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Brief History
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The Civilian Conservation Corps and the National Park Service, 1933-1942: An Administrative History Chapter One: A Brief History of the Civilian Conservation Corps |
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Second
Director of Civilian Conservation Corps James J. McEntee
1940-1942.
Courtesy of the National
Archives.
THE WAR YEARS AND THE CONCLUSION OF THE CCC
The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, and the entry of the United States into World War II brought further dramatic changes to the CCC program in the National Park Service. With the declaration of war, the Park Service terminated all CCC projects that did not directly relate to the war effort, leaving only 89 NPS camps operating by the end of December. Fifty of these camps were assigned to military and naval areas, 20 were in national parks and monuments, 10 were in recreational demonstration areas, and 9 were in state park areas. [57]
On December 24, 1941, the Joint Appropriations Committee of Congress, considering the appropriations bill of 1941-1942, recommended that the CCC be terminated no later than July 1, 1942. President Roosevelt conceded that the CCC could be abolished but argued that it should be maintained as it performed needed conservation work and served as a training program for pre-draft-age youth. Roosevelt urged members of Congress to continue the CCC in light of the essential war work that the enrollees were performing--building military training facilities, barracks, roads, and recreational facilities for military uses and fencing military reservations. [58]
While Congress and the president debated the fate of the CCC, Director McEntee ordered that all existing CCC camps be closed as quickly as feasible unless they met one of two criteria--the camp was engaged in war work construction or in protection of war-related natural resources. Some camps in NPS areas specializing in forest fire protection work were permitted to continue under the second criterion. The effective date for application of this guideline was set for the end of May 1942. Within the National Park Service, Wirth gave further instructions to the regional directors on the termination of CCC camps. He recommended that any incomplete CCC jobs be finished as quickly as possible, using labor paid from other sources, and that any leftover material be transferred to other CCC projects in the area or be declared surplus and disposed of following regional instructions. The closing of those CCC camps that did not meet the criteria was facilitated by the fact that many of the young men and their supervisors were taking jobs with defense industries or going into the military. Even in some of the remaining camps, it was not possible to keep a full complement of 200 men. [59]
On May 4, 1942, President Roosevelt asked the House of Representatives Committee on Appropriations to appropriate $49,101,000 to maintain 150 CCC camps from July 1, 1942, until June 30, 1943. The committee defied the president and voted 15 to 12 against funding the CCC beyond July 1. An attempt was made on June 5 on the floor of the House of Representatives to restore funding, but the House voted 158 to 151 not to appropriate further monies for the CCC. They did vote $500,000 to cover the cost of terminating the program. At the end of June, a Senate and House conference committee agreed to provide an additional $7.5 million to all agencies to cover the cost of terminating the CCC. This action was approved by both the House and Senate, thus forecasting the end of the CCC on July 2, 1942. [60]
During the congressional debate over the CCC, the National Park Service began to prepare for closure of the camps. In May the NPS regional directors were instructed to prepare press releases to be placed in local papers describing the closing of local CCC camps and giving an explanation for the closures. In June Conrad Wirth still hoped that at least a small number of camps could be continued through the summer months to provide forest fire protection for parks, but this was not allowed. Prior to the end of June, the Hawaiian Islands CCC camps were transferred to military bases, while the Virgin Islands CCC camps were discontinued as defense work provided employment for the islands' young men. [61]
As the CCC program was being terminated, maintenance work in the parks suffered dramatically. Trails and parking lots on the Blue Ridge Parkway and in Shenandoah National Park were gradually reclaimed by nature because the parks could not spare enough laborers to maintain them. The superintendent of Shenandoah was deeply concerned that the park could not be maintained after the termination of the CCC, as were officials at other parks such as Acadia National Park and Death Valley National Monument. These areas, prior to and since their establishment, had been dependent upon CCC labor to do work that in older parks had been allocated to regular park staff. The loss of the CCC meant that both old and new parks suffered from a loss of fire protection and maintenance staff. [62]
The advisory council for the Civilian Conservation Corps met on July 1 to consider how to accomplish the CCC termination. It was decided that once the enrollees were transported back to their corps areas, the educational advisors, camp commander and his subordinates, doctors, and chaplains would be dismissed. The Park Service set up a single procurement number for the regions and camps to use during termination proceedings. All work projects were to be halted immediately, if possible, or no later than Saturday, July 14. The Army was to assist in moving the youths and equipment, and all equipment was to be placed in central warehouses and protected until the Park Service could make a determination as to the final disposition of the property. Only those employees required for termination could be retained; all others were to be dismissed. Those workers having less than a month's annual leave would be given two weeks' notice and the rest would be given terminal leave. The final termination was scheduled to be completed no later than June 30, 1943. [63]
The termination process varied from one park to another. For example, all CCC projects in Glacier National Park were halted on July 9, while the superintendent of Isle Royale National Park had received no official notice of the termination by July 10. By the end of July, however, all CCC camp operations in NPS areas had ceased. A number of park superintendents expressed their appreciation for the CCC work and regret concerning the program's termination. Both park superintendents and regional officials requested that the Washington Office ask for an increase in maintenance funds to make up for the loss of the CCC. Officials in Washington responded that the Park Service would be fortunate to keep the present maintenance funds and that there would be no additional funding. Instead, it was recommended to the parks that other activities be curtailed and the money saved used for maintenance. An attempt was made to obtain additional funding for park protection projects; this achieved only limited success. [64]
The most difficult task proved to be the inventorying and disposition of camp equipment--office equipment, automobiles, trucks, construction equipment, barracks furnishings, library material, tools of all kinds, furniture, and the camp buildings. Once a full inventory was made, the items were to be transferred to the military for the war effort or, in descending priority, to the Park Service, other federal agencies, state, county, or municipal agencies, or nonprofit organizations devoted to the promotion of conservation, education, recreation, or health. The NPS policy on CCC camp buildings was that they were either to be used or torn down. Some of the camps, such as the one at Hopewell Village National Historic Site, were converted to rest and relaxation camps for British sailors, others to rest areas for American soldiers, sailors, and marines. CCC camps on the Blue Ridge Parkway and in Shenandoah National Park and Glacier National Park became Civilian Public Service camps in which conscientious objectors performed tasks that were similar to the CCC work. Other camp buildings were dismantled and moved to military reservations for use by the armed services. By June 30, 1943, the termination of the CCC was completed at a cost to the Park Service of $8,347,256. [65]
Toward the end of World War II there was public interest in reviving the CCC program, but Congress failed to act on any of the proposals submitted. Park Service officials requested the U.S. attorney general to rule on the reinstatement rights of former CCC employees returning from the war. NPS representatives had been contacted by these people who wanted to secure jobs within the parks or administrative centers. The attorney general ruled that the CCC was an emergency relief agency and the former employees had no reinstatement rights with the Park Service. After the war, on December 11, 1946, the Selective Service System transferred all former CCC property (which it had received from the Park Service in the first months of World War II) back to the Park Service for final disposition. [66]
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Last Modified: Tues, Apr 4 2000 07:08:48 am PDT
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