Arthurdale: Eleanor Roosevelt’s Pet Project
Arthurdale was the first of 99 New Deal communities built by the government during the Depression.
Mrs. Roosevelt was involved in the planning the community and put Arthurdale on the map.
By World War I, the area was one of the most intensively developed coal districts in the United States;
however, during the 1930s, many of the coal mines in Scotts Run closed or operated sporadically due to
the economic effects of the Great Depression. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt heard about Scotts Run
through her friend Lorena Hickok, who came to north central West Virginia in 1933 to inspect the
Appalachian coalfields. Hickok wrote that Scotts Run was the worst place she had ever seen, with
housing “most Americans would not have considered fit for pigs.” After hearing “Hick’s” account of the
area, Roosevelt traveled to Scotts Run in August of 1933 to visit with the impoverished miners and their
families. The trip made a lasting impression on the first lady and formed a resolve in her to provide
assistance to the residents. Within two weeks of her visit, plans to create Arthurdale were underway in
Washington
It was first called “The Reedsville Project” from quaint little town of Reedsille about a mile north of
Arthurdale. It was later renamed Arthurdale after Richard Arthur, who sold the government the land. It
began in 1934.
The purpose of the project was intended to benefit poor laborers, coal miners, and farmers and move them
to a modern rural community that would allow them to be self-sufficient. Arthurdale was the first planned
community of this type in the United States under this program. The land was purchased from Mr.
Arthur, 165 homes were constructed, and residents were selected to participate in the project.
As said on the above roadside plague, each
family would receive a newly built home and
enough acreage to raise their own food and crops.
Arthurdale was also expected to govern itself, and
there were to be no private employment options in
the area.
There were also community buildings such as a
school built on more than 1,100 acres in rural
Preston County. Most of the community buildings
still stand and are part of the New Deal
Homestead Museum.
According to Arthurdale Heritage.org, “The homesteaders themselves were responsible for paying rent,
working and farming their allotted acreage, and some were employed to build new homes and the
administration building, forge, gas station, cooperative store, craft shop, center hall, and school buildings.
Some found work in the schools, post office, barber shop, and the Mountaineer Craftsmen’s Association.
Some were hired to work in the numerous business ventures which were enticed to the area.”
In 1947, the federal government abandoned and liquidated its holdings in Arthurdale and the project
was deemed a failure. All the homes and community buildings were sold to the public. It was during the
50th anniversary celebration of the project that brought about the establishment of Arthurdale Heritage,
Inc.
Eleanor Roosevelt And The Arthurdale
Experiment
In 1933, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt introduced the
social programs of the New Deal to the people of America.
Laboring under the economic collapse known as the Great
Depression, people needed jobs, many were homeless, and
more lived in dire poverty. This was graphically true in rural
areas. One such was Scotts Run, a stretch of coal mining land in
West Virginia that caught the attention of First Lady Eleanor
Roosevelt. She determined to help the people there by resettling them in a new, self-sufficient community called
Arthurdale.
Eleanor Roosevelt had grown up in wealth and privilege, but
her life had been full of personal hardships. Energetic and
determined as a First Lady, she was a lightning rod for critics
who thought that her “pet project” couldn’t work—but she held
fast and proved them wrong. To the refugees from the slag heaps, Arthurdale was the answer to
their dreams. Here were tidy homes with furniture and indoor plumbing; a place for planting
gardens, sending children to school, learning new trades in new industries, and working together
for the good of the community. Arthurdale, nestled in the green hills of West Virginia, changed
the lives of its first families forever.
Eleanor Roosevelt and the Arthurdale Experiment is the chronicle of an unlikely relationship
between a president’s wife, the poorest of the poor, and the dream they shared. It is told through
the eyes, ears, and memories of those who were children in Arthurdale. And it is a testament to a
remarkable First Lady who never abandoned her ideals or the settlers, even though the
government later did.
Arthurdale, a planned community begun in the mid-1930s in West Virginia, was funded by the
federal government as part of the New Deal. The program offered the hope of a better life to a
selected number of the miners and their families who lived in depressed, overcrowded coal
camps. From its beginnings, Arthurdale had an enthusiastic, caring spokesperson in Eleanor
Roosevelt, who visited often and used her influence for the welfare of its citizens.
Arthurdale, West Virginia, is the site of an important social-engineering project initiated by
Eleanor Roosevelt. Designed to improve the lives of coal miners and their families who were
suffering from the economic effects of the Great Depression, the planned community included
farms, homes, schools, shops, and medical facilities. The government bought the land with the
understanding that the residents would homestead it and repay the loan after achieving a selfsustaining community. The community and others like it were to be models for eliminating
poverty.
Roosevelt’s pioneering effort in community-building offers an interesting commentary on how
government support made a difference in people’s lives but could not resolve their economic or
social problems. It was Roosevelt herself who entered peoples’ homes, engaged them in
conversation, brought modern educational methods to the school, and made a lasting impression
on the people she touched