Later it added the one-act play unit, dance theatre, the Theater for the Blind, marionette theatre, a Yiddish vaudeville unit, a German unit, an Anglo-Jewish theater, and the Radio Division, among other groups. Roosevelt intended Federal One (as it was known) to put artists back to work while entertaining and inspiring the larger population by creating a hopeful view of life amidst the economic turmoil. Many writers who were employed by the Federal Writers' Project would go on to become famous including Ralph Ellison, John Cheever, Conrad Aiken, Richard Wright, Saul Bellow, Studs Terkel, Dorothy West, and Zora Neale Hurston. Regardless, the WPA was immensely important to a great many people, putting money in their pockets and hope for the future. What about those who are not on the WPA or on direct relief? American stage. On this basis, private employment will have to increase to the extent of 500,000 to 650,000 more than seasonal expectations if Works Progress Administration employment is to be reduced to 1,600,000 in June. The Cradle Will Rock became a triumph and played to acclaim all over the country. Despite his reluctance to continue direct relief, shortly after founding the CCC, Roosevelt established the Federal Emergency Relief Administration. As he began to sing the opening song a voice joined his from the audience. The idea that the government would pay people to do it seemed absurd. Over its eight years of existence, the WPA put roughly 8.5 million Americans to work building schools, hospitals, roads and other public works. As head of the NYA Division of Negro Affairs, Bethune was the highest-ranking black person in the New Deal. It was a huge programthe largest public works program ever attemptedin the number of people employed, in money expended, and in volume of results. The New Deal's WPA was most importantly a work relief program. It was this aspect of the work relief programs that provided fodder for critics and ultimately led to the program's demise. Part of this had to do with segregation requirements. The idea of unionizing American workers was gaining acceptance in some areas. That success was largely due to Mary McLeod Bethune. In 1922 Williams became executive secretary of the Wisconsin Conference of Social Work. Melosh, Barbara. February 2000, v. 34:17. New York: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1988. . While inequities existed under the programs, many women, African Americans and other marginalized groups found employment with the WPA. The range of the productions was astounding. Youth were strictly supervised and taught "how to live" as well as how to make a living. Many post offices and other public buildings became canvases for WPA murals. Do Americans really like to work, or would they rather loaf? Meritocracy (merit, from Latin mere, and -cracy, from Ancient Greek kratos 'strength, power') is the notion of a political system in which economic goods or political power are vested in individual people based on talent, effort, and achievement, rather than wealth or social class. Westport, CT: Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc., 1976. The best known and most lasting of the works of art created under FAP were the murals painted in public buildings across the nation. The play, to be a production of the Federal Theatre Project, was a celebration of the triumph of labor unions. It also took an innovative approach to including cultural expression into its employment program. As part of the New Deal, the WPA program was developed in response to the horrible unemployment and destitution of the time, which affected almost every aspect of society. President Roosevelt was a strong believer in work relief. Pick a style below, and copy the text for your bibliography. The WPA made significant contributions to the preservation of Black culture and history with the Federal Writers Project. He believed direct relief to be debilitating and demoralizing. Most workers had no insurance. As the House Committee on Un-American Activities began hearings on Federal One, the FTP was singled out for particular criticism. The Federal Music Project largely realized its vision, performing thousands of low-cost concerts in theaters and schools across the country, and introducing thousands of Americans to different kinds of music. In the late 1930s, composer Virgil Thomson, director and producer John Houseman, and director and actor Orson Welles collaborated on a play. As such the WPA regulations required that 90 percent of those hired had to come from relief rolls. A pretty tough race of people, these Americans, and hard to kill. Work Projects Administration (WPA), former U.S. government agency, established in 1935 by executive order of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt as the Works Progress Administration; it was renamed the Work Projects Administration in 1939, when it was made part of the Federal Works Agency. Some felt that much of the work was make-work. The concepts of work and welfare and the varying views of the appropriate (and inappropriate) role of the federal government were largely established during this time. Senator from Mississippi from 1898 to 1901 and served in the U.S. House of Representatives briefly before that. As weapons production for World War II began ramping up and unemployment dropped, the federal government decided a national relief program was no longer needed. Given this new outlook many in the Roosevelt Administration felt that the United States couldand had a moral obligation toprovide relief for its citizenry. Harry Hopkins: Sudden Hero, Brash Performer. Those views were undoubtedly also expressed in the artistic communities of Federal One. One of the most powerful collections compiled by the FWP writers is that of the Slave Narratives consisting of more than two thousand oral histories from black Americans who had formerly been slaves. Many of the projects completed under Federal One documented some aspect of American culture such as its folklore