Editing Works Progress Administration (section)

==Women==
[[File:Women Working for the WPA.jpg|thumb|right|Women in Costilla, New Mexico, weaving rag rugs in 1939]]
About 15% of the household heads on relief were women, and youth programs were operated separately by the [[National Youth Administration]]. The average worker was about 40 years old (about the same as the average family head on relief).

WPA policies were consistent with the strong belief of the time that husbands and wives should not both be working (because the second person working would take one job away from some other breadwinner). A study of 2,000 female workers in Philadelphia showed that 90% were married, but wives were reported as living with their husbands in only 18 percent of the cases. Only 2 percent of the husbands had private employment. Of the 2,000 women, all were responsible for one to five additional people in the household.<ref name="Howard"/>{{Rp|283}}

In rural Missouri, 60% of the WPA-employed women were without husbands (12% were single; 25% widowed; and 23% divorced, separated or deserted). Thus, only 40% were married and living with their husbands, but 59% of the husbands were permanently disabled, 17% were temporarily disabled, 13% were too old to work, and remaining 10% were either unemployed or disabled. Most of the women worked with sewing projects, where they were taught to use sewing machines and made clothing and bedding, as well as supplies for hospitals, orphanages, and adoption centers.<ref name="Howard"/>{{Rp|283}}<ref>{{Cite journal|url = http://stars.library.ucf.edu/ahistoryofcentralfloridapodcast/33/|title = Episode 32 Tapestries|date = November 18, 2014|access-date = January 30, 2016|journal = A History of Central Florida Podcast|last = Dickens|first = Bethany}}</ref>

One WPA-funded project, the [[Pack Horse Library Project]], mainly employed women to deliver books to rural areas in eastern Kentucky.<ref name=":1">{{Cite news|url=https://www.horse-canada.com/horses-and-history/the-pack-horse-librarians-of-eastern-kentucky/|title=The Pack Horse Librarians of Eastern Kentucky|work=Horse Canada|access-date=2017-09-01|language=en-CA}}</ref> Many of the women employed by the project were the sole breadwinners for their families.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Boyd|first=Donald C.|date=2007|title=The Book Women of Kentucky: The WPA Pack Horse Library Project, 1936–1943|url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/216892|journal=Libraries & the Cultural Record|volume=42|issue=2|pages=120|url-access=subscription |via=Project MUSE}}</ref>