Soul of a People: The WPA Writers' Project Uncovers Depression America. By  David A. Taylor.

The Works Progress Administration (WPA) built bridges, dams,  and parks to provide work for laborers during the Great Depression.  But that didn't help the laid-off white collar workers, the researchers, editors, and writers.  So in 1935, the federal government initiated a project that gave these people the hope of a job.

The WPA's Federal Writers' Project had two requirements for the people they hired:  they had to be certifiably destitute, and they had to be able to write.  Once that was proven, they could be employed for part- or full-time work.  Part-time work paid about $75 a month, good money back when pork chops were eleven for a dollar. (Page 167.)

Work focused on two major projects; travel guides for each of the states, and the collection of American folklore.  The best of the travel guides were honest warts-and-all looks at their state, lovingly chronicling the good parts and the bad. A handful became best sellers.  Some have been digitized and can be found at the Internet Archives at http://www.archive.org/details/federal_writers_project

The FWP hired some of the best known names in 20th century literature.  Zora Neale Hurston worked for them, as did Richard Wright, Ralph Ellison, Studs Terkel,  Kenneth Rexroth,  May Swenson, and John Cheever. "Soul of a People" tells the stories of many of those writers.  

Highly recommended.