The WPA & the Golden Age · See America / Cities & States
Just One Long Step to Sea Cliff, L.I.
Works Progress Administration, 1939
What it is
A 1939 travel poster for Sea Cliff on Long Island's North Shore, made by an unnamed artist for the Works Progress Administration. It is now held in the Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division.
Why it matters
The WPA's poster shops put artists to work selling Americans on America, and this sheet does exactly that job: it pitches a modest North Shore town as an easy reach from the city. The Library of Congress files it among 1939 New York World's Fair material, placing it in the season when the Fair was teaching the region to think of itself as a destination.
What to notice
Look at how the colour sits in flat, un-shaded fields, the silkscreen shorthand that let a WPA shop print a poster in a handful of bold passes.
A whole shoreline, promised in one stride.
Provenance
- School
- WPA — Federal Art Project (United States)
- Format
- Travel poster
- Poster published
- Works Progress Administration, 1939
- Source
- Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division · ppmsca.04892
Rights: CLEAR. Public domain — U.S. government program work (WPA Federal Art Project), any year. Gated by the poster’s own publication year. Cleared by registry on 2026-07-18.
Format
The full-resolution, color-managed file — restored honestly, yours to print and keep.
Sized to protect print quality — this scan supports sizes up to 27x41" cleanly.
Size
$29.00
