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Posters for the Green New Deal Exhibit Now Online
“Art and Activism: From the New Deal to the Green New Deal,” our exhibit at the Canessa Gallery in San Francisco, was cut short due to the shelter-in-place order in the city. Now, thanks to our partners at the Creative Action Network, the public can view the exhibit highlights online. The exhibit features over 100 contemporary Green New Deal posters alongside vintage WPA Federal Art Project prints. The goal is to connect the Green New Deal to its New Deal roots, as well as show the inspirational quality of past and present poster art. An opening reception was well attended and featured talks and a protest song by members of the Sunrise Movement. During these difficult times, we hope these images will bring inspiration and hope for a path forward. The exhibit highlights can be viewed here and some of the art here and here.
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Washington DC New Deal Map Launch Postponed
The launch of the Living New Deal’s pocket map of New Deal Washington DC, planned for June, has been postponed due to the current epidemic. We will reschedule the launch with our partners at the Department of Interior and the Greenbelt Museum when that becomes possible again. Until then, we are working to complete the map and continue to improve our online database, which presently includes more than 380 New Deal sites in DC and many more in greater Washington. Like our New Deal maps of San Francisco and New York City, the Washington DC map will be of use to a wide array of visitors, tour guides, historians, teachers, students, and preservationists. The project has already attracted considerable interest around the nation’s capital, and a hard-working group of local volunteers is helping ensure its success.
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The New Deal Model and the Current Economic Crisis
More and more, the New Deal is being held up by opinion makers as a model to meet the economic crisis brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic, which has brought the economy grinding to a halt. Reports say the U.S. will see a huge fall in GDP and millions unemployed, mostly blue-collar workers. This is an unprecedented crisis for which neither ‘relief’, ‘stimulus’ nor ‘war mobilization’ is appropriate. Yet the New Deal still provides important lessons. First, FDR provided the country strong leadership, backed by moral commitment to aid and give hope to a desperate nation; neither of which is currently in evidence. Second, the New Deal taxed the rich and tamped down financial speculation so the real economy could rebound; if today’s massive credit bubble bursts, things will only get worse. Third, the $2T in federal aid is temporary relief. A Depression will likely linger for months or years; soon the government must be ready with public works projects and millions of targeted jobs to speed the transition to a greener, fairer, and modernized economy.
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WPA's Tuberculosis Containment Measures During the New Deal
Responding to a persistent public health crisis in the 1930s, the Works Progress Administration (WPA) built many portable huts to isolate and care for tuberculosis patients across the United States. Living New Deal Project Historian, Brent McKee, published a blog post, in which he describes the WPA’s swift response to the TB crisis. Drawing on sources from the National Archives, Brent notes that the huts were designed to quarantine patients who were wait listed for a hospital bed. The New Deal built many hospitals across the country, but the available beds were not sufficient to meet demand. The huts helped reserve hospital beds for those with acute symptoms, while ensuring that those with milder symptoms were properly quarantined. A 1942 article in the Index Journal highlights how this resource was deployed quickly and effectively, noting, “[t]he County Supervisor moves this hut on one of the county trucks wherever it is needed,” enabling families to care for the patients while the county nurse performed regular visits.
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