Civilian Conservation Corps
— a government work program rescued the common men in the 1930s

Hunger and hopelessness engulfed much of our nation in 1933 when the newly inaugurated Franklin Roosevelt administration came up with its most successful relief program — the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC).

This year of 2008 is the CCC’s 75th anniversary.

In 1979 when Vernard (Bud) and Marion Wilbur of San Diego became active in the National Association of Civilian Conservation Corps Alumni (NACCCA) program, they were very disappointed at how unaware the general public was about the vital contribution to rehabilitation and preservation that had been made by the CCC.

Marion wrote in the May 1990 issue of the California Historian: “Upon visiting my husband’s CCC camp, it was a big disappointment to him to find ‘not a stick or stone’ to mark the spot . . . I noted the same disappointment when other enrollees spoke of their camps . . . Even park rangers did not know of the CCC.”

The Wilburs were told of a statue, “The Spirit of the CCC,” that had been dedicated at the Balboa Park Expo (San Diego County) in 1936. It was gone. A similar statue had been dedicated at Griffith Park (Los Angeles County) by President Franklin Roosevelt. It was gone.

In her article Marion told about the NACCCA, a California chartered nonprofit corporation. This group, which has over 150 chapters throughout the United States, launched “Operation CCC Identification.” Their objective is to identify the work of the CCC by erecting memorial statues or plaques on sites of CCC camps all over the country.

Today the NACCCA is still actively trying to educate the present generation about the invaluable contributions this army of men made to our nation in its darkest hour. Their project of erecting statues or plaques commemorating the corps continues.

For more information, contact Bob Griffiths, 12415 Woods Road, Wilton, CA 95693; email ffirg@frontiernet.net or phone 916-687-4717. Or contact NACCCA, PO Box 16429, St. Louis, MO 63125-0429; email naccca@aol.com or phone 314-487-8666.

WHAT CCC DID IN CALIFORNIA

The first camp on the west coast was Company No. 901 at Pine Valley (San Diego County), a forestry camp. Applicants were screened at the San Diego recruitment office and sent to Fort Rosecrans for a two-week conditioning program.

They were issued World War I surplus uniforms, given mattress ticking which they filled with straw, and transported by Army trucks to Pine Valley where they set up tents and later built barracks.

The program mixed conservation of natural resources with social rehabilitation. Camps were set up under the direction of Army officers for men ages 18 through 25. Teachers were employed to give the young men a chance to complete their education while they learned vocational skills.

Some men who trained the young crews were agronomists and engineers; others were experts from governmental departments such as Agriculture and Forestry. The work was laid out by technicians who had scientific training in soil, water, forest and grazing land management. New state parks were developed.

By fall 1933 more than 36,000 men were working in the national forests, national parks, and state lands and parks of California. Throughout the Sierra and Coast Range mountains, crews of 15 to 20 men were building dams in the eroded streambeds to check the rushing water of spring floods. The Forest Service had gained a much needed work force.

The boys called themselves “brush marines” or “peavies” or “woodpeckers.” They swung axes, shovels and brush hooks. They learned to operate road graders, tractors and compressed-air drills.

In Northern California, CCC workers built an 800-mile firebreak separating the commercial Sierra Nevada timberland from the Sacramento and San Joaquin valleys. Truck trails were built — these were nine-foot wide roads to transport firefighters to mountain areas that could not be reached except by foot trails.
During the summer of 1933 in the national forests of California, CCC crews built 850 miles of truck trails, 212 miles of firebreaks and 750 erosion control dams, and put up 593 miles of telephone line. They weeded out flammable growth from 976 miles of road and trials, covering more than 61,000 acres. They fought pine beetle depredations and white pine blister rust.
Throughout the state, CCC workers built roads, constructed public buildings — post offices, city halls, recreational facilities — and taught in bankrupt school systems.
La Purísima Mission (Santa Barbara County) was in a sad state of disrepair. The county interested the National Park Service in restoring the old landmark, using CCC crew labor.

