FOREST HISTORY CENTER
CONSERVATION CORPS, MINNESOTA AND IOWA
INTERGENERATIONAL PARTNERSHIP PROGRAM
TRAINING MANUAL
Developed with support from the ―Inter-Generational Program (IGP),
Building Upon the Legacy,‖ CCC, Conservation Corps, Minnesota and
Iowa, and Forest History Center IGP Legacy funds.
Barbara W. Sommer
FOREST HISTORY CENTER
CONSERVATION CORPS, MINNESOTA AND IOWA
INTERGENERATIONAL PARTNERSHIP PROGRAM
TRAINING MANUAL
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Recommended Reading List
Interpretive Methodology
Learning Objectives
Behavioral Objectives
Suggested Interpretation – Forest History Center Minnesota Forest Service Site
Time Period and Setting
Suggested Interpreter Roles and Statements – Forest History Center Minnesota Forest
Service Site
Local Experienced Man (LEM)
Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) Enrollee, Urban Background
Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) Enrollee, Rural Background
Young Woman from the Area
CCC-Indian Division (CCC-ID) Camp Inspector (man or woman)
Wife of CCC Camp Work Program Supervisor
Buildings and Structures – Forest History Center Minnesota Forest Service Site
The Cabin
The Fire Tool Cache
The Garage/Warehouse
The Fire Tower
The Tree Nursery Seedbed
The Palisade Building
Tree Nursery Seedbed and Palisade Building Guidelines
The Tree Nursery Seedbed
The Palisade Building
Resource Information
Appendix A. The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) – United States and
Minnesota
Appendix B. Civilian Conservation Corps Enrollee Manual
Appendix C. CCC-Indian Division Enrollee Manual – first two sections
Appendix D. CCC Camps and Camp Life – Minnesota
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Appendix E.
Appendix F.
Appendix G.
Appendix H.
Appendix I.
Appendix J.
Appendix K.
Appendix L.
CCC Work Agencies – United States and Minnesota
CCC Work Programs – Minnesota
Early 20th Century United States Conservation History
Minnesota Forest, Park, and Soil Conservation History
The Great Depression and the New Deal
Minnesota in the Great Depression Years
Personal Stories – Minnesota during the Great Depression
Popular Culture during the Great Depression
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Acknowledgements
Thanks to the ―Inter-Generational Program (IGP), Building Upon the Legacy,‖
CCC, Conservation Corps, Minnesota and Iowa, and Forest History Center IGP Legacy
funds for support for this program.
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Introduction
The purpose of the Minnesota Forest Service Complex is to provide a physical
setting to interpret its role in the early years of Minnesota forestry. It helps with an
understanding of:
How forestry and forest conservation developed in Minnesota
The lives of Minnesota residents during the time being interpreted
The effects of the Great Depression on northern Minnesota
How these events continue to have an impact on our lives today
The purpose of the Intergenerational Partnership Program is to bring together the
legacy of the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) with youth serving in the Conservation
Corps, Minnesota and Iowa (Conservation Corps). Four Conservation Corps you will be
trained to portray costumed CCC enrollees and others affiliated with or aware of the CCC
as part of the Minnesota Historical Society‘s Forest History Center (FHC) historical
interpretive program. This is the first ―Inter-Generational Program (IGP), Building Upon
the Legacy‖ funded by CCC, Conservation Corps, Minnesota and Iowa, and Forest
History Center IGP Legacy funds.
Recommended Reading List
There are many good sources for New Deal and Minnesota history. Those listed
here provide an overview of the time period and the Civilian Conservation Corps in
Minnesota.
David R. Benson, Stories in Log and Stone: The Legacy of the New Deal in Minnesota
State Parks (St. Paul: Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, 2002).
Clifford Clark, Jr. ed., Minnesota in a Century of Change: The State and Its People since
1900 (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society, 1989).
Calvin Gower, "The CCC Indian Division: Aid for Depressed Americans, 1933-1942,"
Minnesota History (spring 1972).
William E. Lass, Minnesota: A History, 2nd ed. (New York: W.W. Norton & Company,
1998).
Barbara W. Sommer, Hard Work and a Good Deal: The Civilian Conservation Corps in
Minnesota (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2008).
Barbara W. Sommer, ―‘We Had This Opportunity‘: African Americans in the Civilian
Conservation Corps in Minnesota‖ in Annette Atkins and Deborah L. Miller, The State
We’re In: Reflections on Minnesota History (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society
Press, 2010):134-157.
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D. Jerome Tweton, The New Deal at the Grass Roots: Programs for People in Otter Tail
County, Minnesota (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 1988).
The WPA Guide to Minnesota (Executive Council, State of Minnesota, 1938); republished as The WPA Guide to Minnesota: The Federal Writers’ Project Guide to 1930s
Minnesota (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 1985).
The WPA Guide to Minnesota Arrowhead Country (A. Whitman, Chicago, Ill., 1941); republished as The WPA Guide to the Minnesota Arrowhead Country: The Federal
Writers’ Project Guide to 1930s Minnesota (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press,
1988).
CCC Legacy, www.ccclegacy.org/ccc_legacy.htm
Minnesota Historical Society, Minnesota‘s Greatest Generation,
http://people.mnhs.org/mgg/
Minnesota Historical Society, www.mnhs.org/places/nationalregister/stateparks/
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Interpretive Methodology
The interpretive methodology at this site is modified first person. This allows you
to go in and out of character as needed. All suggested interpretive materials are written in
first person. The Resource Information is included to help you add background to your
character while staying in first person.
Often, interpreters start out in first person and then go to third person to answer
questions. Try to be clear to the museum visitors about your interpretation. Let them
know when you are in first person and when you have changed to third person. If they
can‘t tell which you are using, they will become confused.
Your goal is to interpret the Minnesota Forest Service complex in the context of
the Civilian Conservation Corps. This involves an understanding of the Minnesota Forest
Service and adherence to the Expected Learner Outcomes described in the next pages. It
also involves an understanding of the history and legacy of the Civilian Conservation
Corps.
Finally, be aware that, because of your location at the Forest History Center
complex, museum visitors may look to you for general directions. They will ask where
the parking lot is, where the main Interpretive Building is, and the like. You will want to
decide how to handle this with your character. You also will want to explain your setting
to the visitors. You are working at a 1936 site with a 1900 site down the road.
Learning Objectives
Interns will learn:
About the history and legacy of the Civilian Conservation Corps
How to interact with and engage the public in historical interpretation
How to do an oral history interview with a CCC alumni
How to teach conservation to students and the public
Behavioral Objectives
MCC interns will be able to perform credible historical interpretations of CCC
enrollees and others affiliated with or aware of the CCC
MCC interns will elicit information from CCC alumni and be able to share their
stories with the public in an historical setting
MCC interns will undertake forest management projects prescribed by the forest
stewardship plan in place at the Forest History Center
MCC interns will learn and internalize the values directly from CCC alumni
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Suggested Interpretation – Forest History Center Minnesota Forest Service Site
The storyline for this interpretation of the Forest History Center (FHC) Minnesota
Forest Service (MFS) site combines forest service research with the reforestation work of
the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC). It also brings in the Civilian Conservation Corps
– Indian Division (CCC-ID). According to this scenario, enrollees at the FHC MFS site
are developing a seedbed demonstration area similar to that found at the Side Lake (S-53)
camp. They are from the Big Lake (S-79) camp outside Cloquet. Both of these camps are
state forest camps, linking the CCC interpretation to the MFS. They can be from a side
camp, sent in advance of the 1937 opening of the state forest CCC headquarters in Grand
Rapids. There is no historical evidence that enrollees were sent from the Big Lake camp
to the Grand Rapids area; this scenario is fictional. But CCC camps developed
demonstration plots similar to the plot suggested for this interpretation. The Big Lake
camp closed in 1937, the same year the state forest headquarters camp at Grand Rapids
opened. Enrollees often were sent from the main camps to side or spike camps for
specialized work.
