WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.940 You know, it's a funny thing about walking around 00:00:01.940 --> 00:00:05.719 an older American city. Oh, yeah. Always something 00:00:05.719 --> 00:00:08.820 to trip over. Literally, you trip over a slight, 00:00:08.820 --> 00:00:11.500 like, uneven crack in the sidewalk and you look 00:00:11.500 --> 00:00:13.900 down to catch your balance. And right there, 00:00:14.279 --> 00:00:15.960 stamped permanently into the concrete at your 00:00:15.960 --> 00:00:20.059 feet, are three letters. W -P -A. Exactly. W 00:00:20.059 --> 00:00:23.239 -P -A. And today we're unpacking exactly what 00:00:23.239 --> 00:00:25.839 that stamp means. Our material for this deep 00:00:25.839 --> 00:00:28.379 dive is drawn from a comprehensive Wikipedia 00:00:28.379 --> 00:00:31.780 entry detailing the history, the staggering scale, 00:00:31.780 --> 00:00:36.060 and the complex controversies of the Works Progress 00:00:36.060 --> 00:00:38.600 Administration. Yeah, it's this literal imprint 00:00:38.600 --> 00:00:41.399 left behind by a very specific moment in time, 00:00:41.679 --> 00:00:43.539 a time when the government had to figure out 00:00:43.539 --> 00:00:46.820 how a nation actually responds to you know, total 00:00:46.820 --> 00:00:49.399 economic collapse. Right. And our mission for 00:00:49.399 --> 00:00:52.140 you, the listener today, is to explore how the 00:00:52.140 --> 00:00:54.000 U .S. government answered that collapse. Because 00:00:54.000 --> 00:00:55.539 they didn't just hand out money. No, they took 00:00:55.539 --> 00:00:57.579 a completely different route. They transformed 00:00:57.579 --> 00:00:59.679 into the largest single employer in the nation. 00:01:00.579 --> 00:01:03.140 We are going to look at how the physical and 00:01:03.140 --> 00:01:06.200 cultural landscape of modern America was quite 00:01:06.200 --> 00:01:09.540 literally built by the unemployed. So, okay, 00:01:09.560 --> 00:01:11.500 let's unpack this. Let's do it. Before we get 00:01:11.500 --> 00:01:13.439 into all the sprawling structures they built, 00:01:13.700 --> 00:01:15.819 we really have to look at the philosophy behind 00:01:15.819 --> 00:01:19.620 its creation. This all started on May 6, 1935 00:01:19.620 --> 00:01:22.709 via an executive order. by President Franklin 00:01:22.709 --> 00:01:25.989 D. Roosevelt. Yeah. And to grasp the why behind 00:01:25.989 --> 00:01:28.510 that executive order, we have to look at the 00:01:28.510 --> 00:01:31.349 sheer desperation of 1935. I mean, there were 00:01:31.349 --> 00:01:33.689 20 million people on relief in the United States. 00:01:33.709 --> 00:01:36.349 20 million. That's a massive portion of the country. 00:01:36.650 --> 00:01:39.829 So when FDR and his close advisor, Harry Hopkins, 00:01:40.150 --> 00:01:43.069 who was tapped to head up the WPA when they looked 00:01:43.069 --> 00:01:46.150 at this crisis, they secured an initial budget 00:01:46.150 --> 00:01:50.230 of $4 .9 billion. Which is just an astronomical 00:01:50.230 --> 00:01:51.870 number to wrap your... your head around, even 00:01:51.870 --> 00:01:54.230 today. Our sources note the $4 .9 billion was 00:01:54.230 --> 00:01:57.269 about 6 .7 % of the entire US gross domestic 00:01:57.269 --> 00:02:00.810 product in 1935. Yeah, 6 .7%. Imagine the federal 00:02:00.810 --> 00:02:04.069 government today just carving out nearly 7 % 00:02:04.069 --> 00:02:06.349 of the national economy for one single agency. 00:02:06.730 --> 00:02:09.490 It was a monumental injection of capital, for 00:02:09.490 --> 00:02:12.689 sure. But the core philosophy behind how they 00:02:12.689 --> 00:02:14.750 spent that money is really what set it apart. 00:02:15.090 --> 00:02:16.409 Right, because they didn't just write checks. 00:02:16.710 --> 00:02:20.280 Exactly. They firmly believed in work relief 00:02:20.280 --> 00:02:24.500 over the dole, which was their term for direct 00:02:24.500 --> 00:02:27.340 public assistance or welfare. The prevailing 00:02:27.340 --> 00:02:30.120 theory was that direct handouts might keep people 00:02:30.120 --> 00:02:32.939 physically alive, sure, but work relief preserved 00:02:32.939 --> 00:02:36.020 a worker's self -respect. It kept them active. 