WHAT DID THE CCC MEAN TO THOSE WHO JOINED IT?

Here is how one young man from Eureka talks about his time in the service in 1933 and 1934. Arden Scott wrote in the Fall 1996 issue of the Humboldt Historian (published by the Humboldt County Historical Society, a member of CCHS):

“I looked for work anywhere . . . Fortunately, the Civilian Conservation Corps came to Eureka. I registered for it at the Eureka headquarters at the post office. I enrolled on May 24, 1933, and was assigned to the area of Orleans alongside the Klamath River: Company 920–Camp F-22, Orleans.

“At first, most of the new recruits at Orleans were ‘locals’ from the Humboldt County area. When we arrived (about 35 in all), we were given shots and physical check-ups, then were put to work building the four barracks, the cookhouse, recreation hall, doctor’s building and the blacksmith’s building. After the barracks were completed, about 150 young men from the Bay area arrived. Since they were mostly city people, they were not used to swinging an axe or a sledge hammer or being able to find good cover when a dynamite blast was set off. There were many injuries before they learned the necessary skills.

“For a brief time I worked with the bulldozers . . . I finally found a home with the group who drilled and blasted rocks and stumps to widen the roads. We called ourselves the ‘Hard Rock Gang.’

“While performing our daily work away from the camp, we were under the direct supervision of the Forest Service personnel. While at camp we were supervised by the officers who were mainly from the military reserve. We had a very smooth, routine life.

“To entertain ourselves, we would take boxing lessons or hold dances. Once we heard there was a dance at Happy Camp. Three of us got into my 1926 Model T roadster to make the fifty mile trip . . . When we finally got to Happy Camp (Siskiyou County) after driving through the Hoopa Indian Reservation, the dance hall was so crowded with CCC boys from other nearby camps that I couldn’t get a single dance . . .

“My term with the CCC ended in 1934 after I sustained a rupture lifting a heavy rock. I was sent to Letterman General Hospital in San Francisco . . .
“I was discharged on July 10, 1934 . . . I’m grateful for the time I spent in Roosevelt’s CCCs.”

CCC PROJECT COMES TO THE END

The idea of relief through jobs rather than through charity was the main goal of the New Deal in its various governmental aid programs . . . Efforts were made to extend the CCC opportunity to everyone. The program came to include war veterans. Eventually African-Americans, Mexican-Americans and Native Americans were included. However, the greater portion of the enrollees were young unemployed men who agreed to serve six months. The maximum length of service was two years.

By the end of the 1930s, work presented itself in the private sector and enrollment in the CCC fell off. The program was closed in 1942 with the entry of the United States in World War II.

During the nine years the CCC was in effect, over two and a half million young men served in it. They planted over two billion trees, they built over 122,000 miles of roads, they constructed six million erosion check dams.
The Forest Service owes the CCCers an especially large debt because of the many national forest campgrounds, fire towers, office buildings and trails which they built.

The program served as a model for future youth and conservation programs like the Job Corps (1964) and the Young Adult Conservation Corps (1977) which continued the legacy of caring for the land and serving the people.

Information for this article was taken from material supplied by the California State Library, Special Collections Branch. Additional information came from American Forests, April 1934; Centennial Mini-Histories of the Forest Service, July 1992; Humboldt Historian, Fall 1996, published by Humboldt County Historical Society; and California Historian, May 1990.

The Hard Rock Gang in 1933. Standing, left to right, are Billy Hughes, Palubici, unknown, and Melvin Trowbridge. Arden Scott is kneeling on the left. This photo was taken on the Rattlesnake Ridge Road. (Photo courtesy of Arden B. Scott.)

Earle Gutman, 19, from Alameda was one of the young men who found work and a great outdoor life in the CCC program in 1933. He was stationed at Happy Camp (Siskiyou County).

Over 166,000 men served in the CCC in California, 1933-1942, and the California Department of Parks had 40 camps.

CCC Memorial Statue
CCC 75th Anniversary 2008