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Kress Building (Goodwill), 1109 Broadway, 1932; Edward F. Sibbert, New York, architect; NR |
1930 - 1950
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Kress Building (Goodwill), 1109 Broadway, 1932; Edward F. Sibbert, New York, architect; NR |
Though the stock market crashed in late 1929 affected other areas of the country almost immediately, Lubbock’s economy did not deteriorate much until after 1931 because of the presence of Tech and the growth of agricultural irrigation and related products. During the depression, the vast majority of construction in multiple-paned windows are often placed in groups, Chimneys are typically massive with buildings. Some examples of depression era construction include the Santa Fe Bridge at 15th Street and Avenue A (1930), 1002 Avenue G by S. B. Haynes (1931 with alterations), 105 E. Broadway (1933 with alterations), and 1502 Avenue H (1937).
Although there was a lack of privately financed construction between 1931 and 1936, government programs such as the Works Progress Administration and the Public Works Administration increased employment by authorizing several construction projects. One government program that benefited Lubbock from 1935 to 1945 was the Civilian Conservation Corps. This program provided labor and money for the construction of recreational facilities at Mackenzie State Park. Designed by park employees, many of these structures were built with stone from the Crosbyton area or stucco in a simple, indigenous style. While nearly sixty years have passed, several of those structures are still in use including the Outdoor Learning Center, the Party House, barracks buildings, the Bath House, and several bridges.
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Pictured left is the Mackenzie Park Bath House. |
Another government program that influenced Lubbock, a well as the entire nation, was the creation of the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) in 1934. Designed to alleviate unemployment by insuring long-term mortgage loans by private lenders for home construction and sale, the FHA changed the appearance of homes, neighborhoods, and cities through its adoption of minimum construction requirements for guaranteed loans. Standards setting minimum construction quality, lot size, front and side setbacks, and house width encouraged suburban development and spawned an abundance of similar four and six room houses. From the late 1930s to the 1950s, empty lots in Lubbock's twenty area additions began to be filled with modest Cape Cod-influenced homes - many financed through the FHA.
Before the difficult times of the 1930s,
however, an architectural movement began that also had long-term
consequences. The dominance of the United States as a world power
after World War I created a feeling of national pride which was
not felt to be expressed accurately enough by historical foreign
architectural styles. The most recent, strictly American building
type was the skyscraper of the late 1800s - originally sheathed
in classical ornamentation. In the mid-1920s, these symbols of
American ingenuity took on new decorative motifs based upon
designs used in a 1925 Paris exhibition and a setback form
demanded by New York City building code restrictions.
This photograph was featured in a 1942 Avalanche Journal advertisement for Green Acres Addition. The ad promised "A Minimum Down Payment of Only $50 Cash Will Buy One of These Beautiful Homes. These Houses are Built with Best Materials...FHA Specifications...and FHA Approved.
As this style (originally known as Modernistic) grew in popularity, its forms and motifs were applied to numerous smaller buildings across the nation. Now referred to as Art Deco, its heyday was cut short due to the Great Depression when most construction came to a standstill, but it reappeared briefly in the last years of the 1930s. Because of the lower costs and nationalistic perception of the Art Deco style, large federally-financed building projects during the 1930s were essentially Art Deco, though often stripped of its usual ornamentation. As government construction programs continued throughout the Depression, building designs became more sleek and horizontal in emphasis, an expression of the machine age and the speed and aerodynamics of automobiles, trains, and airplanes. By the second World War this new style, known as Moderne, essentially replaced Art Deco, dominating commercial and public architecture in Lubbock between 1936 and the mid-1950s.
Although World War II caused the enrollment of Tech to drop, the establishment of four South Plains military installations, including two at Lubbock, stimulated the growth and prosperity of both the city and the region. The booming oil industry west of Lubbock and an increase in the production of agricultural crops on the plains also contributed to the widening economic diversity of the area, assuring stability by the end of the 1940s. Confident of prosperity and growth, another building boom occurred - this one marked by several landmark institutional and public buildings derivatives of both the decoratively restrained Moderne and the Art Deco styles. The early 1950s witnessed the construction of the present Lubbock County Courthouse - a simply detailed, but powerful structure with distinctive Art Deco massing.