00:02:36.139 --> 00:02:38.780 Yeah, it reinforced their work ethic, and crucially, 00:02:38.979 --> 00:02:41.280 it kept their professional skills sharp for when 00:02:41.280 --> 00:02:43.340 the economy eventually recovered. You know, I 00:02:43.340 --> 00:02:45.020 was thinking about this, and it's basically like 00:02:45.020 --> 00:02:47.870 a sports team. Giving someone direct welfare 00:02:47.870 --> 00:02:50.469 is like paying a player to just sit on the bench. 00:02:50.569 --> 00:02:52.469 Oh, that's a good way to look at it. Right. Sure. 00:02:52.650 --> 00:02:54.090 They're getting paycheck, but they are going 00:02:54.090 --> 00:02:57.449 to get incredibly rusty. The WPA was like the 00:02:57.449 --> 00:02:59.830 government creating a nationwide minor league 00:02:59.830 --> 00:03:01.870 just to make sure the players didn't lose their 00:03:01.870 --> 00:03:03.629 swing while they waited to get called back up 00:03:03.629 --> 00:03:06.389 to the major. Exactly. And they took that that 00:03:06.389 --> 00:03:08.370 minor league strategy quite literally when setting 00:03:08.370 --> 00:03:10.349 their hiring goals. They didn't want everyone 00:03:10.349 --> 00:03:12.370 right. Right. They weren't actually aiming for 00:03:12.370 --> 00:03:14.939 100 percent national employment. The strategy 00:03:14.939 --> 00:03:18.139 was highly targeted. They wanted to supply exactly 00:03:18.139 --> 00:03:21.719 one paid job for every family where the primary 00:03:21.719 --> 00:03:24.180 breadwinner was suffering from long -term unemployment. 00:03:24.819 --> 00:03:27.259 Which still sounds like a massive undertaking. 00:03:27.599 --> 00:03:30.319 Oh, the logistical mountain of achieving even 00:03:30.319 --> 00:03:33.539 that limited goal is staggering. At its peak 00:03:33.539 --> 00:03:37.580 in November 1938, the WPA was employing over 00:03:37.580 --> 00:03:41.860 3 .3 million people simultaneously. Wow. And 00:03:41.860 --> 00:03:45.840 over its entire lifespan, it employed 8 .5 million 00:03:45.840 --> 00:03:48.120 unique workers. To put that in perspective for 00:03:48.120 --> 00:03:50.419 you listening, that was roughly half the population 00:03:50.419 --> 00:03:52.479 of New York at the time, all suddenly working 00:03:52.479 --> 00:03:54.520 directly for the federal government. Yeah. But 00:03:54.520 --> 00:03:56.580 I mean, how do you actually invent jobs for millions 00:03:56.580 --> 00:03:58.300 of people out of thin air? You don't just hand 00:03:58.300 --> 00:04:00.759 them shovels and tell them to dig holes and fill 00:04:00.759 --> 00:04:03.039 them back in. No, you build the nation's physical 00:04:03.039 --> 00:04:05.099 infrastructure on a scale that had never - been 00:04:05.099 --> 00:04:07.979 attempted. And the way they avoided creating 00:04:07.979 --> 00:04:10.580 meaningless work was through a localized system. 00:04:10.680 --> 00:04:13.060 Oh, so it wasn't all just directed from Washington? 00:04:13.500 --> 00:04:15.719 Not at all. The federal government didn't just 00:04:15.719 --> 00:04:18.720 dictate what got built. Local municipalities, 00:04:19.139 --> 00:04:21.600 so mayors, governors, city councils, they had 00:04:21.600 --> 00:04:24.740 to pitch the projects. The local sponsors usually 00:04:24.740 --> 00:04:27.439 covered the cost of the materials, and the WPA 00:04:27.439 --> 00:04:30.079 provided the labor. And the resulting numbers 00:04:30.079 --> 00:04:33.019 in the source material are just... Mind -boggling. 00:04:33.199 --> 00:04:34.980 Most of the jobs were in construction, right? 