The Civilian Conservation Corps

CCC Camp S-81 on Kabetogama Lake

1933-1942

Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Emergency Conservation Work Bill on April 5, 1933 as the country was entering one of the worst years in the Great Depression. That year, 54% of the country’s young men between the ages of 17 and 25 were without jobs. Roosevelt envisioned alleviating the unemployment and providing relief for destitute families by establishing a series of camps where young men would work on forest and park conservation programs on public lands. Forests had once covered 800,000,000 acres of the U.S.; in 1933, only 100,000,000 acres of virgin timber remained. Drought-stressed forests were further stressed by insect infestations and disease. Hundreds of thousands of acres of tilled or tillable land had been impacted by erosion. Roosevelt saw an opportunity to solve the vast unemployment problem while restoring the nation’s natural resources.

The President appointed Robert Fechner to work with four government departments—War, Interior, Agriculture and Labor—to put the program into effect. The first camp was established at Luray, Virginia on April 17, 1933 and by the first of July there were 275,000 enrollees in 1300 camps across the country. Fechner described the program as a way to “build up young men physically and spiritually and to start the nation on a sound conservative program which would conserve and expand our timbered resources, increase recreational opportunities and reduce the annual toll taken by forest fire, disease, pests, soil erosion and floods.” 

The Civilian Conservation Corps, as the program was officially called in 1937, employed young, unmarried men between the ages of 18 and 25 (the age requirements were later changed) for conservation work on public lands. The enrollees had to come from families who were on or eligible for relief. They were enrolled in the program for 6 months, with re-enlistments up to two years. The pay was $30.00 a month, of which $25.00 had to be sent home to the enrollee’s family. Once enrolled, families were taken off the relief rolls.

Enrollees lived in work camps under the operation of the Department of War. At first, lodging consisted of tents until more permanent camps were built. In 1937, all new camp buildings were designed to be portable for easy removal and reuse. Eventually 4,500 camps were built across the nation, including Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. A typical camp might have several barracks, a mess hall, recreation hall, infirmary, officers’ quarters, garages, sheds, shower building and latrine.

Branches of the military (most commonly the Army) operated the camps using standard military procedures including basic training. After training, men were assigned to a Company. Civilian leaders provided instruction in a variety of areas including high school correspondence classes, clerical training, basic literacy skills, typing, first aid, social courtesy, citizenship, motor mechanics, radio, printing, woodworking, cabinet making, metal and leather craft, etc. This gave enrollees training and practical experience while in camp and for many enrollees, it was where they learned to read and write.

Work projects were determined at the local or state level. Technical foremen employed by the Federal agency responsible for the camp (Agriculture, Forestry or Interior) provided supervision and training in the work to be accomplished. Projects were generally forest or conservation related but also included construction of recreational facilities, preservation of historic buildings, disaster aid, flood control, and construction of dams, bridges, wells and fences. Conservation and forestry work included large-scale campaigns against forest insects and diseases especially white pine blister rust, gypsy moths, European bark beetles and grasshoppers, timber estimating surveys, rodent control, mosquito control, clearing underbrush along roads and trails for fire prevention, eradicating poisonous plants, preparing forest cover type maps, laying out experimental forest plots for forest and plant research, inventorying wildlife, controlling erosion, and planting trees.

The Civilian Conservation Corps program ended in 1942, primarily because of World War II, but the program was in trouble years before. By late summer 1941, there were fewer than 200,000 men in 900 camps across the country. Political support and public opinion were changing, unemployment was no longer a serious issue so there was a lack of applicants, and money was going toward the war effort. From 1933-1942, the Civilian Conservation Core program employed or economically benefited over 17 million people, created some 2 billion dollars of infrastructure and provided 7.135 million days of conservation labor.

National Civilian Conservation Corps Statistics

3,463,766 men supervised by 263,755 personnel

7,793 men died in the Corps

2.5-3 Billion trees planted

248,000 acres of swamp drained

814,000 acres of grazing land replanted

972 million fish restocked

154 million square yards of banks & 40 million acres of farmland protected from erosion

125,000 miles of road & 13,100 miles of trail built

89,000 miles of telephone line strung (to improve fire detection & communication systems)

52,000 acres of public campgrounds created

800 state parks begun

3,470 fire towers erected

97,000 miles of fire roads built

4,235,000 man-days devoted to fighting fires

4,000 historic buildings renovated

The majority of camps are no longer existing. Of the 4,500 that were constructed, 26 remain in the nation including Camp Rabideau at Blackduck, Minnesota, which is now a National Historic Landmark. However the legacy of the program is visible in the many public works constructed or maintained through the program and in the public service organizations, such as Americorps, Youth Conservation Corps, and Minnesota Conservation Corps, patterned after the Civilian Conservation Corps.

 

   Company 724 CCC - Kabetogama Lake Area Camp. Ray, Minnesota February 27, 1934.

 

The Civilian Conservation Corps in Minnesota

In Minnesota, 84,000 men participated in the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) and 85 million dollars was spent in the state as a result of the program. There were 166 CCC camps in Minnesota, the majority being National Forest camps.

The CCC was divided into Corps Areas, Districts, Companies and Camps. Each company had its own officers as well as civilian staff—usually skilled laborers and supervisors known as Local Experienced Men (LEMs). The company number was assigned by the federal government. A company might have more than one camp. The camp or project was assigned by the state and included a letter-designation indicating the type of camp followed by a number.For example, S-52 was a state forest camp. The majority of camps in Minnesota were national or state forest camps, state park camps or soil conservation service camps.

