Creator: Work Projects Administration (RG 60).

Collection Summary: Directories, reports, lists of churches, and church records forms for the state-wide church records inventory project conducted by the Work Projects Administration.  County level workers in this project were to visit all churches in their respective county, surveying the records and preparing a church record form for each one. The form contained the name and location of the church, when it was established, what (if any) previous buildings it had occupied, any architectural notes of the present building, who the first minister was, and the types of church records available and their location. Additional forms were prepared on each distinctive type of church record listing the date span, contents, arrangement, and location of each. The first folder for most counties contains a list of all churches in the county, showing their denomination, minister’s name, and church’s and/or minister’s address. This information was compiled into state-wide lists called Church Directories in the list below. There is also a card file organized by county that shows the same information for each church. Not all churches in all counties were inventoried, depending on the initiative of the county worker(s) and the cooperation of the church’s minister.

Access Restrictions: None.

Date(s): 1936-1941.

Volume: 6.25 Cubic Feet.

Finding Aid Created By: Colby Cox in September 2024.

Related Materials: TBD.

Record Group History: The Works Projects Administration (WPA) was a federal program established on May 6th, 1935, in order to increase employment during the Great Depression. While the WPA was a federal program, it was implemented and managed on the state level with each state having their own director and office to guide the operation of the WPA for each state. The WPA was primarily focused on employing individuals for the purpose of creating public works and infrastructure, but a small portion of its funding was devoted to cultural and artistic endeavors which the files in this collection are primarily concerned with. Two of the major cultural projects the WPA undertook were the Federal Writers’ Project and the Historical Records Survey. The Federal Writers Project employed writers to create guides, histories, and chronicles for each state and the Historical Records Survey sought to catalogue the historical records of each state.

Collection Inventory:
Box Content 

Box Number

Card Files - 
Adams - Coahoma counties10877
Copiah - Jackson counties10878
Jasper - Lowndes counties10879
Madison - Simpson counties17542
Smith - Yazoo counties17543
Census of Religious Bodies, Census Bureau Reports: 193610876
Church Directory -  
Baptist (Southern) Churches10876
Catholic Churches10876
Jewish Congregations10876
Methodist Churches10876
Miscellaneous Churches 10876
Presbyterian Churches10876
Church Records Forms –  
Adams-Bolivar Counties10867
Calhoun-Covington Counties10868
DeSoto-Hinds Counties                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   10869
Holmes-Jones Counties10870
Kemper-Lee Counties10871
Leflore-Madison Counties10872
Marion-Prentiss Counties10873
Quitman-Tunica Counties10874
Union-Yazoo Counties10875
Miscellaneous Items10876
Monthly Progress Reports: Feb, Mar, & Jun, 194110876
WPA Instructions for Church Records Survey10876