00:04:35.019 --> 00:04:37.899 Petaly construction, yeah. They built over 620 00:04:37.899 --> 00:04:41.259 ,000 miles of streets. Incredible. They built 00:04:41.259 --> 00:04:44.100 over 10 ,000 bridges. We're talking about iconic 00:04:44.100 --> 00:04:46.660 structures that you probably know or maybe have 00:04:46.660 --> 00:04:49.079 even visited without realizing the unemployed 00:04:49.079 --> 00:04:51.339 built them. Oh, absolutely. Like the Griffith 00:04:51.339 --> 00:04:54.920 Observatory in Los Angeles. WPA Timberline Lodge 00:04:54.920 --> 00:04:58.160 in Oregon's Mount Hood National Forest. WPA. 00:04:58.379 --> 00:05:01.759 Yeah, the architecturally unique bridges of Connecticut's 00:05:01.759 --> 00:05:04.879 Merritt Parkway. Also WPA. It's everywhere. And 00:05:04.879 --> 00:05:06.939 beyond the glamorous landmarks, they were building 00:05:06.939 --> 00:05:09.639 the vital invisible arteries of the country, 00:05:09.939 --> 00:05:11.980 too. They built three hundred and twenty five 00:05:11.980 --> 00:05:14.439 firehouses and renovated over two thousand more. 00:05:14.579 --> 00:05:16.759 That's a lot of brick and mortar. Yeah. And they 00:05:16.759 --> 00:05:19.519 installed twenty thousand miles of water mains, 00:05:19.779 --> 00:05:22.240 which drastically increased fire protection and 00:05:22.240 --> 00:05:25.399 public sanitation nationwide. They spent over 00:05:25.399 --> 00:05:28.839 one billion dollars on publicly owned or operated 00:05:28.839 --> 00:05:31.060 utilities alone. OK, wait, I have to jump in 00:05:31.060 --> 00:05:33.300 here because this seems like a glaring economic 00:05:33.300 --> 00:05:36.860 problem. How so? Well, if the government is suddenly 00:05:36.860 --> 00:05:39.699 stepping in with billions of dollars and hiring 00:05:39.699 --> 00:05:42.160 millions of people to build every road, bridge, 00:05:42.379 --> 00:05:45.360 and water main in the country, doesn't that completely 00:05:45.360 --> 00:05:48.629 crush? private construction companies. I mean, 00:05:48.689 --> 00:05:50.529 how on earth does a private business compete 00:05:50.529 --> 00:05:52.870 with the federal government just giving away 00:05:52.870 --> 00:05:55.490 free labor to cities? This raises an important 00:05:55.490 --> 00:05:57.550 question, and it's one the architects of the 00:05:57.550 --> 00:06:00.689 program actually anticipated. They had to put 00:06:00.689 --> 00:06:03.470 strict economic guardrails in place to prevent 00:06:03.470 --> 00:06:05.810 the exact cannibalization of the private sector 00:06:05.810 --> 00:06:07.310 you're describing. So they knew it was a risk. 00:06:07.430 --> 00:06:10.329 Oh, absolutely. Think of the WPA as an economic 00:06:10.329 --> 00:06:12.310 pressure valve. It was designed to keep the system 00:06:12.310 --> 00:06:14.910 from exploding, but it was calibrated just carefully 00:06:14.910 --> 00:06:16.610 enough that work workers would naturally want 00:06:16.610 --> 00:06:18.730 to escape back into the private sector as soon 00:06:18.730 --> 00:06:25.949 as possible. By design, yes. To ensure they weren't 00:06:25.949 --> 00:06:29.230 undercutting private industry, the WPA intentionally 00:06:29.230 --> 00:06:32.129 kept their hourly wages well below standard industry 00:06:32.129 --> 00:06:34.970 rates. Interesting. Worker pay varied based on 00:06:34.970 --> 00:06:37.930 the region, urbanization, and skill level, ranging 00:06:37.930 --> 00:06:41.550 from $19 to $94 a month, with the average wage 00:06:41.550 --> 00:06:44.930 sitting at about $52 .50. OK, so a pretty low 00:06:44.930 --> 00:06:47.810 ceiling. Right. Furthermore, the hours were capped. 00:06:48.170 --> 00:06:50.629 Workers were generally kept to a minimum of 30 00:06:50.629 --> 00:06:52.990 hours and a maximum of 40 hours a week. week. 00:06:53.430 --> 00:06:56.009 The underlying logic was to provide a subsistence 00:06:56.009 --> 00:06:58.529 income just enough to put food on the table. 00:06:58.730 --> 00:07:00.550 But keep it undesirable enough so they leave. 