Restoring America: Historic Preservation and the New Deal (Public History in Historical Perspective)

Exploring how the New Deal shaped history through politically driven commemoration During the Great Depression, Americans employed historic preservation as a tool to address the political, economic, and social upheavals of the era. Inspired by the Roosevelt administration’s unprecedented support of federal arts projects, US politicians, architects, laborers, artisans, and local boosters skillfully used New Deal funds to restore, mythologize, and politicize the “historic shrines” in their communities. Restoring America illustrates how and why Americans turned to historic preservation as a strategy for managing both political realities and ambitions. Stephanie Gray presents four thoroughly researched and diverse case studies: a colonial theater in the Deep South, a Puritan minister’s home in New England, aviator Charles Lindbergh's modest farmhouse and parklands of the Upper Midwest, and a multi-layered Spanish-German-Mexican arts village in the Central South.