Hamblen County WPA Hot Lunch Photos

The images shown on this page were taken by Frank Gracey Jarrell (1896-1975) and preserved in a scrapbook. Mr. Jarrell was an administrator for the WPA during the Depression, a Postmaster, and an administrator for one of the Veteran Administration' hospitals in Nashville. The photos are now owned by his great-granddaughter, Brandi Hargrove, and used here with her express permission.

What was the WPA?
The Works Projects Administration, the series of work projects and programs established by Roosevelt during the Depression to give out-of-work individuals a paycheck. Many people of the time adamantly refused to "go on the dole (welfare)," as it was called, and instead insisted on working for the WPA. The WPA had projects teaching sewing techniques, providing hot lunches to children, building roads (this is where the highway systems began, and why every five miles there will be a one-mile stretch of straight road, for planes to land on in emergency) and public buildings like schools and offices. They gave artists work as well, having them paint murals in government buildings, like post offices, many of which still exist. There was also a Writer's Project, in which professional writers were given work to write pamphlets and brochures for various tourist attractions and government projects, like the TVA projects, which were also WPA. There were a slew of others as well, some of which went away during the War, and some of which persist to this day, usually under different names. -- Brandi Hargrove

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