00:07:01.089 --> 00:07:03.829 Exactly. Keep the conditions undesirable enough 00:07:03.829 --> 00:07:05.829 that a worker was heavily incentivized to take 00:07:05.829 --> 00:07:08.790 a private sector job. The absolute second one 00:07:08.790 --> 00:07:10.930 opened up. You want it to be a safety net, not 00:07:10.930 --> 00:07:13.529 a hammock. Perfect way to phrase it. But the 00:07:13.529 --> 00:07:16.069 WPA quickly realized that not every unemployed 00:07:16.069 --> 00:07:18.269 person is a guy who knows how to pour concrete 00:07:18.269 --> 00:07:20.730 or lay pipe. I mean, a nation doesn't just need 00:07:20.730 --> 00:07:23.579 roads. It needs culture. And artists, writers, 00:07:23.740 --> 00:07:25.839 and musicians were starving too. Which brings 00:07:25.839 --> 00:07:29.620 us to one of the most enduring and hotly debated 00:07:29.620 --> 00:07:32.620 aspects of the agency Federal Project Number 00:07:32.620 --> 00:07:34.759 One. Here's where it gets really interesting 00:07:34.759 --> 00:07:39.379 to me. The government essentially transformed 00:07:39.379 --> 00:07:41.740 into the greatest patron of the arts in American 00:07:41.740 --> 00:07:44.139 history. It was unprecedented. Federal Project 00:07:44.139 --> 00:07:47.439 Number One employed 40 ,000 artists, musicians, 00:07:47.779 --> 00:07:49.959 actors, and writers. They had the Federal Theater 00:07:49.959 --> 00:07:52.920 Project, directed by a playwright named Hallie 00:07:52.920 --> 00:07:56.660 Flanagan, which employed 12 ,700 performers. 00:07:56.860 --> 00:07:59.000 And they were busy, too. Yeah, they were producing 00:07:59.000 --> 00:08:01.720 a thousand performances a month. And they employed 00:08:01.720 --> 00:08:04.399 future legends, like a young Orson Welles. Then 00:08:04.399 --> 00:08:06.620 you have the Federal Writers Project, which left 00:08:06.620 --> 00:08:09.920 an incredibly vital historical record. They created 00:08:09.920 --> 00:08:12.779 the American Guide series, extensively analyzing 00:08:12.779 --> 00:08:15.199 the history and culture of every state and major 00:08:15.199 --> 00:08:17.899 city. Such a cool project. But even more importantly, 00:08:17.980 --> 00:08:20.490 they recorded massive archives of oral histories. 00:08:20.810 --> 00:08:23.329 This included the slave narratives and initiative 00:08:23.329 --> 00:08:25.889 where writers interviewed formerly enslaved people. 00:08:25.930 --> 00:08:28.110 Right. Their firsthand accounts of American history 00:08:28.110 --> 00:08:30.209 might have otherwise been lost to time entirely. 00:08:30.430 --> 00:08:33.370 And we can't forget the Library Services program. 00:08:34.129 --> 00:08:35.970 Before the Depression, it was estimated that 00:08:35.970 --> 00:08:38.549 a third of the U .S. population didn't have reasonable 00:08:38.549 --> 00:08:41.070 access to a public library. A third of the country. 00:08:41.250 --> 00:08:45.309 Yeah. The WPA employed over 38 ,000 people. Primarily 00:08:45.309 --> 00:08:47.809 women, to change that. They created initiatives 00:08:47.809 --> 00:08:50.330 like the Pack Horse Library Project, where women 00:08:50.330 --> 00:08:53.250 would literally ride horses or mules deep into 00:08:53.250 --> 00:08:55.990 the remote mountains of eastern Kentucky to deliver 00:08:55.990 --> 00:08:58.750 books to isolated communities. It was a revolutionary 00:08:58.750 --> 00:09:01.690 expansion of rural access to information. But 00:09:01.690 --> 00:09:03.970 the mechanism of how they saved local budgets 00:09:03.970 --> 00:09:06.549 is brilliant to me. The government realized that 00:09:06.549 --> 00:09:09.049 replacing worn -out books was a crippling expense 00:09:09.049 --> 00:09:11.230 for local public schools. Because books aren't 00:09:11.230 --> 00:09:14.019 cheap. Exactly. So they trained thousands of 00:09:14.019 --> 00:09:16.440 these women, many of whom were the sole breadwinners 00:09:16.440 --> 00:09:19.100 for their families, simply to repair and mend 00:09:19.100 --> 00:09:21.940 damaged books. It sounds like such a mundane 00:09:21.940 --> 00:09:25.139 task. But the impact was huge. That one mending 00:09:25.139 --> 00:09:27.740 project saved public schools thousands and thousands 00:09:27.740 --> 00:09:30.220 of dollars in acquisition costs during a time 00:09:30.220 --> 00:09:32.399 when local tax revenues were totally decimated. 