The Civilian Conservation Corps in Colorado
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# Christine Pfaff “Happy Days” of the Depression: The Civilian Conservation Corps in Colorado Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) men of the Montrose, Colorado, camp pose with their trucks on November 16, 1935. Both the trucks and the men had just had their mandatory Saturday baths; note that some of the men have complied with the off-duty necktie rule. The Great Depression by its very definition was a stressful and A two-day journey delivered Taylor to the CCC camp desig- hopeless period for the immense majority of Americans, and those nated “BR-23” near Montrose, 175 miles west of Denver. Located residing in Colorado were not exceptions. In the rural Denver in an agricultural valley about thirty miles long, BR-23 was at the suburb of Englewood, Malcolm Taylor was barely nineteen years U.S. Bureau of Reclamation’s Uncompahgre Irrigation Project old, just out of high school, when he and a friend joined thousands which diverted water from the Uncompahgre and Gunnison rivers of other unemployed young men across the country in the Civilian to some 76,000 acres of fertile land. For the next six months, Conservation Corps (CCC). You “couldn’t pay for a job,” he young Taylor and his hard-working new friends labored in this recalls today, but he was aware that with the CCC he could earn at magnificent ranch and canyon country of west-central Colorado. least bare wages, and—importantly—gain new skills. After join- Although Taylor’s stint with the CCC was but a brief episode, it ing the CCC at Camp Morrison, in the foothills west of Denver, offered purpose when many people had lost purpose—and hope. Taylor and other new recruits were driven in trucks to Union Malcolm Taylor’s life was forever changed by the CCC, and later Station where they boarded trains bound for various CCC camps. he could even proclaim: “Those were happy days.” 1 COLORADO HERITAGE/SPRING 2001 lthough remembered nostalgically by Malcolm ing, and recreational activities. The departments of interi- Taylor and other enrollees, the CCC was born or and agriculture selected the location of the conserva- A out of desperation. As dry winds and dust tion work camps and supervised the actual labor. storms blew across the western High Plains in the early At the president’s urging, the CCC enrolled its first 1930s, leaving devastated farmers in their wake, newly 25,000 young men by April 6, 1933. The initial camp, elected President Franklin D. Roosevelt faced a great appropriately called Roosevelt, was established on April 17 challenge. The entire country was afflicted by this “Great at George Washington National Forest near Luray, Virginia. Depression” and jobless men everywhere struggled to Less than three months later, about 300,000 men from earn enough money to feed their families. For the coun- throughout the country were settled in almost 1,500 camps. try’s youth, the situation was equally desperate. According to Fechner, “It was the most rapid large-scale Hundreds of thousands of young men from economically mobilization of men the country had ever witnessed.” stricken households were unable to find work. Roosevelt CCC enrollment was initially limited to unemployed hastened in formulating diverse plans for relief. In his single men between the ages of eighteen and twenty-five inaugural address of March 4, 1933, the president who were U.S. citizens. Generally these were discour- announced his intent to create a jobs program for aged young people, unsuccessful in securing jobs youth—a program to conserve the nation’s depleted nat- because they had no work experience. They were ural resources. He told the American people: “Our great- described by a newspaper as “a weaponless army whose est task is to put people to work. This is no unsolvable recruits came from broken homes, highway trails and problem if we face it wisely and courageously.” relief shelters . .” Enrollees were assigned to camps for By the early 1930s, the results of decades of unchecked an initial six-month period but could reenlist for up to exploitation of the country’s lands were apparent. two years. Widespread timber harvesting and excessive cultivation The height of CCC enrollment was reached in the sum- had eroded slopes and stripped precious topsoil. mer of 1935 with over a half-million men scattered in Valuable natural resources had been destroyed faster 2,652 camps. Each of these typically housed about 200 than they could be replenished. As Robert Fechner, the men. The youths worked on a myriad of conservation CCC’s first director, later stated: “Prior to the inaugura- projects all over the country. Most of the recruits were tion of the Civilian Conservation Corps, conservation of assigned to the Department of Agriculture where they resources was allied with the weather, in that there was were primarily engaged in protecting and enhancing plenty of talk about both