In addition the Cloquet Forestry Center did research on seedbed and tree nursery
projects for Great Lakes climates which were written up in a 1917 University of
Minnesota Bulletin (copy included in this manual). Information from Cloquet Forestry
Center research guided federal and state forest tree nursery and tree planting work
throughout the CCC years. Thus this interpretation, though fictional, is based on fact.
The interpretation also allows for a multi-cultural approach to Minnesota‘s CCC
history. Again, although the interpretation is fictional, it is based on the history of African
American and American Indian involvement in the CCC in Minnesota. Until 1938, young
black men, most from the Twin Cities, were accepted into the CCC in Minnesota and
assigned to Minnesota camps. Although all were assigned to national forest, rather than
state forest, camps, a black enrollee could be included in the interpretation at this site.
The Civilian Conservation Corps – Indian Division also was active in Minnesota
throughout the CCC years. Based on Minnesota reservations, with most enrollees coming
from Consolidated Chippewa and Red Lake – Minnesota CCC-ID enrollees did the same
types of work done by Minnesota CCC enrollees. They also had camp inspections,
although CCC-ID inspectors, rather than being from the United States Army as were
CCC camp inspectors, were from the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA). The Red Lake
Reservation had a CCC-ID tree nursery, further supporting options for a multi-cultural
interpretation of this FHC MFS site.
Finally, the interpretation provides options for including other New Deal
programs, specifically the Works Progress Administration (WPA). The WPA, which
began in 1935, was the largest relief program in United States history. In Minnesota,
WPA workers did civic projects in cities and towns throughout the state. The program
sometimes is confused with the CCC since some of the work, especially in state parks,
overlapped with that done by the CCC. Although the interpretive focus of the FHC MFS
site is the CCC, incorporating information about the WPA broadens the scope within a
historic context while providing some clarifying information about these two major relief
programs and their work in Minnesota.
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Time Period and Setting
April 1, 1935, to March 31, 1936, was the period of greatest CCC activity and
work accomplishments. In August 1935, enrollment in CCC camps throughout the
country peaked at 505,782 in about 2,900 camps, followed by a reduction to 350,000
enrollees in 2,019 camps by June 1936. During this period the public response to the
CCC program was overwhelmingly popular. A Gallup poll of April 18, 1936, asked "Are
you in favor of the CCC camps?" – 82% of respondents said yes, including 92% of
Democrats and 67% of Republicans.
The suggested time period for this interpretive program is the summer of 1936.
This was a peak time for the CCC nationally and in Minnesota. Many of Minnesota‘s
camps were in operation and enrollees were working throughout the state on forest, park,
and soil conservation programs. Minnesota‘s Department of Conservation Division of
State Parks had been formed the year before, giving added structure to the state‘s
conservation work. Harold Lathrop, the new state parks director, was hailed as being as
good at running his division as Grover Conzet, the legendary director of the Division of
State Forests, was at managing the state‘s forest.
Nationally, the Soil Conservation Service recently had been organized and
funded. President Franklin Roosevelt was running for a second term in office. His
platform included support for New Deal programs, such as the CCC, that were making a
difference in people‘s lives. The CCC was one of the most popular of these programs and
the thinking among many people in government and out was that Congress would make
funding for it permanent in 1937.
The Knife River Nursery was operating with enrollees from the Spruce Lake (F53) camp. The Baudora Nursery also was operating, though it is unclear which camp the
enrollee workers were from. The Lydick Nursery was staffed by enrollees from camps in
the Cass Lake area. The Red Lake Indian Reservation operated a tree nursery with CCCID enrollee workers. A silent movie shot by the Department of Conservation shows CCC
workers at the Baudora Nursery tending seedbeds and transplant beds in the summer of
1936.
The interpretive setting can be a Demonstration Nursery Plot similar to that
developed at the Side Lake (S-53) camp in 1935. That setting included a seed bed and a
painted wood sign identifying the area as a Demonstration Plot developed to illustrate
CCC forest work. In 1937, the State Forest CCC Headquarters moved to Grand Rapids;
for interpretive purposes, this Demonstration Plot can be attached to an advanced
headquarters unit from the Big Lake Camp (S-79). S-79 was a state forest camp with a
work assignment that included the Cloquet Forestry Center. Other camps operating near
Grand Rapids in 1936 were Federal forest camps at Day Lake (F-34) and Stokes (F-35).
Here is information about the state forest headquarters camp and Big Lake camp:
Grand Rapids (State Forest Headquarters Camp)
Camp Number:
Post Office: Grand Rapids (Itasca County)
Known Company Names: Headquarters Company
Dates: 1937-1942
In August 1937, an article in the Grand Rapids Herald Review noted the CCC state forest
headquarters was scheduled to move from Fort Snelling to the community. The camp
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opened the next month and remained the state forest headquarters until CCC funding
ended, operating perhaps as late as 1943. Originally located in a regional supply depot at
a temporary site in the 4-H Building on the county fairgrounds, the camp moved to 16 th
Avenue and 3rd Street Northwest on the Mississippi River after a full administrative
facility was built. This currently is the location of the Mississippi Melodie Showboat, a
summer tourist attraction dating from 1956. A maintenance building from the CCC camp
still is standing and houses equipment for community organizations. The camp
headquarters building stood until about 2004.
Big Lake
Camp Number: S-79
Post Office: Cloquet (Carlton County)
Known Company Number: 1760
Dates: 1933-1937
Notes: Company 1760 was organized in Kansas on May 25, 1933, and opened
Big Lake (S-79) on June 28, 1933. Enrollees had completed all buildings in the camp by
October 1, 1933. The camp closed on May 29, 1937. The camp‘s assigned work area was
Fond du Lac State Forest and the Cloquet Forestry Center. The camp newspaper was the
Big Lake Breeze.
Insert: Samples of Big Lake Breeze, summer 1936 issues
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Suggested Interpreter Roles and Statements – Forest History Center Minnesota
Forest Service Site
Although the CCC was a program for young men only, the following suggested
interpreter roles provide opportunities for young men and young women. All are based on
researched, realistic roles for the place and time period. The suggested interpreter
statements include first-person stories from the time period. Multi-cultural information
applicable to northern Minnesota CCC history is incorporated into several interpretations.
The sample statement included with each suggested interpreter role is designed to
help interpreters develop characters. Each statement is written to include Civilian
Conservation Corps history as well as personal statements based on individual characters‘
stories.
The suggested interpreter roles for the FHC MFS site are:
Local Experienced Man (LEM)
Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) enrollee, urban background
Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) enrollee, rural background
Young woman from the area
CCC-Indian Division (CCC-ID) camp inspector (man or woman)
Wife of CCC camp work program supervisor
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Local Experienced Man (LEM)
Less than a month after being organized, the CCC was expanded to include Local
Experienced Men (LEMs). LEMs were non-technical work supervisors hired and
employed by camp work program agencies. They were stonemasons, artisans, woodsmen,
and others who taught enrollees the skills they needed to carry out camp work programs.