00:09:32.740 --> 00:09:35.259 It perfectly illustrates the multifaceted value 00:09:35.259 --> 00:09:37.980 of these programs. The public response to these 00:09:37.980 --> 00:09:41.250 libraries and theaters was profound. As our sources 00:09:41.250 --> 00:09:44.289 note, for many Americans in deeply impoverished 00:09:44.289 --> 00:09:47.370 areas, the WPA had become what was termed the 00:09:47.370 --> 00:09:49.730 bread line of the spirit. The bread line of the 00:09:49.730 --> 00:09:52.330 spirit, wow. Yeah. It wasn't merely about physical 00:09:52.330 --> 00:09:54.669 survival anymore. It was about democratizing 00:09:54.669 --> 00:09:58.149 art, education, and basic human enrichment for 00:09:58.149 --> 00:10:01.289 millions of rural Americans who previously had 00:10:01.289 --> 00:10:03.909 zero access to that kind of cultural infrastructure. 00:10:04.129 --> 00:10:06.960 It's an incredible legacy. But as we look at 00:10:06.960 --> 00:10:09.440 the source text for this era, it presents a very 00:10:09.440 --> 00:10:12.120 complicated dual reality. It really does. The 00:10:12.120 --> 00:10:15.600 WPA was a sprawling microcosm of 1930s America. 00:10:16.039 --> 00:10:18.500 The records show unprecedented economic relief, 00:10:18.720 --> 00:10:21.600 but they also objectively document severe institutional 00:10:21.600 --> 00:10:23.419 prejudice. And we should be very clear here. 00:10:23.659 --> 00:10:26.720 Yes, exactly. We need to pause for a second because 00:10:26.720 --> 00:10:29.059 our source material highlights historically and 00:10:29.059 --> 00:10:31.779 politically sensitive facts detailing both progressive 00:10:31.779 --> 00:10:34.799 economic policies and deep institutional racism. 00:10:35.300 --> 00:10:38.139 We want to be clear to you, the listener, that 00:10:38.139 --> 00:10:41.080 we are not... taking aside or endorsing the historical 00:10:41.080 --> 00:10:44.220 actions of the era. We're just impartially reporting 00:10:44.220 --> 00:10:47.200 the complicated realities contained in the source 00:10:47.200 --> 00:10:49.320 document. Right. Our goal is to look closely 00:10:49.320 --> 00:10:51.379 at exactly what the records tell us happened 00:10:51.379 --> 00:10:53.740 on the ground when federal ideals collided with 00:10:53.740 --> 00:10:56.480 local realities. Exactly. And that tension between 00:10:56.480 --> 00:10:58.700 federal mandates and local administration is 00:10:58.700 --> 00:11:01.440 really the defining theme of the WPA's demographics. 00:11:01.860 --> 00:11:04.059 Because the projects were locally sponsored and 00:11:04.059 --> 00:11:06.559 managed, local prejudices often dictated how 00:11:06.559 --> 00:11:08.940 the federal money was distributed. The statistics 00:11:08.940 --> 00:11:10.820 regarding African Americans show this starkly, 00:11:10.820 --> 00:11:14.519 right? Very starkly. By 1938, about 45 % of the 00:11:14.519 --> 00:11:16.399 nation's African American families were either 00:11:16.399 --> 00:11:19.799 on relief or employed by the WTA. Almost half. 00:11:20.080 --> 00:11:22.700 Yeah. In northern urban centers, the program 00:11:22.700 --> 00:11:25.259 actually provided many Black Americans with their 00:11:25.259 --> 00:11:28.059 first real opportunity for white collar employment. 00:11:28.740 --> 00:11:31.000 Civil rights organizations at the time eventually 00:11:31.000 --> 00:11:33.139 praised the agency for keeping discrimination 00:11:33.139 --> 00:11:35.940 to a minimum in those specific northern areas. 00:11:36.220 --> 00:11:38.500 But the WPA was operating during the height of 00:11:38.500 --> 00:11:41.299 the Jim Crow era, and the South was a completely 00:11:41.299 --> 00:11:43.990 different story. Completely. The local administration 00:11:43.990 --> 00:11:46.809 in the South largely operated segregated units 00:11:46.809 --> 00:11:49.570 and maintained rigid systemic discrimination. 00:11:50.289 --> 00:11:53.169 To give you a clear example from the text regarding 00:11:53.169 --> 00:11:56.889 who held the power out of 10 ,000 WPA supervisors 00:11:56.889 --> 00:12:00.429 in the South, only 11 were black. Wow, 11 out 00:12:00.429 --> 00:12:03.029 of 10 ,000. Yeah. The programs in that region 00:12:03.029 --> 00:12:05.990 routinely perpetuated existing segregation and 00:12:05.990 --> 00:12:08.629 enforced differential wages. And that same tension 00:12:08.629 --> 00:12:11.919 between federal policy and societal bias. deeply 00:12:11.919 --> 00:12:15.039 impacted women, too. Women made up about 15 percent 00:12:15.039 --> 00:12:17.100 of the household heads on relief. But there was 00:12:17.100 --> 00:12:20.080 this very strong prevailing belief in the 1930s 00:12:20.080 --> 00:12:22.600 that husbands and wives shouldn't both be working. 