Ohio Federal Writers' Project
Description
Dated May 6, 1936, this photograph shows children eating a meal at Butler County Emergency School, a Works Progress Administration program, at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. The photograph's caption reads "Hamilton, O., South Second St., Florence Watson (head teacher), Viola Sampson (nurse), Lucille Gray, Flora McClure (cook), Othello Robertson N.Y.A. Feeding Program, After dinner the children are put to bed for two hours, where they thoroughly enjoy a nice quiet nap, in a clean cot with fresh laundered sheets." The Works Progress Administration (WPA) was a government office that hired unemployed Americans to work on various government projects from April 8, 1935 to June 30, 1943. In the first six months that the WPA existed, more than 173, 000 Ohioans, including both men and women, found employment through this program. More than 1, 500 unemployed teachers in Ohio found work through the WPA teaching illiterate adults how to read. In twelve separate counties, primarily in southeastern Ohio, more than twenty-five percent of families had at least one member working for the WPA during the late 1930s. By the end of 1938, these various workers had built or improved 12, 300 miles of roads and streets and constructed 636 public buildings, several hundred bridges, hundreds of athletic fields, and five fish hatcheries. WPA employees made improvements to thousands of more buildings, roads, and parks within Ohio. WPA artists also painted a number of murals in Ohio post offices. This photograph is one of the many visual materials collected for use...
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