Ebel compellingly shows that the federal workers camp projects were not simply a secular endeavor. The federal migrant camps, although not the project of any particular religious denomination, Ebel argues, were unmistakably sites of evangelism for the religion of reform in New Deal California. The camps, a Depression-era project, presented yet another project in the broader American Protestant missionary enterprise in which the goal was the reformation or redemption of a group of people. In this case, the people in need of reform in the western United States were not Chinese, Native American, or Mexican; rather, they were dispossessed Dust Bowl Okies. The ministers of the New Deal gospel were not denominational or seminary-trained ministers but were camp managers, who “pastored” or led the migrants in the camps in a way similar to formal religion.
This book is structured to mimic an experience of walking into the camp. All fifteen...