In northern Minnesota camps, LEMs provided stoneworking, rockbuilding, logbuilding,
and specialized woodsman skills. Often out of work, the Civilian Conservation Corps
offered LEMs employment close to home. The LEM at the FHC MFS site could have
worked at the Cloquet Forestry Station on nursery seedbed research in 1917. He could
have been hired by the state forestry division to work at the Big Lake camp (S-79) near
Cloquet because of its state forest and Cloquet Forestry Center work assignment and his
work experience at the Center.
CCC humor, aimed at everything and everyone in camp, didn‘t miss the LEMs. A
poem from a camp newspaper poked fun at hard times and its effect on LEMs:
Life of a Farmer
His old cow dies
His mule went lame
He lost his horse
In a poker game
Then a storm came
And blew his house
And barn away
Then an earthquake came
To make things good
And swallowed the ground
Where the buildings stood
Now he is an L.E.M.
A story about an LEM who chose the stones to build a state park building
illustrates how LEMs worked. It was the LEM‘s responsibility to choose building stones
from the local quarry. Enrollees remember watching him look at a stone and discard it,
look at another, seemingly identical, stone and take it, and so on. Enrollees brought the
stones to the construction site, often in wheelbarrows which they walked over. In another
camp, enrollees working with an LEM on a log building remembered going into the
woods with him day after day looking for trees that were tall, straight, and without knots.
They remembered getting impatient with the LEM and his work standards because it took
so long to find just the right trees for the project; years later they talked about the
patience and skill of the LEM and how proud they were of the quality of the building
they built with those logs.
In some places LEMs doubled as work crew leaders. More often, they taught
skills through hands-on work program activities. Their salaries were about $100/month.
Tools and Props
LEMs were knowledgeable about woodworking tools. The LEM for this
interpretive project also is knowledgeable about building nursery seedbeds and is familiar
11
with the nursery and log building tools described in the work program section of this
manual.
LEMs used CCC tools rather than bringing their own to work. They wore work
clothes suitable for the season, including a hat, work gloves, and heavy work boots. They
probably carried a pocket knife and a large kerchief.
Work Assignment
The LEM‘s job is to supervise the enrollees and teach them the work skills needed
at the FHC MFS work site. This includes supervising nursery seedbed building and
maintenance and palisade-style log-building construction. For purposes of this project, he
also should supervise the women working at the site.
Suggested Interpreter Statement
Good morning/afternoon. I am _____________________. I am an LEM at the
Big Lake camp over by Cloquet, sent here to help with this Seedbed Demonstration Site.
We work with the Cloquet Forestry Station over at that camp, so we know about seedbed
development. I am an employee of the Minnesota forest service hired to help teach the
enrollees how to do forest conservation work. I make more than the junior enrollees,
enough to keep my family in our home. The CCC has been going for three years now,
since 1933, and we all hope it will become permanent. Mr. Roosevelt is campaigning for
his second term as president and he mentions the CCC as a New Deal success program.
We‘re pretty sure he will be re-elected this fall and then he can convince Congress to
make it permanent.
LEM means Local Experienced Man, that‘s what I am. I worked at the Cloquet
Forestry Center in 1916-1917 when they were doing some of the first seedbed
experiments, learning about what kinds of trees grow best in our Great Lakes area. This is
part of the scientific approach to forestry that came in when the United States Forest
Service was founded in 1905. Minnesota‘s forests were extensively logged in the 1800s
and early 1900s. That old logging camp down the road was part of that. Today we want
to rebuild our forests according to the most advanced scientific methods of the time. We
follow the USFS guidelines of building forests for the ―greatest good for the greatest
number‖ of people.
Our goals are to build sustainable forests. We don‘t just plant trees for their
beauty, though they are pretty. We plant trees that can be harvested. That‘s why the work
at the Cloquet Forestry Center was so important. It helped us understand what kinds of
trees grow best in Minnesota and which ones will be the most valuable for harvesting.
Are you surprised that we would think of harvesting the trees we plant? When our
white pine were logged off, we were left with a mess. The forest fires, like the 1894 fire
in Hinckley or the 1918 fire in Moose Lake and Cloquet, didn‘t help. They devastated our
areas. We don‘t want that to happen again though if this drought doesn‘t end, 1936 is
going to be the worst year I can remember for forest fires this fall. If that happens, all our
CCC boys in Minnesota will be on alert to fight fires in September and October, maybe
longer. They‘ll even truck in the boys from those soil conservation service camps in
southeastern Minnesota. Everybody will have to fight forest fires. That is USFS and MFS
policy.
12
White pine are beautiful trees. The loggers went for them first. But now that they
are gone, we aren‘t just replanting white pine. Our scientific management says that red
pine, also called Norway pine, are sturdier and healthier trees. Their transplant survival
rate is higher and they are resistant to disease. There is a good market for them so we can
harvest them some day. We plant acres of red pine. A crew of fifteen enrollees can plant
10,000-12,000 a day. Our work project supervisor, an employee of the United States
Forest Service, says that whenever you see a big stand of red pine, you can know the
CCC planted them. We also plant some white pine, as well as spruce and jack pine and
other trees.
The white pine, as you know, is susceptible to blister rust, a disease that came
here from Europe many years ago. To keep white pine healthy, we have to remove the
gooseberry bushes. They are what the foresters call the alternate hosts. We usually have a
couple of CCC crews out doing that.
CCC enrollees now work at five tree nurseries in northern Minnesota to help keep
up with the demand for seedlings. We transplant four-year-old seedlings. We also collect
the seeds, clean them up, plant them in the seedbeds, and take care of them until they are
ready for transplant. The CCC is a full-service tree planting operation these days.
What can I show you about our seedbed operation here? We are proud of our
scientific approach to reforestation. We are putting our cutover, tax forfeit land back into
forest production. Folks from the Sierra Club criticize us because we say we are planting
harvestable trees. They think we should just preserve the woods for the beauty of the
forests. What do you think?
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Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) Enrollee, Urban Background
Enrollees were 18-25 years old, though some lied about their ages and entered as
young as ages 14-16. They were unmarried, unemployed, and from families eligible for
or on relief. They enrolled for six months and were paid $30 a month, $25 of which was
sent directly to a designated dependent. They were given food, clothing, a place to live
(in a CCC camp), a job working on a conservation project, and were allowed to keep $5 a
month as spending money. The camps were run by the United States Army while the
conservation work programs were administered by various agencies. By 1936, as the
economy began to recover, enrolling in the CCC became less restrictive than during the
first years (1933-1935). At this time, many enrollees also had brothers or other family
members who had served in the CCC, making it a known entity.
Enrollees for this project could have been from the state forest Big Lake camp
(Company 1760, Camp S-79), sent over in advance of the building of the state forest
CCC headquarters in Grand Rapids. They could have been sent because they had some
experience in seedbed work at the Cloquet Forestry Center.
Urban enrollee stories:
1) One family remembered sending their 10-year-old daughter to the store for
milk. She had a nickel to buy a quart of milk. On the way home she tripped and dropped
the glass milk bottle. It broke. The family, not having another nickel for milk, went
without milk that week.
