The Palimpsest

McDaniel, George William

English

Smith Wildman Brookhart

Smith, Thomas S

The Vietnam Era in Iowa Politics

The Palimpsest, vol.63 no.1, January-February 1982

Horton, Loren N

James Weed: Iowa’s Renaissance Man

Carroll, Jr, Edmund H

Davenport's Golden Building Years

The Palimpsest, vol.63 no.2, March-April 1982

Narber, Gregg R

The New Deal Murals
in Iowa
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by Gregg R. Narber 
and Lea Rosson DeLong
ost of President Franklin D. Roosevelt s 
programs for recovery from the Great 
Depression aimed to relieve material want in 
the United States, but some New Deal agen­
cies sought to enrich the quality of American 
life in ways that were not purely economic. 
Between 1934 and 1942 a number of public 
programs involved the federal government in 
buying works of art and employing painters, 
sculptors, and other artists. The best-known 
arts program was part of the Works Progress 
Administration (WPA), though several others 
operated during the Roosevelt years as well: 
the Public Works of Art Project (PWAP), the 
Treasury Relief Art Project (TRAP), and the 
various Treasury Section programs.
Treasure Section officials stressed art, not 
welfare, and were quite happy to award com­
missions to “proven” artists who were comfort­
ably fixed; artists did not have to demonstrate 
need for their proposals to be considered by 
agency judges. However, the depression had 
put all but a few artists out of work, so that most 
of the men and women who received commis­
sions could have passed a means test had it 
been required. Still, even the Treasury Relief 
Art Project, whose very name belied a welfare 
component in its mission, and the PWAP, 
which required a demonstration of need, 
claimed a higher purpose than merely keeping 
artists working and eating. PWAP Director 
Edward Bruce admonished his regional chair­
men in 1933 that “this is not relief work and the
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word relief should be eliminated by you in all 
reference to the project and in any discussion 
with the artists employed. We want to put 
competent artists to work who are out of 
work. . . . sentiment or need should not be a 
prime factor in selection of artists. ”
©Iowa State Historical Department/Division of the State Historical Society 1982 0031—0360/82/0506—086 $1.00


88 The Palimpsest
The murals themselves exhibit a variety of✓
themes—historical, educational, social, and 
agricultural—conveyed in the distinctive sty le 
of the artists involved. Some were group proj­
ects, while others expressed the vision of a 
single artist. A few inspired great local contro­
versy, as in the case of the FRAP murals paint­
ed in the courtroom of the Federal District 
Courthouse in Cedar Rapids. Several others 
remain important as representations of the em­
ergent midwestern regionalism of the 1930s, 
exemplified by the Iowa State University Li­
brary7 murals supervised by Iowa PWAP head 
Grant Wood. Whatever their particular his­
tories, all contributed to a unique experiment 
that supported artists and made art available on 
a wide scale to the public. The illustrations on 
the following pages reveal the diversity and 
power of Iowa’s New Deal murals and suggest 
some of the preoccupations of the state’s citi­
zens during the troubled years of the Great 
Depression. □
Marion Gilmore's Band Concert (right) de­
picts summertime activity in Corning at a time 
when concerts played a vital role in the cultural 
life of Iowa communities. Corning residents 
joked that Homer's got his shirttail out! when 
they first viewed conductor Homer Snodgrass, 
pictured in the center of the mural. Actually, 
Homer s shirttail is in; he is wearing a suit coat. 
Painted for $740, the hand concert mural was 
financed by the Treasury Fine Arts Section.
Mt. Ayr native Orr Fisher painted “Corn 
Parade” (below right)for the local post office in 
1941. This humorous fantasy takes place in a 
realistic setting—Fisher s courthouse is an ac­
curate representation of the building in Mt. 
Ayr. But note the beerbellied clown with the 
Dallas Cowboy cheerleader legs, Popeye on the 
drums, the horse that stands on one leg, and 
the floats that out-do even the Rose Bowl 
pageant-<dI this with Shirley Temple looking 
on! This PWAP mural cost $750.
Except where noted, all photographs in 
this article are reproduced courtesy of 
Gregg R. Narber and Lea Rosson 
DeLong. The authors recently completed 
a survey of New Deal murals in Iowa and 
this spring will present public lectures on 
the Iowa murals in communities through­
out the state, under the auspices of the 
Iowa Humanities Board, a state program 
of the National Endowment for the Hu­
manities.
An annotated version of this article is on 
file at the State Historical Society in Iowa 
City. The authors wish particularly to
acknowledge the assistance of the Des 
Moines Register and Tribune Company, 
the Sioux City Public Museum, Mrs. 
Patty Elwood, Mrs. Donella Jackson, and 
the postmasters of Cresco, Audubon, 
Rockwell City, Forest City, Pella, and 
Sigourney. The suggestions, encourage­
ment, and guidance in preparation of this 
article and the lecture from which it came 
of Dr. Dorothy Schwieder, Thomas F. 
Worthen, Dr. Dwight Saunders, Karel 
Yasko, Dr. Walter C. Clark, Jr., Dr. 
Walter R. Houf, and Dr. Malcolm J. 
Rohrbough are also greatly appreciated.