Recruiting for the CCC was under the direction of the Department of Labor, acting through state agencies responsible for public relief programs. All men selected for the CCC program were required to report at a designated army recruiting office. At first, enrollees in Minnesota were sent to the statewide CCC headquarters at Fort Snelling. The headquarters was later moved to Grand Rapids.

The War Department was in charge of the men from the time they reached the headquarters until they were delivered to the camps. At the headquarters, enrollees received medical exams and inoculations and two weeks training. Each enrollee received two sets of Army fatigue work clothes, a dress uniform, a heavy overcoat, mittens, two pair of shoes, woolen blankets, sheets, a pillow, 3 pairs of socks, two hats, two pairs of heavy underwear and a raincoat.

The enrollees were then formed into companies of approximately 200 men and assigned to camps. At the camps, the War Department fed, clothed, housed, and gave the men medical attention. From the time the men left the camp in the morning until they returned in the evening they were under the direction and supervision of the U.S. Forest Service or other agency. The War Department provided heavy equipment such as tractors and trucks and state agencies provided small equipment such as shovels, hoes, axes, etc.

Northern Minnesota welcomed the CCC program as unemployment had reached 70% in 1933 on the Iron Range, a large portion of land was on tax delinquent rolls and the Department of Conservation had fewer than 50 employees statewide to manage 500,000 acres of forest. Much of the pine forests that had been cut in the preceding decades were vulnerable to catastrophic forest fires because of early logging practices that left large amounts of brush and slash.

The state divided the work that needed to be done into two primary categories, protection and improvement. Protection was described as “work which prevents or reduces further destruction of the forests by fire, insects and disease,” and included firefighting, fire prevention, fire breaks, roadside cleanup, hazard reduction, truck and foot trails, lookout tower construction, and construction of buildings for state forest administration personnel. Improvement work was described as, “work which improves the present stand of timber, the establishment of a new forest and betters the growing conditions, and included nursery work, planting, forest stand improvement, lineal surveys, timber type survey and mapping, forest game improvement, and recreational developments. 

The Minnesota Department of Conservation also considered its waters as one of its most valuable resources and pleaded with the director of the Emergency Conservation Work to give approval for water conservation work projects. Eventually the director agreed to surveys of lakes to gather data on which a work program and water conservation camps could be developed. However, much to the dismay of the state, the director placed the program under the Soil Conservation Service (instead of the Forest Service), which focused primarily on erosion control projects in southeastern Minnesota.

From 1933 to 1941, over three and one half million man days were put toward work in 5,000,000 acres of Minnesota state forests by CCC crews including collecting 9,000 bushels of pine cones for seed and planting over 25 million trees. Thousands of man days were spent in the game and fish program surveying lakes, conducting deer and small game censuses, controlling erosion, constructing dams, improving streams, adapting Minnesota wild foods for commercial sale, and conducting experiments in rodent control.

The state considered the task of administering a camp (providing a home and pay for the men, giving them medical attention, and fostering education and recreational opportunities) an Army obligation but closely allied with forest conservation in that, “It is fundamentally a conservation of youth through the medium of conserving natural resources.” The Department of Conservation took great pride in providing opportunities for physical work out-of-doors that would also provide mental regeneration, and an education for young men.

The impact of the CCC on local economies was also significant and businesses near camps typically flourished. Camps purchased supplies, tools, medicine, lumber, rock, vehicles, etc. and the men recreated in nearby towns. Local communities also benefited from construction of public facilities such as picnic grounds, ball diamonds, and parks.

At first the CCC program did not allow African-Americans or American Indians to participate in the program. The enlistment was eventually extended to African-Americans although primarily in segregated camps. In Minnesota, the Consolidated Chippewa Indian Agency wrote to the Director of the E.C.W. stating that Indians were also suffering greatly from the Depression and should be a part of the program. The Agency asked for two changes in the program, that instead of housing in special camps, that Indians be allowed to work in camps on reservations and live with their families. This was agreed to for the most part, although for logistical and efficiency reasons some Indian CCC camps were constructed. 84,000 American Indians participated nationwide. In northern Minnesota there were camps at Nett Lake, Grand Portage and Mille Lacs. Read more information information about the CCC Indian Division.

 

For More Information about the Civilian Conservation Corps

Cohen, Stan, The Tree Army: A Pictorial History of the Civilian Conservation Corps 1933-1942 Missoula , Montana: Pictorial Histories Publishing Co. 1980.

Nelson, Edward P. and Barbara Sommer (editors), It was a Good Deal: The Civilian Conservation Corps in Northeastern Minnesota, St. Louis County Historical Society, Duluth, 1987.

Ryan, J.C., The CCC and Me: Roster of Company 719, edited by DeLores Guzek, published by J.C. Ryan, Duluth, 1987.

Sommer, Barbara, Hard Work and a Good Deal, Minnesota Historical Society Press, St. Paul, 2008.

Oral history interviews in park library collection.

James F. Justin Civilian Conservation Corps Museum (online museum of histories, biographies, and photographs about the CCC).

CCC Alumni Groups, such as The National Association of Civilian Conservation Corps Alumni (NACCCA): to remember and celebrate the efforts of the Civilian Conservation Corps.

Helms, Douglas, compiler. Preliminary Inventory of the Records of the Civilian Conservation Corps. Washington: National Archives & Records Service, General Services Administration, 1980.

Online book about the history of the CCC and the National Park Service.