Catholic Crusade Castle photograph

Dated 1937, this photograph shows stairs leading up to the Catholic Crusade Castle in Cincinnati, Ohio, on Shattuc Avenue. The Catholic Crusade Castle served as the headquarters of the Catholic Students' Mission Crusade from 1919 until about 1970, which appealed to students thinking about taking holy orders or becoming missionaries. A note on the photograph's reverse reads "Catholic Crusade building East of Ault Park." A man by the name of Schulte modified the wine cellar into crypt-like chapel, known as the Oratory of the True Cross. This photograph is one of the many visual materials collected for use in the Ohio Guide. In 1935, President Franklin D. Roosevelt established the Works Progress Administration by executive order to create jobs for the large numbers of unemployed laborers, as well as artists, musicians, actors, and writers. The Federal Arts Program, a sector of the Works Progress Administration, included the Federal Writers’ Project, one of the primary goals of which was to complete the America Guide series, a series of guidebooks for each state which included state history, art, architecture, music, literature, and points of interest to the major cities and tours throughout the state. Work on the Ohio Guide began in 1935 with the publication of several pamphlets and brochures. The Reorganization Act of 1939 consolidated the Works Progress Administration and other agencies into the Federal Works Administration, and the Federal Writers’ Project became the Federal Writers’ Project in Ohio. The final product was published in 1940 and went through several editions. The Ohio Guide Collection consists of 4,769 photographs collected for use in Ohio Guide and other publications of the Federal Writers’ Project in Ohio from 1935-1939