This photo documents a street construction project completed in 1938 on Maple Street between Summit Street and South Prospect Street, using money appropriated by the Works Progress Administration (WPA). The project, listed as WPA project number 465-21-1-16, included 432 lineal feet and 1300 square yards of street bed. This photograph illustrates a stage in the project after the completion of the excavation of two or three feet of frozen ground with hand tools and the street had been prepped for paving after being laid with a sand cushion, telford and crushed stone base. As the construction took place during the winter months and involved excavating substantial amounts of frozen ground, the cost of the project totaled $10,007.50, much more than comparable projects completed in the same year. (1)

Three buildings are visible in this photo. In the left-hand foreground is a two-story dwelling at 436 Maple Street, occupied in 1938 by Wilmer c. Dreibelbeis, according to that year's City Directory. Dreibelbeis was a Lieutenant Colonel in the United States Army. (2)

The next building on the left, at the corner of Maple and South Prospect Street, listed as 215 South Prospect.  In 1938 it housed the Kappa Alpha Theta sorority sisters.(3)

The final building at this viewpoint, listed as 231 South Prospect, on the right-hand corner of Maple and South Prospect Streets.  The 1938 City Directory lists Robert T. Platka at this address.  Platka was the treasurer of the E.S. Adsit Coal Company, Inc., located at 198 Main Street. (4)

(1) 73rd Report, 193, 196.

(2) Manning’s Burilington Winooski and Essex Junction Directory for year beginning Septrember 1938 (Springfield: H.A. Manning Company), 209.

(3) Directory 1938, 224.

(4) Directory 1938, 18, 151, 224.