2) It was in the fall of 1933 when Cossum Yekaldo and I heard that Swifts was
going to hire some people so we got up real early and took the streetcar there. Everybody
else had heard the same thing, the yard was crowded with job seekers. While standing
there I heard one man say to a teenager, ―I thought you were up in the forests.‖ The
teenager replied, ―I went over the hill. I wasn‘t going to stay up there for thirty bucks a
month.‖ Going over the hill was the term used for leaving the camp for good without
authorization. That was the first time I had heard things pertaining of the new youth
program, the Civilian Conservation Corps.
The way he talked it was kind of scary, army uniforms, army food and army
regulation and standing [reveille] every morning, also hard work. I never gave the
C.C.C.s another thought again until March of 1934. My cousin John Bartone came over
to my house quite excited as he blurted out, ―Mike! Tony Gag, Archie and I are going to
sign up for the C.C.C. Why don‘t you come too? Your family will get 25 dollars a month
and you keep 5 dollars for yourself.‖
―Boy,‖ I thought to myself, ―are these guys nuts! It‘s like joining the army. If war
starts they have to go first!‖ But that 25 dollars looked better because things for our
family had gotten worse. The caseworker would deduct the 25 dollars from whatever help
our family got but the cash my mother could work miracles with, she would buy some
stuff from the Good Will store. We weren‘t the first to go to the C.C.C.s, but we were
first in our neighborhood. After we joined up, others from Railroad Island did. Six
months seemed like a long time, the work was hard but we got used to it. I even had some
easy jobs like surveying. What I missed most was home, I got a little lonesome. Some of
the boys stayed one year but we four came home. I was 19 years old now and I figured I
had a better chance of landing a job. I found out nothing had changed, jobs were still
scarce.
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3) It was so degrading during the depression for a man not to have employment.
… Like me, who had nothing to do, it [CCC] came along as a wonderful blessing. It gave
us a new lease on life.
My father … was one of the very first welders in this city [Duluth]. The
depression came along and his business just went down to nothing and he only worked
part time. I had a brother and sister besides myself, mother and father, five of us in the
family. And from day to day, we wondered where our next meal was coming from. …
Being the oldest among the children, I felt it was my obligation to help support the
family.
This interpretation can be adapted to a Minnesota black urban CCC enrollee.
For background information on a black urban CCC enrollee interpretation, see: Barbara
W. Sommer, ―‘We Had This Opportunity‘: African Americans in the Civilian
Conservation Corps in Minnesota‖ in Annette Atkins and Deborah L. Miller, The State
We’re In: Reflections on Minnesota History (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society
Press, 2010):134-157.
Tools and Props
By 1936 the surplus World War I Army uniforms worn by the first enrollees were
gone. CCC Army-issue summer work uniforms were denim pants and shirt, white socks,
heavy boots and full-brimmed, soft denim hats. If the weather was too hot for a denim
shirt, enrollees wore white T-shirts. They were issued a green Army jacket for cool days
and a poncho for rainy days. Dress clothing, worn at the evening meal, was a khaki shirt,
worn with a dark tie, and khaki pants. Enrollees did not wear camouflage clothing of any
type.
Work Assignment
Enrollees assigned to the nursery plot will work under the direction of the LEM.
They will learn how to build a seed bed and prepare it for planting according to
University of Minnesota Bulletin #169. They will tend the seedlings in the seedbed,
making sure the seedlings are watered, weeded, and protected from the sun. They will
become familiar with use of the following tools (see page 44): wooden scraper, corn
planter, heart-shaped spade, iron wedge, mattock or grub hoe, cylindrical spade.
Enrollees assigned to build the palisade style structure will work under the
direction of the LEM. They will use log building techniques in the USDA Forest Service
Bulletin.
Enrollees also may be assigned to fire tower duty at this site. Fire tower duty
requires specific enrollee characteristics. According to CCC criteria, enrollees assigned to
fire tower duty needed to have good eyesight and the ability to: remain alert for extended
periods of time without outside stimulus, live alone, work unsupervised, and describe a
situation. They also should know how to work and use the tower instruments – telephone,
fire finder, maps, and weather instruments – and be able to take notes, identify
topographic locations, identify types of ground cover, and distinguish reportable smoke
from routine smoke originating from towns or rural homes or from dust storms
simulating smoke.
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Suggested Interpreter Statement – Urban or Rural Enrollee
Good morning/afternoon. I am _________________. I am an enrollee in Company 1760,
assigned to the Big Lake CCC state forest camp (S-79) outside of Cloquet. Next year, in
1937, when the state forest headquarters comes here to Grand Rapids permanently, some
of us will be assigned to the company at that camp. Our Big Lake camp work area is the
Cloquet Forestry Station and Fond du Lac State Forest, so we have some experience in
seedbed development and tree planting. I suppose that is why we have been sent here.
Are you visiting our demonstration plot today? We like visitors. Back at camp,
our company commander often invites people from our area to visit, maybe have a piece
of pie and a cup of coffee in our mess hall, and get an idea of the work we do.
I enrolled in the CCC last year. We enroll four times a year for six months at a
time. I hope I can stay in for a while. I hear we can re-up at least once. Most of the money
I make - $25 of the $30 each month – is sent directly to my family. It helps them because
my dad has been out of work for a couple of years. They use it to buy groceries and
winter clothing for my younger brothers and sisters. Right now I am the only person in
my family who is working.
The CCC got going in 1933, right after Franklin Roosevelt was elected president.
It was one of his first New Deal programs and we know it is the President‘s favorite.
Now we have a new work/relief program, the WPA. It started last year (1935). My dad is
hoping to get work on it.
The CCC is a work/relief program, I know. Work/relief isn‘t a hand-out. We have
to work for what we earn, but I am in the CCC because the county relief officer identified
my family as being in need of public help. Sometimes when I go into town, I have to be
careful because when people see what I am wearing, they know it means I am in the
CCC, and they look down on me.
In the CCC, I am learning about forest conservation. We know that the old
forests were cut by the loggers and it is our job to replace them. I think there is an old
logging camp down the road from here. It hasn‘t been used in years but it reminds us
about why we are here today. Here at this Demonstration Plot, we are showing how the
CCC grows the trees that enrollees plant.
I hear people are starting to call us Roosevelt‘s Tree Army. I suppose this refers
to the fact that the CCC is President Franklin Roosevelt‘s favorite New Deal alphabet
soup program, the United States Army runs our CCC camps, and we plant a lot of trees
on cutover, tax forfeit land. It is sort of funny, isn‘t it? Tree Army.
We do a lot of different kinds of forest work. Our forest work project leader says
our work is for the greatest good for the greatest number. He means our work helps make
the forests accessible for people to use and it gives us a strong forest for future
harvesting. In forested areas, we do roadside clean-up and we thin brush to give stronger
trees room to grow. We locate corners and do wildlife and fish surveys. We watch for
fires and we fight fires. We plant fish in lakes and build small buildings for the forest
service. And we grow and plant trees.
Some of you may think that we shouldn‘t plant trees to be harvested. I know that
the Sierra Club and others believe we should plant the trees and let them be – keep the
area pretty for users. But the trees we are planting will be ready for harvesting in about
sixty years and we know they are useful for our state‘s wood products industries. We are
planting them for the use by generations to come.