00:12:22.919 --> 00:12:25.639 Right. It was viewed as stealing a job from another 00:12:25.639 --> 00:12:29.000 family's rightful breadwinner. Because administrators 00:12:29.000 --> 00:12:32.340 held that bias, women were largely excluded from 00:12:32.340 --> 00:12:34.100 the heavy construction projects. So what did 00:12:34.100 --> 00:12:36.840 they do? Well, instead, they were relegated to 00:12:36.840 --> 00:12:39.220 sewing projects, making bedding for hospitals 00:12:39.220 --> 00:12:41.649 or being trained for domestic employment. We 00:12:41.649 --> 00:12:43.889 see another battle for inclusion with people 00:12:43.889 --> 00:12:47.190 with physical disabilities. Initially, city relief 00:12:47.190 --> 00:12:49.470 bureaus coded physically disabled applicants 00:12:49.470 --> 00:12:52.070 as PH for physically handicapped. And they were 00:12:52.070 --> 00:12:54.070 just flat out denied jobs? Yeah, denied by the 00:12:54.070 --> 00:12:56.269 WPA administrators who assumed they couldn't 00:12:56.269 --> 00:12:58.529 perform the manual labor. Which led to organized 00:12:58.529 --> 00:13:02.899 pushback, right? It did. In May 1935, the League 00:13:02.899 --> 00:13:05.159 of the Physically Handicapped organized in New 00:13:05.159 --> 00:13:08.379 York and staged sit -ins to protest this explicit 00:13:08.379 --> 00:13:10.879 discrimination. Did it work? The pressure actually 00:13:10.879 --> 00:13:14.100 worked. The WPA relented and was forced to create 00:13:14.100 --> 00:13:16.799 1 ,500 jobs specifically designed for physically 00:13:16.799 --> 00:13:19.559 disabled workers in New York City. And then perhaps 00:13:19.559 --> 00:13:22.240 the starkest example of the WPA being used as 00:13:22.240 --> 00:13:25.299 a tool of the era's policies involves Japanese 00:13:25.299 --> 00:13:27.779 Americans. Yes. This is a crucial point from 00:13:27.779 --> 00:13:30.620 the text. After the attack on Pearl Harbor, the 00:13:30.620 --> 00:13:33.580 government utilized the WPA's vast infrastructure 00:13:33.580 --> 00:13:36.659 network to facilitate the incarceration of Japanese 00:13:36.659 --> 00:13:42.100 Americans. In 1942, WPA regional directors actually 00:13:42.100 --> 00:13:44.659 took charge of the early assembly centers. They 00:13:44.659 --> 00:13:46.679 essentially repurposed their expertise. Yeah, 00:13:46.679 --> 00:13:49.080 they used the logistical expertise and road building 00:13:49.080 --> 00:13:50.980 experience they'd gained during the New Deal 00:13:50.980 --> 00:13:53.399 to help build and staff the internment camps 00:13:53.399 --> 00:13:55.919 on the West Coast, complete with the installation 00:13:55.919 --> 00:13:58.799 of guard towers and spotlights. The agency spent 00:13:58.799 --> 00:14:02.279 nearly $4 .5 million on the removal and internment 00:14:02.279 --> 00:14:05.200 process in just an eight -month period in 1942, 00:14:05.919 --> 00:14:07.879 acting as a major administrative arm for that 00:14:07.879 --> 00:14:10.120 wartime enterprise. So what does this all mean 00:14:10.120 --> 00:14:12.639 for you, the listener? If you're wondering how 00:14:12.639 --> 00:14:15.279 the exact same agency could build a public library 00:14:15.279 --> 00:14:18.240 to save a rural town and then pivot to building 00:14:18.240 --> 00:14:21.100 an internment camp, It really comes down to the 00:14:21.100 --> 00:14:23.899 sheer mechanical power of the WPA. It was a massive 00:14:23.899 --> 00:14:26.539 machine. It was the ultimate reflection of the 00:14:26.539 --> 00:14:29.620 state apparatus of that era, wielding unprecedented 00:14:29.620 --> 00:14:32.179 resources. And anytime you have a government 00:14:32.179 --> 00:14:34.899 program that is this expensive, this ubiquitous, 00:14:35.299 --> 00:14:37.529 and this culturally dominant, It is going to 00:14:37.529 --> 00:14:39.929 make a lot of enemies. Oh, it faced ferocious 00:14:39.929 --> 00:14:42.169 political pushback. Critics strongly attacked 00:14:42.169 --> 00:14:45.090 the WPA as essentially functioning as a giant 00:14:45.090 --> 00:14:48.070 political machine for FDR's Democratic Party. 