For those of you curious about the banner graphic, this was derived from part of a flyer extolling the benefits of the WPA for Pennsylvania.  Note that the unemployed are curvilinear–a sure sign of shiftless behavior, I suppose.  The workers on relief are properly rectilinear, as befits their hard work creating an infrastructure for America that we still enjoy. I did replace a pickaxe with a shovel, although I’ve certainly employed the former in my own archaeological investigations.  I do agree with the flyer’s anonymous author that the WPA created projects of lasting value–certainly this is true of the archaeology carried out across the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the rest of the U.S.