16
I have been told loggers liked white pine trees the best. You might think we
would plant white pine trees on this cutover land. And we do plant some white pine. But
they are susceptible to disease, especially something called blister rust. We do a lot of
blister rust control, pulling out gooseberry bushes as the alternate hosts. So when we replant, we put in a lot of red or Norway pine trees. That is what we have growing in our
demonstration seed bed here. Norway pine are sturdy trees, disease-resistant, their roots
set in well, and they tend to have a good transplant survival rate. When we plant, we put
in four-year-old seedlings at a rate of 600 to 800 per enrollee per day. Sometimes our
work project leader has a competition with all our work crews to see who can plant the
most trees in a day.
Planting trees starts with plowing furrows in an open area. When that is done, we
all go out carrying a bundle of seedlings in little wooden boxes. We can‘t carry too many
seedlings at a time because their roots will dry out, killing them. To plant a tree, we use a
spade to lift the soil, put the seedling under the soil – roots down, place the soil over it,
and tamp the soil down with our feet. Its not difficult work but it is pretty hard on our
backs – leaning over all the time. In addition to Norway pine and white pine, we plant a
lot of spruce and jack pine.
Enrollees work at tree nurseries in Knife River, Lydick, Baudora, Eveleth, and
Willow River. I hear the Red Lake Indian Reservation has a tree nursery run by CCCIndian Division enrollees. One of the CCC-ID camp inspectors is visiting our
demonstration plot today if you want to know more about that program.
We built our demonstration plot under the direction of the LEM – Local
Experienced Man – working for our camp. Our LEM has background working at the
Cloquet Forestry Station on tree nursery research. He learned how to build seed beds
there. We had to build the bed structure, put in the soil and make sure it sloped from the
center to the outside for drainage, sow the seeds (a couple of hundred in each seed bed),
fertilize them, and cover them until they take hold. When the seedlings are two years old,
we lift them out of the seed beds, usually in one piece, bundle them making sure their
roots stay wet, and put them in trucks for transport to planting sites.
My buddy working with me today is assigned to the fire tower.
17
Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) Enrollee, Rural Background
Enrollees from rural backgrounds came from farms and small towns. If from
farms, their families could have marched on the state capitol with the Farmers Holiday
Association in 1933. Farmers Holiday Association members were Midwesterners who
supported withholding crops from market, taking a ―holiday‖ from farming, and,
basically, creating a strike. Farm families raised crops which, when they tried to sell,
were hit by low commodity prices. They burned corn cobs for fuel during the winter and
tried to weather severe drought conditions in 1935 and 1936. When the grass dried up,
they were forced to sell their cattle at ruinously low prices. If the enrollees were from
small towns, they often were from the Iron Range where unemployment rates were 70%.
Enrollees for this project could have been from the state forest Big Lake camp
(Company 1760, Camp S-79), sent over in advance of the building of the state forest
CCC headquarters in Grand Rapids. They could have been sent because they had some
experience in seedbed work at the Cloquet Forestry Center.
Enrollee stories – farm:
My grandfather had homesteaded [the land]. He had two large farms. He lost both
of them. The lack of prices, of course, my father in the family worked on this farm. They
worked all year, produce a crop and then when they sold the grain or wheat or what have
you, they weren‘t able to pay the feed bills. I can remember my grandmother complaining
about the price of flour compared to what they got for wheat. It was almost criminal.
Enrollee stories – small towns:
1) I graduated from high school in June 1936. Those were hard times. I remember
them days because I looked for work. I intended to go on in school. I walked and I
bummed as far as Keewatin, looking for a job in the mines. If your dad wasn‘t working
for the mines, you just were out. … If your dad worked for the mines, your chances were
that you would get a job sooner or later. But if their dads didn‘t work for the mines, they
were out. So then, I decided the only place for me to go was the CCs, because I didn‘t
want to stay home. We had a large family and I wanted to get out and make some money
somewhere. … There was ten in the family and I was the oldest of six boys. My dad
worked for the WPA [Works Progress Administration] and that didn‘t bring in much.
2) I went into the CCCs two different times, maybe a year each time. The
depression was pretty rough. … My dad, he ran a little business here in Chisholm, just
making something to eat. That‘s all there was. Just kept him off the WPA rolls. That‘s
about what it was. We got along anyhow without going on welfare and WPA projects. It
was a tough time. … I left school in the eleventh grade to go to work, just like most
everybody did. I could have made it pretty good, I suppose … I had to help my dad.
3) I graduated from high school. My dad and mother were divorced when I was
sixteen and my dad wasn‘t around, wasn‘t home. My mother was a proud woman. She
never applied for relief and was never on it that I know of. What I did, when I was still in
high school, we had a municipal electric – water and light – plant. Times were bad and
she was behind on her light bill. I worked it out, dug ditches, put in water pipes and etc.
etc. My mother was alone with four kids.
4) [I went into the CCC] because there wasn‘t that much [anywhere else]. It was
something that was there to be offered. There wasn‘t that much in the line of work and
18
the pay was not that good. At that time, [my father] was unemployed. He used to be with
the mining company for years and years and years and then, of course, he lost his job.
Tools and Props
By 1936 the surplus World War I Army uniforms worn by the first enrollees were
gone. CCC Army-issue summer work uniforms were denim pants and shirt, white socks,
heavy boots and full-brimmed, soft denim hats. If the weather was too hot for a denim
shirt, enrollees wore white T-shirts. They were issued a green Army jacket for cool days
and a poncho for rainy days. Dress clothing, worn at the evening meal, was a khaki shirt,
worn with a dark tie, and khaki pants. Enrollees did not wear camouflage clothing of any
type.
Work Assignment
Enrollees assigned to the nursery plot will work under the direction of the LEM.
They will learn how to build a seed bed and prepare it for planting according to
University of Minnesota Bulletin #169. They will tend the seedlings in the seedbed,
making sure the seedlings are watered, weeded, and protected from the sun. They will
become familiar with use of the following tools (see page 44): wooden scraper, corn
planter, heart-shaped spade, iron wedge, mattock or grub hoe, cylindrical spade.
Enrollees assigned to build the palisade style structure will work under the
direction of the LEM. They will use log building techniques in the USDA Forest Service
Bulletin.
Enrollees also may be assigned to fire tower duty at this site. Fire tower duty
requires specific enrollee characteristics. According to CCC criteria, enrollees assigned to
fire tower duty needed to have good eyesight and the ability to: remain alert for extended
periods of time without outside stimulus, live alone, work unsupervised, and describe a
situation. They also should know how to work and use the tower instruments – telephone,
fire finder, maps, and weather instruments – and be able to take notes, identify
topographic locations, identify types of ground cover, and distinguish reportable smoke
from routine smoke originating from towns or rural homes or from dust storms
simulating smoke.
Suggested Interpreter Statement – Rural or Urban Enrollee
Insert fire tower interpretation, FHC MFS manual, pages 66-68.
19
Camp Inspector, Civilian Conservation Corps – Indian Division
(CCC-ID)
(man or woman)
The CCC-Indian Division (CCC-ID) was a CCC program for American Indian
enrollees administered through the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA). CCC-ID enrollees
were enrolled tribal members. They did standard forest conservation work on
reservations. They also did cultural work related to American Indian history and the
history of their reservations.
There were a number of CCC-ID camps and work sites in Minnesota. The two
largest camps were at Nett Lake and Grand Portage. Short histories of these camps are:
Nett Lake
CCC-ID Camp Number: 3 in District 1
Post Office: Bois Fort, Gheen (Koochiching, St. Louis Counties)
Known Company Number: none
Dates: 1933-1942
Notes: The first CCC-ID camp in Minnesota, organized on June 27, 1933, opened at Nett
Lake on July 16, 1933, to serve the Consolidated Chippewa reservations. The camp
operated in its original location until 1941 when, needing extensive repairs, it was moved.