or its music. That included women, African Americans and other groups. This experience led him to become a social worker. Dies accused the two projects of spreading communist propaganda more than the Communist Party itself. In 1931 New York Governor Roosevelt appointed the former social worker as the executive director of the New York State Temporary Emergency Relief Administration. Woodward petitioned to have the Women's Division become part of the Professional Division where there might be more seemingly appropriate jobs for women as stenographers and office workers. On May 6, 1935, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs an executive order creating the Works Progress Administration (WPA). She was fully dedicated to building a truly national theater. In response to the challenge to address the needs of these youth, the NYA developed a residential work program. Encyclopedia.com. The Committee charged that the Federal One projects were radicalizing America. From 1922 to 1929 six million families42 percent of the families in the United Statesmade less than $1,000 a year. (7) See note 1 at pp. The Roosevelt Administration saw the pervasiveness of the Great Depression and the depth of the problem as being too much for states to bear alone. It put four million people to work within four weeks. The NYA had a better record than many federal agencies of the time in providing assistance to black American students. Some politicians criticized the WPA for its inefficiencies. example in defense of the WPA, the following excerpts are from an article by David Cushman Coyle published in the March 1939 issue of the journal Forum entitled "The WPALoafers or Workers?" Mangione, Jerre. There is a reserve of millions of unemployed, outside the WPA, to which industry can turn. In the early years of the Great Depression Williams returned to the South where he coordinated activities of President Hoover's Reconstruction Finance Corporation in bringing economic relief to people of Texas and Mississippi. Mary McLeod Bethune (18751955). The key measures of the Second New Deal were the Social Security Act, the Works Progress Administration (WPA), and the Wagner Act. La Vere, David. The music was documented, generally for the first time, so that it would not be lost forever as the traditional musicians died and communities disappeared. But the women's projects, which were indoors, had to be entirely segregated, making them more costly to run. Flanagan believed that theatre should both educate and entertain. The Dies Committee placed Representative Clifton Woodrum in charge of the investigation. Traditional conservatives included the Liberty League and many Republicans who saw the WPA as a means of undermining the capitalist system. The specific characteristics of the WPA, however, particularly its specific inclusion of artists and actors, grew out of the 1920s. Each industry itself likewise should bear a part of the premium for this insurance, and the State, in the interest of its own citizens, and to prevent a recurrence of the widespread hardship of these days, should at least supervise its operation. This was done even though astronomical unemployment percentages (well into the double digits) indicated that private sector jobs were unavailable. The FTP was led by Hallie Flanagan, former head of the Vassar College Experimental Theatre and former classmate of Harry Hopkins at Grinnell College. It is generally agreed that there are from ten to twelve million unemployed in the country. I look forward to the day when many, many people from this region of the Nation are going to come here for skiing and tobogganing and various other forms of winter sports. When Roosevelt became president he recruited Hopkins to implement his various social welfare programs including from 1935 to 1938 the Works Progress Administration. The Federal Music Project (FMP) was the least controversial of the Federal One projects. The largest number of people in WPA was employed in engineering and construction projects where most of the money from the WPA was directed. The Works Progress Administration was a unique program designed to get the unemployed off of the reliefwelfarerolls by providing work at minimal pay until they could find work for a private business. Many criticized the wages as insufficient and a punishment for being jobless. Marshall, Will Geer, Burt Lancaster, and John Houseman. Many of the welfare-to-work programs implemented in the late twentieth century, often by conservative state governments, relied on this same belief. All sorts, of course. It became the most controversial of all the WPA programs. So I take very great pleasure in dedicating this Lodge, not only as a new adjunct to our National Forests, but also as a place to play for generations of Americans in the days to come. One painter had put a plea for Puerto Rican independence in a mural in a post office building. It remained under WPA jurisdiction until 1939, then the Federal Security Agency became its home until September 1943, when it dissolved. What if the government-sponsored art was bad art? The Works Progress Administration (WPA). Called The Cradle Will Rock, it became caught in the controversy regarding the FTP. Hopkins, Flanagan, and Cahill in particular wanted to bring the "Arts to the Millions." FDR's Second New Deal also. While this did not happen, the concern about the potential impact of organized youth was not unfounded. TAG Archives: WPA Women: The Living New Deal. Living Newspapers were plays in the form of a documentary that provided information about and took a stand on the issues of the day. Jacksonville, MS: University Press of Mississippi, 1999. About half of the workers were involved in the direct creation of art. Early in the program, some complained that WPA workers would dig a hole and other WPA workers would fill it in. Young people who were out of school could work 70 hours a month for no more than $25 a month. 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