eatured in this lot is a ceramic Brown Trout plaque with Museum Extension Project W. P. A. Dist - 5 on a medallion on the front, and the words Brown Trout carved into the ceramic. "Sample" is written on the back; circa 1935-1943. An Amazing Piece Of History! This plaque was made during the Depression Era for the Works Progress Administration. As part of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's "New Deal", the W. P. A. was intended to provide employment for struggling artists during the Great Depression. It operated from August 29, 1935, until June 30, 1943, and was created as a relief measure to employ artists and artisans to create murals, easel paintings, sculpture, graphic art, posters, photographs, Index of American Design documentation, museum and theatre scenic design, and arts and crafts. The Federal Art Project operated community art centers throughout the country where craft workers and artists worked, exhibited, and educated others. The project created more than 200,000 separate works, some of them remaining among the most significant pieces of public art in the country. Controversies engulfed the Federal Art Program, which employed a number of muralists strongly influenced by the social realism and politics of Mexican-born artist Diego Rivera, a communist. For critics of Roosevelt and his administration, federal arts programs presented convenient targets. Curiously, the most prolific New Deal arts program, measured in terms of sheer output, generated neither celebrity nor controversy and perhaps for that reason remains the least well known. Between 1935 and 1943, the Museum Extension Project (MEP) turned out millions of pieces of “visual culture” – everything from colored illustrations, scale models, and dioramas to specimen casts and marionettes – and placed them in the hands of the nation’s schoolchildren. the Museum Extension Project emerged out of the Division of Women’s and Professional Projects, a unit of the Works Progress Administration (WPA) charged with developing relief programs for women and white-collar workers. Originally assigned to the Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA), the division was transferred to the WPA in 1935 and enjoyed the strong backing of First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, a highly vocal and eminently articulate supporter of both women and the arts. This ceramic plaque is in good overall condition, some chips noted otherwise in amazing condition for its age. Measures 9.5"W x 17.5"L x x 2"D