From 1935 to 1943 the Federal Art Project -- a project of the Works Progress Administration, or WPA-- employed some 10,000 artists and craft workers, helping them survive the Great Depression.
The artists created hundreds of thousands of visual arts: paintings, murals, prints, posters, and renderings. Many of them survive to this day, but you have to know where to look for them.
That’s why LHT host Chris Garlock found himself on Telegraph Hill yesterday, during a visit to San Francisco, meeting up with Harvey Smith, who leads tours of local WPA sites. Find out more at LivingNewDeal.org
Coit Tower is home to a stunning collection of murals that have recently been restored; Chris had seen them many years ago and had been struck by the depictions of workers and bosses that managed to be simultaneously beautiful and politically powerful and arranged to meet up with Harvey so he could shed some light on their creation and meaning.
Harvey does a terrific job describing the art, but we’ve also got a great album of photos of the murals posted on the Labor Heritage Foundation’s Facebook page.
On this week’s Labor History in Two: The year was 1917; that was the day IWW leader Frank Little was buried in Butte, Montana.
Questions, comments, or suggestions are welcome, and to find out how you can be a part of Labor History Today, email us at LaborHistoryToday@gmail.com
Labor History Today is produced by Chris Garlock for the Labor Heritage Foundation and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor. Coit Tower mural photos by Lisa Garlock.
#LaborRadioPod #History #WorkingClass #ClassStruggle @GeorgetownKILWP #LaborHistory @UMDMLA @ILLaborHistory @AFLCIO @StrikeHistory #LaborHistory @wrkclasshistory @LivingNewDeal
Jane Street and the Rebel Maids of Denver
Union women heroes, past and present
The Radicalism of Irish American Women
Tragedy and Resistance at Port Chicago Naval Magazine
Black labor in Richmond
The Irish Immigrant Miners’ Memorial
City Workers Strike Song
“America Works” launches new season
The Bread Uprising
MLK at the AFL-CIO in 1961
Who was Zelda D’Aprano?
Women in the coal mines; Billionaires in Space
Labor’s Untold Stories
Striketober & The Great Resignation: Take this job and shove it!
The first pay equity strike; Massachusetts’ longest strike
Founding the American Federation of Labor
Long live Mother Jones!
Murder, Race and (In)Justice
Tom Morello holds the line
Communists and community in wartime Detroit
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
Irish Songs with Ken Murray
History Obscura
Historycal: Words that Shaped the World
The Rest Is History
Lore