by Sidney P. Johnston
Seldom mentioned in studies of New Deal
architecture or history, Florida is typically associated
with beaches, citrus, sunshine, and tourism. Even
students of Florida history too often give scant
attention to the state’s growth patterns and built
fabric developed during the New Deal period. In the past
several years, however, inquiries to Florida’s State
Historic Preservation Office from building owners and
local governments about New Deal resources in their
communities prompted a statewide study and the
preparation of a National Register of Historic Places
multiple property nomination that revealed some
surprising results.
The multiple property format
permits the State Historic Preservation Office to
associate scattered resources that share a common link
in history, prehistory, or architecture. The multiple
property format also reduces the amount of time and
paperwork required to prepare individual National
Register nominations in the future. The multiple
property format is flexible because additional property
types and historic contexts may be added over time.(1)
The
methodology used to prepare Florida’s “New Deal
Resources” multiple property nomination consisted of a
literature search of past surveys and primary and
secondary sources. The research yielded significant
information about the extent and nature of the New Deal
in Florida. Historical contexts and property types for
evaluated properties were developed emphasizing
important activities, individuals, and significant
themes in the development of Florida during the Great
Depression. Florida’s New Deal resources were analyzed
and evaluated for architectural themes and the agencies
that contributed to Florida’s built environment.
Existing National Register nominations of New Deal
resources suggested contextual frameworks and
methodologies for organizing the multiple property
document. Architectural styles were identified, and
three general property types were developed: buildings,
structures, and objects. A period of development between
1933 and 1943 was selected to reflect the traditional
period of significance of the New Deal.
The
multiple property format serves as a research tool with
its extensive bibliography and a predictive model to
help locate resources built throughout Florida with New
Deal dollars. The document also assists Florida’s State
Historic Preservation Office with reviews under Section
106 of the National Historic Preservation Act, which
requires that federal agencies identify and assess the
effects of their activities on historic resources. In
addition, a National Register nomination for the St.
Augustine Civic Center, a Federal Emergency Relief
Agency project with Mission Revival influences, was
prepared.
During the New Deal, the Federal
Government established numerous “alphabet agencies” to
construct buildings, conserve natural resources,
establish recreation facilities, and improve
infrastructure using grants, loans, and matching funds.
Nearly two dozen agencies became known to millions of
Americans by familiar initials, including the Civilian
Conservation Corps (CCC), Civil Works Administration
(CWA), Federal Art Project (FAP), Federal Housing
Administration (FHA), Federal Writers’ Project (FWP),
National Recovery Administration (NRA), Public Works
Administration (PWA), Resettlement Administration (RA),
Rural Electrification Administration (REA), Works
Progress Administration (WPA), and U.S. Housing
Authority (USHA).
While criticized by some, the
New Deal provided federal funding for thousands of
improvement projects across the United States. In
Florida, this included airports, armories, bridges, city
halls, civic centers, courthouses, dams, fire stations,
gymnasiums, hospitals, and public housing. The New Deal
employed thousands of Floridians and provided local and
state governments and federal agencies with new
infrastructure, some of which displayed the latest in
construction technology and reflected Art Deco,
Streamline Moderne, and other architectural
influences.
New Deal programs also yielded
thousands of government documents and publications, many
of which pertain to Florida. In 1939, the Public Works
Administration published Public Buildings: A Survey
of Projects Constructed by Federal and Other
Governmental Bodies between the Years 1933 and 1939 with
Assistance of the Public Works Administration.(2) The
agency published the treatise, in part, to promote the
PWA and help silence the New Deal’s critics. Replete
with photographs of projects throughout the nation, the
volume included black-and-white pictures and
descriptions of approximately 15 buildings and
structures that showcased the agency’s contributions in
Florida, including the Apalachicola River Bridge near
Blountstown (Figure
1); the Overseas Highway to Key West; Tallahassee’s
National Guard Armory; and Miami’s Liberty Square, one
of the nation’s first federal low-cost housing
projects.(Figure
2)
Florida contains a surprisingly large
number of New Deal resources, in part, because of the
state’s staunch support of Roosevelt and his programs.