00:14:48.250 --> 00:14:51.009 Buying votes with jobs. Exactly. The argument 00:14:51.009 --> 00:14:53.389 was that these millions of relief jobs were being 00:14:53.389 --> 00:14:56.750 implicitly traded for loyal votes. This criticism 00:14:56.750 --> 00:14:58.950 grew so intense that it led to the passage of 00:14:58.950 --> 00:15:01.929 the Hatch Act of 1939. Which was what exactly? 00:15:02.149 --> 00:15:05.549 A federal law specifically designed to de -politicize 00:15:05.549 --> 00:15:08.460 the agency. and restrict the political activities 00:15:08.460 --> 00:15:10.860 of its employees. And it wasn't just the politics 00:15:10.860 --> 00:15:13.860 of patronage. There was deep ideological paranoia, 00:15:14.179 --> 00:15:15.980 particularly aimed at federal project number 00:15:15.980 --> 00:15:18.700 one. The artists. Right. Representative Jay Parnell 00:15:18.700 --> 00:15:20.759 Thomas of the House Committee on Un -American 00:15:20.759 --> 00:15:23.460 Activities at UAC went after the arts divisions. 00:15:23.980 --> 00:15:27.080 He explicitly called them a hotbed of communists 00:15:27.080 --> 00:15:30.159 and a New Deal propaganda network. What fueled 00:15:30.159 --> 00:15:32.679 that paranoia was the actual content the artists 00:15:32.679 --> 00:15:35.980 were producing. The Theater Project, for instance, 00:15:36.179 --> 00:15:38.779 frequently put on plays with strong pro -labor 00:15:38.779 --> 00:15:42.860 themes or featured integrated casts, which infuriated 00:15:42.860 --> 00:15:44.879 conservative politicians at the time. And that 00:15:44.879 --> 00:15:48.080 had real consequences. Huge consequences. The 00:15:48.080 --> 00:15:50.620 backlash was so severe that the Federal Theater 00:15:50.620 --> 00:15:53.580 Project actually had its funding entirely zeroed 00:15:53.580 --> 00:15:57.379 out by Congress in 1939. Wow. And beyond the 00:15:57.379 --> 00:15:59.980 halls of Congress, there was also a massive cultural 00:15:59.980 --> 00:16:03.240 stigma against the workers themselves. Private 00:16:03.240 --> 00:16:05.899 employers complained that the WPA instilled poor 00:16:05.899 --> 00:16:08.379 work habits. Yeah, the workers were relentlessly 00:16:08.379 --> 00:16:10.580 mocked and stereotyped as just, you know, lazy 00:16:10.580 --> 00:16:12.759 men leaning on shovels. The jokes from the era 00:16:12.759 --> 00:16:15.240 were fairly brutal. Because the program was perceived 00:16:15.240 --> 00:16:18.620 as inefficient, people joked that WPA stood for 00:16:18.620 --> 00:16:21.539 we poke along or we putter along. My personal 00:16:21.539 --> 00:16:23.940 favorite from the sources is that it stood for 00:16:23.940 --> 00:16:27.190 whistle, piss, and argue. Oh, wow. That is brutal. 00:16:27.490 --> 00:16:29.409 Which is a pretty harsh indictment of how some 00:16:29.409 --> 00:16:31.570 of the public view these infrastructure projects. 00:16:31.629 --> 00:16:34.330 Yeah. But ultimately, what ended the WPA wasn't 00:16:34.330 --> 00:16:36.690 the congressional critics or the sarcastic nicknames 00:16:36.690 --> 00:16:39.230 or even the politics of the New Deal. No, it 00:16:39.230 --> 00:16:41.710 was a complete shift in the global landscape. 00:16:41.850 --> 00:16:44.940 Right. World War II completely altered the economic 00:16:44.940 --> 00:16:48.100 reality of the United States. As the war approached, 00:16:48.299 --> 00:16:51.980 the WPA rapidly evolved. The focus shifted away 00:16:51.980 --> 00:16:55.039 from civilian parks and cultural arts, and it 00:16:55.039 --> 00:16:57.500 pivoted aggressively to military readiness. They 00:16:57.500 --> 00:16:59.820 just started building for the war. Yeah. The 00:16:59.820 --> 00:17:02.659 agency began building military bases, cantonments, 00:17:02.860 --> 00:17:05.880 and airports. In fact, they built 85 % of the 00:17:05.880 --> 00:17:08.539 new airports in the U .S. during that pre -war 00:17:08.539 --> 00:17:12.349 buildup. 