The new Nett Lake camp, near the post office in Gheen, opened on February 12, 1941,
and closed in 1942. In 1936, officials described the original Nett Lake camp as ―very
striking,‖ because of its brick chimneys and painted buildings.
Grand Portage (Mineral Center)
Camp Number: S-68
Post Office: Grand Portage (Cook County)
Known Company Number: none
Dates: 1936-1942
Notes: Construction on this CCC-ID camp began on April 14, 1936. As with Nett
Lake, the first CCC-ID camp, Grand Portage was designed to serve enrollees from
Minnesota Consolidated Chippewa reservations. The camp had eleven buildings. Its bestknown work project was the archaeological excavation of the North West Fur Company
post site and the reconstruction of the stockade and Great Hall. The camp baseball team
won the North Shore League championship silver cup trophy and the superb
sportsmanship trophy in 1937. The Grand Portage site, including the fur depots at Grand
Portage and Fort Charlotte, along with the nine-mile Grand Portage trail, was designated
a National Monument in 1958 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places in
1966.
As with the CCC, the CCC-ID had inspectors who regularly visited the camps.
Camp inspectors checked: overall camp appearance, upkeep of camp buildings,
cleanliness of camp buildings including latrines and kitchens, daily menus, and camp
recreational and free-time activities. In 1936, camp inspectors found the Nett Lake camp
to be, overall, in excellent condition. The buildings were painted green with white trim
and were well-maintained. The latrines could have been cleaner, but overall the facility
was in good shape. Inspectors, however, regularly noted the lack of recreational
equipment and space for quiet reading at this CCC-ID camp. They recommended
additions to the recreation hall which, at the time, had space for playing basketball,
20
indoor tennis, dances, moving pictures, and large group meetings. An addition to the
recreation hall to accommodate quiet reading and writing areas eventually was built. This
gave the enrollees a space for quiet time in addition to private barracks space on their
bunks. Additional sports equipment also was sent, including baseball equipment. For
more information, see copies of CCC-ID inspection letters at the end of this section.
The Grand Portage CCC-ID camp was built during the summer of 1936.
Inspection letters describe camp construction and the camp‘s major work program –
doing archeological work on the Grand Portage North West Fur Company post site in
cooperation with the Minnesota Historical Society. This work would lead to
reconstruction of the fur post stockade and a Great Hall (which burned in 1969 and was
replaced by the current Great Hall).
Tools and Props
CCC-ID inspectors were registered members of American Indian tribes.
Inspectors working in Minnesota would not necessarily have been members of Minnesota
tribes, although this interpretation is written to represent close ties with the Red Lake
Reservation. This person will wear professional clothing, but not fancy clothing. It should
be serviceable for doing camp inspections and visiting work sites. Shoes should be
sturdy, good for walking. The person may want to carry a notebook for taking notes
during inspections.
Work Assignment
This person is a CCC-ID camp inspector. He or she is visiting this Demonstration
Seedbed site for the Red Lake Reservation tree nursery, taking notes about seedbed
design, tools used, and collecting, sowing, growing, and transplanting tree seedlings. He
or she will want a hands-on work experience at the demonstration site seedbed. The
person can be asked to help out with other interpreter‘s tasks as needed.
Suggested Interpreter Statement
Hello. I am a visitor to this Demonstration Plot site today. I am ______________,
and I work as a camp inspector for the CCC-Indian Division. Do you know about the
CCC-ID, as we call it? It is a conservation work/relief program that is administered
through the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) for enrolled tribal members. Our BIA
director, John Collier, sees it as a way to help Indians on relief and do work that is
sensitive to our cultural heritage. We also do standard conservation work just like the
CCC. I am a BIA employee but funding for conservation work comes from the CCC, so
we look to Mr. Robert Fechner, CCC Director, for work program guidance just as the
CCC does.
We have two large residential CCC-ID camps in Minnesota along with a number
of other work sites on the Consolidated Chippewa, Red Lake, and Dakota reservations.
The two large camps are at Nett Lake (it has been there for a while) and the new one we
are building at Grand Portage this summer. We hope to have it up and running by early
fall.
My job is to check on CCC-ID camps. I visit camps in our area regularly,
checking on camp care and maintenance, cleanliness, facilities for recreation, and food. I
am a finicky eater so checking on camp food is not an easy part of this job for me. I have
21
to eat in the Mess Hall with the enrollees. But I have to admit the food at the Nett Lake
camp, now that they have a new cook, is some of the best I have found anywhere. That
isn‘t the case for one of its side camps, where the enrollees told me they were given beef
stew for lunch and dinner for weeks on end. I wrote to William Heritage, the Minnesota
CCC-ID director, about this situation and the situation was quickly corrected.
CCC-ID enrollees eat the same kinds of food that CCC enrollees eat. It isn‘t fancy
but it is wholesome and filling. Pancakes and eggs and bacon and hot or cold cereal for
breakfast, sandwiches and fruit in the field for lunch or hot dogs and sauerkraut or
creamed chip beef if in camp, and meatballs, spaghetti, macaroni, and stew for the
evening meal. Always lots of potatoes with every meal and good desserts – pies and
cakes. We don‘t have a lot of salads and vegetables as a rule, though we try to encourage
cooks to make them if we can get them locally or we can find canned goods. It is hard to
cook for 200 people so we are glad the food in camp is tasty and nourishing. We want to
make sure enrollees get as much to eat as they want.
CCC-ID enrollees do the same kinds of work that CCC enrollees do. They plant
trees. We run a tree nursery on the Red Lake Reservation. I am here today to observe the
Demonstration Seedbed on behalf of our Red Lake Reservation tree nursery. I‘ll bring my
observations back to them.
CCC-ID enrollees also do Indian cultural work. That is the purpose of the Grand
Portage project. We will be doing archeological work on the fur post site under the
direction of Minnesota Historical Society archeologists. We hear Mr. Fechner thinks this
project is too expensive but we will fight to keep it going. We want to put the stockade
posts in and build a Great Hall building on the site. In our Nett Lake area, we want to
develop a project for wild rice sites – improve camp sites in the areas for our people.
When we did a little bit of this work last year, some of our enrollees found wild rice pits
that had pottery in them. We sent the pottery to the Minnesota Historical Society and they
said it was from the time of the Dakota living in our northern Minnesota area. That was
pretty interesting. We also want to develop maple sugar programs for our people.
So you can see, we do all kinds of conservation work from growing and planting
trees to work that is connected to our history and culture. Do you have any questions?
Young Woman from the Area
22
People in communities near CCC camps had mixed feelings about having a camp
in the area. In spite of economic development opportunities that came with the camps,
many people were concerned about the influx of a large group of young men to an area.
People worried that work done by CCC enrollees would take the only jobs in the area or
enrollees would incite fights or other public unrest. Young men saw competition for local
young women. One woman said her girlfriend‘s mother made her cross the street
whenever she saw CCC enrollees coming down the sidewalk. Some people, knowing the
CCC was a work/relief program, looked down socially on the enrollees. An enrollee
remembered his local priest telling him, even if people judged him negatively, not to let
the Army-issue CCC clothes hold him back from going to church. Other people,
however, appreciated the enrollees and the business they brought to town. Cal‘s Sweet
Shop was located across the street from the Cass Lake armory. The wife of the proprietor
remembered enrollees coming to town each weekend and heading for Cal‘s where they
spent a quarter on hamburger baskets with lots of French fries, a nickel on a Coke, and
fifteen cents on a malted milk. Enrollees ate at Cal‘s Sweet Shop and then went to dances
at the armory. When an enrollee did misbehave – trying to steal comic books, for
instance – Cal grounded him from the cafe for a time.
