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25 NPS Form 10-900-a OMB No. 10240018 {8-86) United States Department of the interior National Park Service NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES CONTINUATION SHEET Section 8 Page 14 ~ Murphey School name of property Qrange County, NC • county and state totaled $155,454. The cost for the Murphey School addition totaled $16,365 and included in. addition to the auditorium: a new water supply, indicating that the construction of the water tank occurred in 1936, the renovation of the Teacherage, and a new sewage system and plumbing. George W. Kane was selected as the general contractor for the project, with plumbing installed by Jobe-Blackley and heating by J. L. Powers. WPA projects, part of the New Deal programs €rom the Roosevelt administration, provided relief work for the unemployed and funding for the construction of schools and internal improvement projects across North Carolina, and elsewhere, during the 1930s. As a result of the New Deal, the~federat government intervened in the lives of many North Carolinians. Author Anthony Badger states of North Carolina during the New Deal era, "In a time of mass unemployment the New Deal provided direct relief to as many as 300,000 clients a month and gave work to over 200,000 of the state's jobless."2° Murphey School was one of ten school projects in Orange County during 1936 receiving WPA grant money from the federal government. The architect of the auditorium is unknown. On June 1, 1936, the board inspected the new auditorium at Murphey School and approved it with only minor changes. Also in 1936, an electric range was ordered for Murphey School in hopes that a power line would soon be ins#aped by the Durham Public Service Company.2t With many children at Murphey School desiring to attend the Hillsboro school throughout the 1930s and 1940s, numbers began to decline: Frequently throughoiut this period, parents sought the board's permission for their children in the Murphey School district to attend the Hillsboro. elementary school. According to the minutes for November 1, 1948, a parent appeared before the board stating that, "regardless of the #eachers employed at Murphey School they would insist on their child attending school at Hillsboro because #hey believed it to be a better school." The board at many times throughout this period refused to allow children to attend Hillsboro if they lived within the Murphey district, but, after strong persistence from parents, they eventually gave in with the condition that these children who desired to attend school in Hillsboro provide their own -transportation. Stitt, the Orange County board faced a tough battle as students deliberately 20 Badger, Anthony. North Carolina and fhe New Deal. {Raleigh: Nor#h Carolina Division of Arohives and History, 1981), 41. 21 Orange County Board of Education Minutes, 1872-1962, microfilm (Raleigh: State Archives Research Room, c. 073.94002), p. 151-157. "Orange County's New Schools; Chape! Hill Weekly, May 22, 1936, p.1. "Work. on School Building Awaits Melting of Snow," Chape! Hill Weekly, January 3, 1936, p.1. In March of 1930 the committeemen of Murphey School appeared before the Orange County School Board to solicit their interest~in building a new room onto Murphey School. The board approved the application and in June of 1930 elected to provide $300 for the new room. However, this "new room" referred to in Orange County School Board minutes is unknown. There is no physical evidence where an addition would have been made; it also could have bean an addition that was razed with the construction of the 1936 auditorium.