Discover how Roosevelt's Works Progress Administration helped flourish museums in America
A discussion concerning why American museums flourished in the 1930s, from the documentary The Great Depression.
Great Museums Television (A Britannica Publishing Partner)
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Transcript
[Music in]
MARJORIE SCHWARZER: One would think that the Great Depression was a very hard time for museums in this country. Ironically, it wasn't. It was a time of a flowering of museums.
NARRATOR: Roosevelt's Works Progress Administration was essentially an employment program. Artists, architects, construction workers, educators all found work in America's museums.
MARJORIE SCHWARZER: They built dioramas; they built buildings; they created murals; they cataloged objects. They built a vast new system of museums for the National Park Service. And you get an infusion, once again, of this progressive educational ideology.
[Music out]
MARJORIE SCHWARZER: One would think that the Great Depression was a very hard time for museums in this country. Ironically, it wasn't. It was a time of a flowering of museums.
NARRATOR: Roosevelt's Works Progress Administration was essentially an employment program. Artists, architects, construction workers, educators all found work in America's museums.
MARJORIE SCHWARZER: They built dioramas; they built buildings; they created murals; they cataloged objects. They built a vast new system of museums for the National Park Service. And you get an infusion, once again, of this progressive educational ideology.
[Music out]
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