90 The Palimpsest
A sharp contrast to the playful character of hols and social content: its portrayal of west- 
the Mt. Ayr and Corning murals is this detail ward expansion is stark and didactic, as is its 
from “The Social History of Des Moines depiction of the misery of economic depression 
(below), painted for the Children s Reading and the bright future of social planning. The 
Room of the Des Moines Public Library by section pictured here symbolizes the Louisiana 
Harry D. Jones. The mural employed a crew of Purchase and compares the ultimate futility of 
artists from September 1937 to its completion military conquest with the modest but noble 
in December 1941. The mural is rife with sym- goals of the yeoman farmer.
The Treasury Section pro­
grams initiated many fine 
mural projects, including the 
others represented on these 
pages. Criss GlasselTs Rural 
Free Delivery (above), com­
pleted for the Leon Post Office 
in 1938, exhibits the vivid style 
of the midwestern regionalists 
of the period.
John Blooms ‘Cattle’*(right) 
has a storybook quality. It was 
completed in August 1940 at a 
cost of $670.
The Palimpsest 91
PWAP artist William Henning, works on a mural for the Harrison School in Cedar Rapids, 1933 or 1934 
(SHS1)
92 The Palimpsest
Perhaps the most controversial of the New Deal 
murals painted in Iowa was the group effort 
supervised by Francis Robert White in the 
courtroom at the Federal District Courthouse 
in Cedar Rapids. White s affiliation with al­
legedly left-wing causes explains much of the 
controversy surrounding his Cedar Rapids 
work. In the early Thirties, he had participated 
in a boycott staged at the Iowa State Fair; 
White and other members of the Iowa Coop­
erative Artists demanded rental fees rather 
than cash prizes from the judges. (A few years 
later, at the fair oj 7937, White himself ac­
cepted one of the cash prizes.) Following the 
boycott, in 7935, White and fellow Cedar 
Rapidians Arnold Pyle and Harry Jones formed 
Cooperative Mural Painters, the group soon 
afterward receiving a commission to do the 
courtroom mural.
The artists began by putting a fiieze just 
below the ceiling of the room, using tempera 
rather than oil, the usual medium. For the 
murals themselves, they drew sketches on large 
sheets of paper; these were later transferred to 
the canvas, which had been coated with casein 
(consisting of lead, ammonia, milk, and lime). 
On top of this, the designs were painted in 
water colors that had been mixed with a goo 
made of water and egg yolk. The effect pro­
duced had the dynamic effect of oil paint but 
with unusually clear, bright colors.
Though a chart was made showing which of 
the four participating artists had done each 
section of the painting, supervisor Francis 
Robert White insisted that the mural had been 
done in a cooperative manner—'I do not feel 
that to speak of my murals and my assistants is 
correct. Each of us as individual artists [Ts]
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responsible for the section of the mural as indi­
cated . . . [fruf] there is a unity to the four walls 
which has resulted from group criticism and 
cooperation
The criticism continued after the mural was 
completed in 1936 with funds from the Trea­
sury Relief Art Project. Jurists were shocked by 
the mural s "Law and Culture section (above), 
which portrayed a hanging next to the jury box. 
Intended to contrast lynch law with the modern 
judicial system, the paintings meaning was lost 
on many viewers, stunned as they were by the
graphic depictions of good and evil. Other sec­
tions of the mural portrayed—with equally 
brutal candor—such themes as the opening of 
the Midwest, the impact of the machine age, 
and the rise of public health. The paintings 
references to campaigns against syphilis and to 
Christ s chopping up of the cross (opposite) 
fueled local controversy for some time, leading 
Judge Scott of Cedar Rapids to complain that 
he was "sufferingfrom Mural turpitude. 'After 
years of objections, the court finally ordered 
the mural painted over; it is now totally lost.
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The Palimpsest 95
Installed in February 1938, William Hennings 
“Iowa Farm Life (below) was one of several 
dozen Section murals completed in Iowa. Man­
chester postmaster Paul Kehoe suggested the 
subject; some years earlier the butter of a local 
creamery had won a prize in a New York City 
competition. Another Section mural finished in 
1938 was Tom Savage s “The New Calf (left), 
painted for the Jefferson Post Office. Savage s 
earlier painting titled “Butchering had won 
an Iowa State Fair award; it was derisively 
known as “Bloodless Butchering because the 
snow in the foreground of the painting showed 
no sign of the slaughter. “The New Calf' ex­
hibits the same concern for the squeamish 
viewer. Though some made fun of Savage's 
inattention to these details, others gave his 
work high praise. Indeed, Eleanor Roosevelt 
chose “Butchering to hang in the White 
House.

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William Sachett of Independence posed for 
Robert Tabors PostJiuin in a Storm,’ com­
pleted in January 1938. A local artist, Tabor 
painted in a natural style; his postman is as 
realistic as a close-up snapshot.
Frontier schoolteacher Mary Wilkins is the 
focus of Herbert O. Myres mural (below) at 
Sioux City's East High School, one of the first 
paintings funded by the Piddic Works of Art 
Project. Begun in late 1933, Arrival of the 
First Teacher took almost a year to paint;
money contributed by East High’s graduating 
classes helped pay for the work when PWAP 
funding ended. The artist painted in bright 
colors, giving his historical characters a vivid 
realism. The event depicted here occurred in 
1857, when the arrival of the steamboat 
Omaha, bringing Sioux City’s first teacher, 
was a major community event, drawing to the 
pier local dignitaries, housewives, and other 
residents of the town and the surrounding 
country.
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Smith Wildman Brookhart

The Vietnam Era in Iowa Politics

The Palimpsest, vol.63 no.1, January-February 1982

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Davenport's Golden Building Years

The Palimpsest, vol.63 no.2, March-April 1982

The New Deal Murals in Iowa

Women at Home: A Photographic Essay

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