October 2, 2015 RICHMOND (California) — A mural of pre-World War II Richmond, considered missing for nearly four decades, will once again be put on display.

The painting, an oil on canvas that shows union workers and their supervisors against a backdrop of the Standard Oil Refinery, was commissioned by the federal Works Progress Administration in 1940 as a way to employ artists during the Great Depression. It was painted by Victor Arnautoff, a protege of famed Mexican muralist Diego Rivera, and displayed at the central branch of the downtown Richmond Post Office until 1976.

But after it was removed during a remodel, local historians lost track of the artwork. Databases of WPA works classified the mural as missing until an inquisitive historian began asking around and turned to the Richmond Museum of History to assist in the search for the canvas. McCrary was eventually put in touch with a former janitor at the post office who went back in the bowels of the historic building and found a dusty crate containing the rolled-up mural.

“This is a mural painted on the eve of World War II and represents a different time and place, before the shipyards became known to the world,” Cappelletti said. “Arnautoff was a well-known artist in California who painted the main mural at Coit Tower, showing San Francisco city life, and I felt it was important to showcase his other work. It does us no good to have it sitting in storage.”

source: Richmond: Post office mural missing for decades rediscovered| Contra Costa Times