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FEDERAL wo..-qxs AGENCY WORK PROJECTS ADMINISTRATION For Release to Morning lfawSJ?apers Wednesday, July 9, 1941 rl WPA WILL SURVEY 200,000 ORG.ANIZ.ATIONS FOR COOPERATION IN CIVILI.Alf DEFENSE More than 200 1 000 national, state and local civilian organizations with memberships of 50,000,000 individuals will be surveyed and catalogue~ by the WPA for the parts they _can play in home defense, Howard o. Hunter, Commissioner of Work Projects, ari..nounced today. The project will provide basic information for programs of the Office of Civilian Defense., uncler tho direction of Fiorello H. LaGuardia and other agencies . It will be cond.uctod during tho next 60 clays by the 'WPA Historical Ro.c ords Survey under tho general supervision of Mrs . Florence Kerr, Assistant WPA Commissioner in c~a:.•ge of Connnunity Service :projects and assistant to Mr. LaGu.ardia in tho OOD. With information available for county seats and towns of more than 2,500 population, lvo:-s . Kerr said, civilian omorgencios can be handled with dispatch by tho ~ppro:priato organizatio'ns in all largo cities and more than 5•000 towns~ Information regarding all civilian organizations will be o~tained on special forms by project workers of tho Historical Records Survey~ • Those records will become a national master directory in punch card form • When tho OCD is about to inaugurate a particular activity--from consumer protection to air raid warden services-the punch cards of suitable orgrulizations can be as sembled autom~tically for any or all States. Similar lists will bo retained in each State~ 11 It is imperative that this survey bo completed within tho next Digitized by Original from NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY 4-2255 60 days as one of the ~mportant s~eps for the work of t he Office of Civilian Defens e, 11 Mrs. Kerr said. rl 11 It is our hope that all organizations apDroached by the Historical Recor QS Survey will offer their full and prompt cooperation. 11 The index will i nclucie general civic 01·ganizations, service organizations, welfare and charitable groups, . auxiliary religious groups engaged in service work, chambers of commerce, national and State head,.. quarters of labor unions and city-:-wid.o trado councils, Parent-Tea cher Associations, patriotic societies, professional nss ociations, home demonstration clubs and far 1:: organizations, alumni groups, mo torists 1 clubs, youth organizations and his torical societies . \ Purely social clubs will be omitted. ~i1ilc chur ches will not be listed, indexes of such organizatio ns have aµ-eady boon compiled by t ho Historical Records Survey and arc available ~ • oOo Digitized by Original from NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY
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