekeepers and poor women on sewing projects, were requested and ordered to change their registration from Republican to Democratic and in many cases those who refused were fired. <ref>[http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,756769-2,00.html Records on Relief], [[Time magazine]], Oct. 19, 1936,</ref> There was testimony that there were a number of Republicans on the WPA project near Wilkes Barre. They lived in Wilkes Barre and they thought they had a right to continue to be Republicans. They soon discovered that the right had vanished when they became wards of the New Deal and as punishment, 18 were transferred from the project near Wilkes Barre to a project 35 or 40 miles from their homes because they refused to discard their Republican buttons.
In Pennsylvania workcards were issued by the Party entitling the recipients to employment on the state highways and these were distributed by political groups. Some of these cards entitled the holders to employment "for two to four weeks around election time." In one county, from September, 1935 to September, 1938, the WPA spent more than $27,000,000 on highways.
:Dear Committeemen :
:Contact all houses in your division and get the names of all men on relief, also of those holding WPA jobs. Urge them to register Democratic on March 26 or else lose their jobs. <ref>''Philadelphia Inquirer'', March 28, 1936.</ref>
===Tennessee===
It was the same in Tennessee where the WPA was lighting a fire under Governor Browning. <ref>[http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,931436,00.html "People Would Be Shocked!"], ''Time magazine'', Aug. 08, 1938.</ref> Reliefers who were for Browning if it could be proved were dropped from the payroll. They were asked for contributions of two per cent. One man was asked to put up $5. He didn't have it. He was summoned the next day. The collector had decided to reduce his tribute to $3. He didn't have that. He was told to get it. He had to borrow it. Another, assessed twice before, rebelled. "You don't have to pay," he was told, "but if you don't you'll have a hell of a time getting on the WPA." [[African-American]]s on relief were made to put up 25 and 50 cents.
===Illinois===
* Bold, Christine. ''The WPA Guides: Mapping America.'' U. Press of Mississippi, 1999. 246 pp.
* Brightman, Stacy Claire. "The Federal Theatre Project in Los Angeles." PhD dissertation U. of California, Davis 1999. 188 pp. DAI 2000 60(8): 2741-A. DA9940083 Fulltext: online at ProQuest Dissertations & Theses
* Browne, Lorraine. "Federal Theatre: Melodrama, Social Protest, and Genius" ''Quarterly Journal of the Library of Congress,'' Volume 36 No. 1, Winter 1979, p. 18-37. [http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/fedtp/ftbrwn00.html online edition]
* Bustard, Bruce I. ''A New Deal for the Arts.'' U. of Washington Press, 1997. 133 pp.
* Craig, E. Quita. ''Black Drama of the Federal Theater Era: Beyond the Formal Horizons.'' U. of Massachusetts Press, 1980. 239 pp.
* O'Gara, Geoffrey. ''A Long Road Home: In the Footsteps of the WPA Writers.'' Houghton Mifflin, 1990. 312 pp.
* Seaton, Elizabeth Gaede. "Federal Prints and Democratic Culture: The Graphic Arts Division of the Works Progress Administration Federal Art Project, 1935-1943." PhD dissertation Northwestern U. 2000. 364 pp. DAI 2000 61(6A): 2080-A. DA9974356 Fulltext: online at ProQuest Dissertations & Theses
* Strickland, Carol. "Posters for the People," ''Civilization'' April-May April–May 1997 [http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/fedtp/ftstri00.html heavily illustrated online edition]
==External links==
* [http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/wpaposters/wpahome.html Posters from the WPA at the Library of Congress]
[[Image:Wpa-done.jpg|thumb|530px|WPA summarized its achievements; click twice for the poster]]
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