Final Report of the Work Projects Administration for the City of New York, 1935-1943 by Abernethy, Charles T. ; acting administrator [WPA, New York City] - March 2, 1943

New York City: Work Projects Administration, New York City. Very Good+. March 2, 1943. First Edition. Hardcover. xi, [2], 271pp pages; Publisher's black cloth, spine and front cover lettered in gilt. No publisher stated on title page, this book was not "published" in any traditional commercial sense, but was more of an "in-house" document, as confirmed by the printer's slug on the verso of the title page: "Duplicated by / New York City WPA War Services." This copy has the bookplate of the U.S. Department of State mounted to the front paste-down endpaper with a deacquisition Surplus-Duplicate stamp from the Library of Congress on the front free endpaper. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt created the Works Progress Administration as a way to get 8.5 million unemployed Americans back to work under the authority granted by Emergency Relief Appropriation Act of 1935. [The agency was renamed in 1939 as the Work Projects Administration]. Officially, the WPA had 8.5 million employees over the period of its existence -- 1935–1943. The peak figure was 3.3 million in November 1938. The WPA programs were shut down in June, 1943. By this point, unemployment was under two percent, as many Americans in the work force had switched to employment by the Armed Forces or the defence industries. WPA had attracted much criticism during the eight years of its activity, partly due to its costs to the Federal taxpayers; the agency's annual budget for 1935 was $1.3 billion. Representative J. Parnell Thomas of the House Committee on Un-American Activities claimed in 1938 that divisions of the WPA were a "hotbed of Communists" and "one more link in the vast and unparalleled New Deal propaganda network." New York received more federal funds than any other city in the nation and employed more than 700,000 people through the Depression years. Those workers built or renovated schools, bridges, parks, hospitals, highways, airports, stadiums, swimming pools, beaches, hospitals, piers, sewers, libraries, courthouse, firehouses, markets and housing projects throughout the five boroughs. The Triborough Bridge, the Holland and Lincoln Tunnels, the FDR Drive, the Henry Hudson and Belt Parkways, and the New York Municipal (LaGuardia) Airport are just a few of the WPA-funded projects in NYC. WPA did not just improve parks and build roadways—a portion of the money was set aside for unemployed professionals in the “arts.” As WPA director Harry Hopkins explained, “they have to eat like other people.” This portion of the WPA was called Federal Project Number One, and consisted of Art, Music, Theatre and Writers’ Projects. The Federal Writers' Project (FWP) was the only one to operate in all 48 states and the territories of Alaska, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands, as well as New York City. At its peak, in April of 1936, there were 6,686 on the payroll nationwide. New York City housed the largest FWP Unit, employing nearly 300 people. The writers produced the New York City Guide, New York Panorama, Almanac for New Yorkers, a number of ethnic studies, Who’s Who in the Zoo— in all, a total of 64 proposed books. Eighty years later, projects and accomplishments of the WPA remain at the center of modern life in NYC and accross the nation. All this was achieved using workers, skilled and less-so, who were paid an average of $47 per month. This book is now quite scarce, and this status seems consistent with the way in which the program had been shut down quickly during 1943, under the new circumstances of the Second World War. See OCLC Number: 1226737713 for the copy preserved in the New York City Municipal Library (who also have most of the records and archives of the NYC Federal Writers Project). There are another handful of copies described in two additional OCLC numbers. .