Marietta in History
The New Deal
1930s
It all depended on your point of view. The New Deal was a friend of the working man, but the enemy of landlords and factory owners. As a response to the Great Depression, the National Recovery Administration (NRA) was formed in 1933. Then, a textile worker in Marietta got paid ten cents an hour. Even the most enlightened mill owner was powerless to raise wages without putting himself out of business.
But the NRA unilaterally raised wages to a minimum of thirty cents an hour or $12 for a 40-hour week. Textile executive Guy Northcutt said, "[When] FDR came in and slapped the thirty-cent minimum wage [on the industry], some of the old codgers thought we were ruined and couldn’t survive." But he added that everyone adjusted to the change just fine.
The New Deal created the Works Progress Administration (WPA) and the Public Works Administration (PWA) with the purpose of creating jobs for the unemployed. These workers built roads and dams, dug sewers and recorded oral histories. They expanded schools, erected public housing and created parks.
In Marietta, they helped build the Brumby Recreation Center, an extension to Perkinson (later named Lemon Street) High School, and Northcutt Stadium. Mr. Northcutt, a member of the school board, recalled, "The city could get all the WPA labor it wanted."
Despite critics who said WPA stood for, "We piddle around," workers were able to keep their families fed during the Depression. Many of their projects are still enjoyed today, including Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park.
Scott, Thomas A. Cobb County, Georgia, and the Origins of the Suburban South.