When a camp moved to an area and enrollees brought business to restaurants,
many hired young local women as waitresses. These young women needed the work and
they liked meeting new boys in town. There are many stories about enrollees meeting
their future wives at cafes or at the dances they went to after eating at the cafes.
For this interpretation, the young woman is in, or just out of, high school. She
lives at home with her mother and father. Her father is a carpenter. Before the CCC camp
came to the area, he hadn‘t worked in several years. The camp commander hired him to
help work on the state headquarters site and to handle repairs that enrollees can‘t do. Her
brother is in the CCC, assigned to a camp in the Superior National Forest. He writes
home every once in a while and the family receives his $25 monthly allotment which
they use for groceries and to help buy clothing and shoes for younger children. The
young woman works weekends at the local restaurant, waiting tables, cleaning tables, and
running the cash register. She likes the job because it gives her a chance to meet enrollees
– the new boys in town.
Tools and Props
The young woman is visiting the forest work site, dropping off some work or a
lunch for her father. She gardens with her mother and, because she is interested in
meeting enrollees, offers to help work at the site for a little while. She wears jeans with
the pant legs rolled up, a cotton button-up blouse, work shoes, white socks, and, if it is
cool, a light jacket.
Work Assignment
The young woman will help with the FHC MFS work assignments under the
direction of the LEM. She may tell him she knows only boys can join the CCC, but she
wishes girls could join, too.
Suggested Interpreter Statement
23
Hello. My name is _____________. I live outside of town on a little farm. It
doesn‘t make much money. My dad says we‘re probably going to have to sell our cows if
this drought doesn‘t end soon because we won‘t have any grass or hay to feed them.
My dad is a carpenter. He gets hired to help build the CCC camps around here.
The income helps. The Works Progress Administration – they call it the WPA – started
last summer (June 1935). They are doing highway and bridge work along with building
projects in town here and other towns around here. My dad got hired on this year so that
helps a lot. He brings home about $40 a month from the WPA. He is a good carpenter.
My older brother is in the CCC. I think he said the name of his camp is Seagull. It
is way up in the Superior National Forest outside of Grand Marais. He likes the camp and
the work but says the CO [camp commander] sometimes sells their food so they don‘t get
quite enough to eat. He wrote a letter to my dad about it. Said they organized a food
strike, then things got better. My dad wrote to him to tell him to write a letter to President
Franklin Roosevelt and I think my brother did that because, in his next letter home, he
said the government had sent an inspector out to check on the CO after the CCC in
Washington, D. C. got a letter of complaint about the food.
My family gets the $25 a month sent home for my brother‘s work. He gets to keep
$5 but he doesn‘t need much else. The CCC gives him food, clothing, a place to live, and
he works forty hours a week in the forest. My mother and dad keep say the CCC is a
good deal for everyone. We know it is for us.
I think my brother does the same kind of work the guys here do. I work as a
waitress in a café outside of town. The CCC boys like to come and eat there because they
can get hamburger baskets with lots of fries for $.25 and a malted milk for $.15. Our café
is near the dance hall so they can eat and then go over to the dance. I get to meet all the
boys when I wait on them. Most of them are nice guys. There is one from St. Paul I kind
of like. His family had a hard time but he is helping them by being in the CCC. My
girlfriend‘s mother is more strict. She won‘t let my girlfriend date any CCC guys and
makes her promise she won‘t even talk to them. I think that is silly. Their families are far
away and they are lonesome. They want to make friends with people in the area. Last
year someone I went to high school with met a CCC guy at the dance and they got
married. He lives in this area now and is looking for work at the paper mill. They want to
stay here.
My brother wrote to us that people are still talking about the company of black
(Negro) enrollees from down South who were sent to the North Shore when the CCC
started. I think they were in a camp near Grand Marais. People there accused them of
poaching. I guess the story made the newspaper. When the sheriff tried to come into the
camp to check on poaching stories, the camp commander wouldn‘t let him in. They got
into a big argument and the camp commander had a stroke. After that the black enrollees
got sent home.
We had a group of black enrollees out at the Day Lake camp then, too. The Day
Lake camp is just north of Grand Rapids. They were quieter. We didn‘t see them much
but we all knew they were there. Everybody talked about it, wondering where they were
from and why they were here. Not much news of them in our paper other than when they
came in the winter (1933) and when they were sent back South (June 1934). When they
came to town it was hard. People weren‘t used to seeing them in the restaurants or at the
movie theaters. They paid their money like anyone else but a lot of people couldn‘t get
24
used to it. I think people were kind of relieved when they got sent home. We have white
enrollees working up at the Day Lake camp now.
My brother wrote home about how his work crew won the tree planting
competition last month. Everyone in their work crew planted 800 trees a day. They have
fifteen guys in their crew so that‘s 12,000 trees a day. They did that for a week. No
wonder the CCC is growing trees in the nurseries. They have to keep up with all that
planting.
My boyfriend is an assistant foreman. He makes a little bit more a month - $36.
He wants to become a foreman because they make $45 a month. Foremen help the work
project men – the foresters, making sure the boys get their work done. My boyfriend said
it is pretty easy because the boys want to work. They don‘t like the idea of a handout so
they want to prove to everyone they know how to work.
My dad talks a lot about our Minnesota Governor. He really likes Governor Floyd
B. Olson, says he is a man of the people. He is a Farmer-Labor governor, not a Democrat
or a Republican. That makes a difference, we think. But I heard when I was waitressing
the other day that Governor Olson is sick. He has cancer. We were hoping he would run
for president some day. He would be a good president, but having cancer doesn‘t sound
good.
We like President Franklin Roosevelt. He gets things done. We listen to his
Fireside Chats and they give us hope that things will get better. My dad says he has a lot
of confidence in President Roosevelt. The President knows how to make things get better.
My brother and my boyfriend say they have pictures of President Roosevelt hanging in
their camp recreation halls. They say most camps do this.
Wife of Camp Work Program Supervisor
25
Work project administrators were assigned to CCC camps to supervise the
assigned work projects. Because this site is a Minnesota Forest Service site, the work
project administrator is a Minnesota Forest Service forest ranger. The ranger‘s
responsibilities were to carry out the approved six-month forest service work plan. Forest
rangers often brought their wives and families with them when assigned to a CCC camp.
The families lived outside the camp in rented cabins or camped in tents.
CCC forest camp work plans commonly included tree planting, timber and lake
surveys, blister rust control, road maintenance, trail construction, timber stand
improvement, building construction, stringing telephone lines, and fire suppression. A
specific number of man-days were assigned to the tasks to assure there was enough work
for a company of 200 CCC enrollees assigned to the camp for the standard six-month
enrollment period. Forest rangers made sure the work was completed on time and to
forest service standards. They also often taught evening classes on conservation concepts
or related topics.
For this interpretation, the woman is the wife of the forest ranger assigned to the
camp. They live outside the CCC camp in a rented cabin and she sometimes goes into the
camp to see her husband or to help wherever she can. She and her husband often join the
other camp families and enrollees for Sunday dinner in the Mess Hall.