85%. Yeah. They also began heavy vocational 00:17:12.349 --> 00:17:15.250 training for war industries. And with that mobilization, 00:17:15.730 --> 00:17:17.589 the unemployment crisis that birthed the agency 00:17:17.589 --> 00:17:20.549 just evaporated. Millions of men joined the armed 00:17:20.549 --> 00:17:23.170 services and the explosion of wartime manufacturing 00:17:23.170 --> 00:17:25.529 contracts meant private companies were desperately 00:17:25.529 --> 00:17:28.369 hiring and training anyone who was left. The 00:17:28.369 --> 00:17:31.450 economic crisis was just over. FDR officially 00:17:31.450 --> 00:17:34.529 terminated the WPA in 1943, concluding that a 00:17:34.529 --> 00:17:36.829 national relief program simply wasn't needed 00:17:36.829 --> 00:17:39.930 in an economy running at absolute full capacity 00:17:39.930 --> 00:17:42.589 for the war effort. So what does this all mean 00:17:42.589 --> 00:17:44.869 when we look back at the whole eight year run? 00:17:45.190 --> 00:17:47.910 What is the grand takeaway of the WPA? Well, 00:17:47.910 --> 00:17:50.089 if we connect this to the bigger picture, there 00:17:50.089 --> 00:17:53.750 is a profound historical irony here. The WPA 00:17:53.750 --> 00:17:56.450 was conceived strictly as a peacetime program 00:17:56.450 --> 00:17:59.150 for civilian relief. Right. Yet because it spent 00:17:59.150 --> 00:18:01.990 years organizing millions of workers, building 00:18:01.990 --> 00:18:04.769 supply chains across all 50 states and constructing 00:18:04.769 --> 00:18:07.750 heavy infrastructure, it unintentionally became 00:18:07.750 --> 00:18:10.549 the very mechanism that laid the logistical groundwork 00:18:10.549 --> 00:18:12.930 for America's rapid entry into World War Two. 00:18:13.049 --> 00:18:15.650 That's wild. The skills they preserved and the 00:18:15.650 --> 00:18:17.910 physical facilities they built literally strengthen 00:18:17.910 --> 00:18:20.150 the country to bear the burden of a global war. 00:18:20.410 --> 00:18:23.289 It is a wild trajectory. To summarize this deep 00:18:23.289 --> 00:18:26.950 dive, the WPA leaves behind a legacy of an undeniably 00:18:26.950 --> 00:18:30.650 flawed, heavily scrutinized, but entirely unparalleled 00:18:30.650 --> 00:18:32.890 10 -year experiment. Absolutely unparalleled. 00:18:33.150 --> 00:18:36.029 It was a moment when the government decided that 00:18:36.029 --> 00:18:38.829 preserving human dignity mattered as much as 00:18:38.829 --> 00:18:41.819 basic economic survival. And it left America 00:18:41.819 --> 00:18:44.240 with a cultural and physical infrastructure that 00:18:44.240 --> 00:18:46.839 we are still driving on, learning from, and utilizing 00:18:46.839 --> 00:18:49.500 today. Which leaves us with a fascinating question 00:18:49.500 --> 00:18:52.640 to consider. The economy is vastly different 00:18:52.640 --> 00:18:55.759 today than it was in 1935. Very true. If a sudden 00:18:55.759 --> 00:18:58.059 unforeseen crisis wiped out millions of jobs 00:18:58.059 --> 00:19:01.359 tomorrow, would modern society have the imagination 00:19:01.359 --> 00:19:05.539 or the political will to create a new WPA? What 00:19:05.539 --> 00:19:08.039 would a modern federal project number one even 00:19:08.039 --> 00:19:10.240 look like in the age of artificial intelligence, 00:19:10.420 --> 00:19:12.960 remote work, and the gig economy? How do you 00:19:12.960 --> 00:19:15.420 create a bread line of the spirit for the 21st 00:19:15.420 --> 00:19:17.519 century? Exactly. That is something to really 00:19:17.519 --> 00:19:19.779 shoe on as you navigate the modern economy. Next 00:19:19.779 --> 00:19:21.079 time you're out walking in your neighborhood, 00:19:21.500 --> 00:19:23.839 look down at the sidewalks, see if you can spot 00:19:23.839 --> 00:19:26.759 that WPA stamp in the concrete. When you do, 00:19:26.759 --> 00:19:28.940 you'll know exactly the history, the struggle, 00:19:28.980 --> 00:19:31.099 and the incredible scale of human effort that 00:19:31.099 --> 00:19:33.559 put it there. Thank you so much for taking this 00:19:33.559 --> 00:19:34.559 deep dive with us today.