and not much done about forests under the direction of the U.S. Forest Service. either.” As elsewhere in the United States, the CCC had a pro- Within a month after Roosevelt outlined his ambitious found impact on Colorado’s depressed economy and jobs-creation proposal, Congress acted upon the presi- assisted greatly in the conservation of the state’s natural dent’s recommendation and passed a law creating the resources. It is estimated that the CCC contributed over CCC (initially called the Emergency Conservation $56 million to Colorado’s economy. Over the program’s Works). Probably no other New Deal program instituted lifespan, approximately 32,000 young men, most of them by Roosevelt proved as popular and successful. With leg- native Coloradans or longtime residents, were employed islation in place, the president moved ahead. In April at camps in the state. 1933, he appointed Fechner as CCC director and estab- Colorado’s first twenty-nine CCC camps were estab- lished an advisory council of representatives from the lished in the summer of 1933. At the height of the pro- departments of labor, war, interior, and agriculture. The gram two years later, that number was at forty-seven. In council would oversee the program and provide a forum all, 172 camps spread across mountains and plains. Men for discussing policy issues. The Labor Department was performed all types of badly needed conservation work. assigned responsibility for recruiting youths and the War About half of the camps were assigned to two bureaus in Department (Army) was in charge of enrollee administra- the Department of Agriculture—the Forest Service and tion, transportation, housing, food, clothing, supplies, Soil Conservation Service. With Colorado’s vast tracts of medical care, education, discipline, physical condition- forests, the CCC provided an unprecedented opportunity to accomplish many badly needed improvements. CHRISTINE PFAFF is a historian with the U.S. Bureau of Among other things, enrollees built roads, trails, and Reclamation in Denver. She researches and writes about campgrounds; planted millions of seedlings; thinned water development and irrigation projects throughout overcrowded timberstands; removed dead and insect- the West. infected wood; and performed fire suppression. On 2 COLORADO HERITAGE/SPRING 2001 Colorado’s eastern plains, camps administered by the The Bureau of Reclamation camp a half-mile north of Soil Conservation Service completed soil and water ero- Montrose to which Malcolm Taylor reported in May 1936 sion control projects resulting from overgrazing and pro- was established the previous summer of 1935. longed drought. Construction started at the end of June and was completed Next to the Department of Agriculture, the National on August 1. Just a few days earlier, First Lieutenant Park Service was the greatest beneficiary of the CCC in August Carlson and 189 young men arrived from Colorado. Enrollees achieved an impressive record of Ardmore, Oklahoma, to occupy the camp. For them, the accomplishments in national parks and monuments as grandeur and vastness of the scenery must have seemed well as at state and municipal recreation facilities. During worlds away from home. The fresh recruits soon were the course of the CCC pro- joined by sixteen local experi- gram, up to six camps were enced men, often referred to as assigned to Rocky Mountain LEMs, who served as technical National Park alone. Other foremen on the work projects. camps were located at Mesa The Montrose camp was Verde National Park and at the similar in appearance to other Black Canyon of the Gunnison, CCC camps in the United Great Sand Dunes, Colorado, States, because such standard- and Hovenweep national izations were prescribed by monuments. the military. Detailed instruc- Probably the best-known tions were provided for con- achievement of the CCC in struction from initial ground- Colorado was the construction clearing to finish work. of the Red Rocks Amphi- Typical camp layouts were theater near Morrison. That also developed by the Army work was completed over five and, not surprisingly, they years by CCC enrollees housed resembled temporary military at Camp SP-13-C on Bear installations. Buildings at the Creek just west of downtown Montrose camp were of wood Morrison. The camp still sur- (rather than canvas); were vives today and is one of the sturdy, multifunctional, and few intact examples remaining came in panels for easy in the United States. assembly. BR-23 contained Camps under the auspices five enrollee barracks with of the Grazing Service, now plasterboard interior walls. the Bureau of Land Manage- Accommodations were sim- ment, were primarily located ple and comforts were mini- on the West Slope. Their work Young Malcolm Taylor breaking rocks by sledgehammer at mal. Enrollees slept in bunk the Montrose CCC camp, summer 1936. focused on the rehabilitation beds, forty to a barrack, in one and improvement of publicly- large open room.