Several notable Florida politicians supported the New
Deal, including the indefatigable Claude “Red” Pepper
and Senator Duncan U. Fletcher, and lesser known
personalities, such as Ruth Bryan Owen and Bert Fish,
whose contributions to the Roosevelt campaign were later
rewarded with diplomatic posts. Florida’s rewards came
in the construction of several large military
installations, such as Naval Air Station Jacksonville
and MacDill Air Force Base, numerous post offices with
murals by artists working in the Federal Art Project,
and massive funding for one of the nation’s largest New
Deal undertakings, the ill-fated Florida Ship Canal. An
addition to the state capitol in Tallahassee, an
expansion of the state hospital at Chattahoochee and
construction of facilities at the Port of Miami were
notable New Deal projects.
The Florida Park
Service developed seven state parks during the New Deal,
providing recreation opportunities for residents and
out-of-state visitors. Following the tradition
established by the National Park Service, the state park
system employed rustic architecture in the construction
of pedestrian bridges, palmetto-log overnight cabins,
and limestone visitor centers. The Public Works
Administration awarded the National Park Service a grant
to build a visitor center at Fort Matanzas National
Monument, another project with rustic architectural
influences.
Research for the multiple property
nomination project was conducted at various
repositories, including the Florida Master Site File and
the National Register Section at the Bureau of Historic
Preservation, Florida State Archives, State Library of
Florida, and the Florida State University Library.
Holdings at the University of Florida also provided
useful information, including the Government Documents
Department, Map Library, and P.K. Yonge Library of
Florida History. Newspapers contained vital information
about the state’s development during the Great
Depression and the impact of the New Deal.
In
addition, National Register nominations, including
multiple property nominations from other states and
individual resources previously listed in Florida, held
important contextual information about the New Deal.
Previous multiple property documents prepared in other
states typically addressed only a few New Deal agencies
or otherwise limited the scope of the investigation.
Florida’s “New Deal Resources” is one of few multiple
property documents to address the full range of New Deal
programs and resources associated with Federal
Government spending statewide.
Research was also
conducted on the Library of Congress and National
Archives websites. Record groups at the National
Archives that hold useful research materials include RG
31 (Records of the Federal Housing Administration), RG
35 (Records of the Civilian Conservation Corps), RG 69
(Records of the Works Projects Administration), RG 119
(Records of the National Youth Administration), and RG
135 (Records of the Public Works Administration). Files
at the Florida State Archives containing important
information include RG 192 (Florida State Planning
Board), RG 150 (Florida Park Service Project Files), RG
590 (Florida Construction Program), and correspondence
files of New Deal-era governors.
At the local
level, school board and city and county commission
minutes yield information about public buildings
developed with New Deal resources. The Congressional
Serials Set also contains valuable sources; an entire
document is devoted to the Florida Ship Canal. Other
contextual and site-specific information is available in
government publications and reports issued by New Deal
agencies. Filled with black-and-white pictures taken by
photographers working in the Farm Security
Administration and narratives composed by writers in the
Federal Writers’ Project, Florida: A Guide to the
Southernmost State, provides a graphic account of
the Sunshine State near the close of the Great
Depression. Articles in American City, Engineering
News-Record, Florida Historical Quarterly, Florida
Municipal Record, Tampa Bay History, and
Tequesta furnish primary and secondary
documentation about Florida in the Great
Depression.
Compiled from these sources and the
Florida Master Site File, approximately 450 resources
previously inventoried in Florida have direct New Deal
associations including public buildings, structures, and
objects. Perhaps another 500 resources have yet to be
documented. The review indicated that all of Florida’s
67 counties enjoyed some level of New Deal
development.
Project research also revealed some
of Florida’s Jim Crow segregationist culture. The U.S.
Forest Service used CCC labor to develop Juniper Springs
in the Ocala National Forest. There tensions between
local whites and visiting African Americans from the
North resulted in the Forest Service creating a
“separate but equal” facility for blacks at Doe Lake
Recreational Area elsewhere in the national forest.
Other African American resources developed in Florida
include Lake Wales’s Roosevelt School, Tampa’s Clara
Frye Hospital, and low-cost public housing complexes in
Jacksonville, Miami, and several other
cities.
Florida’s New Deal multiple property
nomination establishes the framework for nominating
additional properties to the National Register without
preparing architectural and historic contexts for
individual properties. In addition, the multiple
property nomination serves as a predictive model,
providing information about potential New Deal-era
resources throughout Florida. |
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