Tools and Props
The woman has come to camp to see her husband. He is out in the field working
with some enrollees so she offers to help out while she waits for him. She wears jeans, a
cotton blouse, work shoes and socks, and, if it is cool, a light jacket. She understands the
role and work of forest rangers and enjoys answering questions about the CCC work
programs. This interpretation may be adapted to wife of the camp medical officer or wife
of the camp educator.
Work Assignment
The young woman works at the direction of the LEM. She can offer to help out
where she is needed while she waits for her husband.
Suggested Interpreter Statement
Hello. My name is ________________. My husband is the Minnesota Forest
Service ranger sent over to this side camp. His responsibility is to make sure the side
camp work program gets done according to Minnesota Forest Service standards. Right
now he is running an errand. They said he would be back in a little while, so I‘m waiting
for him. I offered to help out a little here while I wait.
The CCC camp forest ranger is responsible for making sure camp conservation
work programs get done. The work program for the main camp he was at before coming
here includes seedbed development, reforestation, blister rust control, and timber stand
improvement. Since he knows seedbed development, he got sent here. Do you know what
these things are? Let me tell you about them.
Seedbed development is part of the tree growing work done by the CCC. The
CCC has an active reforestation program and, as a result, is always in need of healthy,
strong seedlings to plant. Enrollees collect pine cones and seeds for the types of trees the
forest service wants planted – red (Norway) pine, white pine, jack pine, and Scotch pine
26
among others. They harvest seeds from the cones and prepare them for planting. Then
they plant them in the nursery seedbeds to get them started. When the seedlings are about
two years old, they will transplant them to the transplant beds at the nursery and when
they are about four years old, will plant them in the forests. The seedbed we have here is
a demonstration plot to show you one part of the CCC tree planting process.
Reforestation is the tree planting that every CCC camp does. Enrollees in state
and federal forest camps plant thousands of trees a day in our forests. Spring and fall are
planting seasons; some seedlings like to be planted in the spring and others work better in
the fall. Red (Norway) pine are good, hearty trees that do well in either season. One of
the foresters told me he had crew of the boys sorting trees to be planted. He said, ―We
have about 100 men on planting now and they plant between 16,000 and 18,000 trees a
day.‖ A forest service superintendent remembered how he got his teams to work: "Most
of the planting crews was about a 20-man crew and we started a competition between
whoever planted the most trees this week got a keg of beer. We'd try to get competition to
get more trees planted."
Blister rust control helps keep this imported disease at bay. Blister rust is a fungus
that preys on white pine. It came to the U.S. from Europe around the turn of the twentieth
century. Trees in Europe usually were immune to the disease, but U.S. white pine were
vulnerable and it usually killed them. It first was reported in Minnesota in 1916 and by
1929, the state legislature had enacted a blister rust control law.
My husband had a one-day course in blister rust control at the Cloquet Forestry
Center so he now is the blister rust control expert for our state forest area. We get a kick
out of that, but that‘s how things are in the CCC. Work programs have started so fast that
anyone with information or background in a specific area is considered an expert.
Another forester described how this works: "My first job was when they gave me a crew
of about 40 men to start out on blister rust control work. … This is a job confined to
white pine stands…it was removing all of the gooseberry and currant bushes that you
could find and pulling them up and hanging them up, because they were the ones that
transferred the blister rust disease to the white pine. In other words, they were the
alternate host. …Whatever you got started on, you got stuck with. So, every place I
went, I was the blister rust control man. My boss was a … forest service employee who
was in charge of the whole blister rust control program for Minnesota.‖
Blister rust control work is labor-intensive, but effective. A former enrollee
described what he was taught: [We] ―could only pull the gooseberries and currants when
the plants were leafed out. ... They had to make sure they got all the bush, all the roots. If
you pulled out a gooseberry bush and left some roots, it would grow back.‖
A former enrollee described timer stand improvement work to me: ―[We did]
timber stand improvement. This was an action that had no real rule of thumb. You just
went into a given area and removed some and left some—the object being removing
where too thick to make good timber. The weak and crooked and the bent had to go.‖
Another enrollee remembered: ―We thinned the forest. In some cases where trees were
starting to die, we could cut them down and bring them in.‖
Timber stand improvement is a scientific forest management conservation tool
that results in strong stands of trees, giving people a vital, renewable resource.
One thing that scares me – everyone has to do fire fighting. We have a no burn
policy. Fires can‘t be allowed to burn so we have to put them out. [Note: Although the ad
27
campaign was not developed until after the CCC ended, many people still associate this
policy with ―Smokey the Bear‖ posters designed to prevent forest fires.] We remember
the big forest fires in Minnesota – the Hinckley Fire and the Fires of 1918 – and we don‘t
ever want that to happen again. My husband teaches enrollees how to build fire trails. A
former enrollee described how he did this: "This one year, I was in charge of fire trails. I
had a 75-cat [caterpillar] with a huge grader on it, and we had a bulldozer, and we had
four trucks. We used to grade the road, then, wherever there was fill [areas where the
road wasn‘t flat], we would use the trucks to haul dirt in there and make fills. A crew
went ahead to chop the smaller trees down for the fire trails, and we made some pretty
good roads." Another former enrollee described the work: ―They would build roads. The
grader would roll rocks up on the road. I worked behind the grader throwing the rocks off
the side of the road so that they didn‘t have the rocks on the road. I worked with them
pretty near a year and then I got a chance to work a little on the grader and also on the cat
(caterpillar). Later on I went on steady on the cat and on fire protection roads.‖ Some
sections of Minnesota‘s well-known trails were built by CCC enrollees for conservation
and fire prevention access. Another enrollee we met recently said: "If you ever go up on
the Gunflint Trail [which runs from Grand Marais to the Canadian border], I can say I
was part of that."
Fire prevention work also included stringing telephone wires to link prevention
centers and building fire towers like the one I am helping out with today. Fire towers are
built on high ground whenever possible, standing taller than the trees around them, and
are used to help spot forest fires. Building them is a "tough proposition." The boys
[enrollees] have to blast into solid rock. When we had dinner with one of them in the
mess hall last Sunday, he told me: "It was kind of a slow dog-gone job. It was all hand
work."
Enrollees also fight forest fires. During the fall fire season, regardless of anything
else, fighting fire is everyone‘s job. Fully equipped trucks are kept ready to go all the
time, passes to town are canceled, and enrollees are kept on standby, waiting for the call,
often from an enrollee in a fire tower, that smoke has been sighted. They say 1936 could
be the worst fire season Minnesota has had in years. [With an extended period of low
humidity, high temperatures and extremely dry conditions, fires broke out almost
continuously across northern Minnesota in July and August and again in October of 1936.
Many enrollees spent a month or more fighting fires. The situation was severe enough to
warrant a special section in the state Department of Conservation annual report that year.]
Fighting fire is some of the hardest and most dangerous work enrollees do.
Depending on the size of the fire, enrollees from all camps in an area are brought in. If
more people are needed, they‘re brought in from camps across the state. When fighting
forest fires, camp just clears out. Enrollees stay out for days at a time, supplied with food
and water by runners. They dig fire breaks by hand and use hand pumps to spray water.
One of the enrollees told me: "We used [these tools]: the pump tank you put on your
back. It was about a five gallon pump can. Had a hand pump on it. And, of course, the
shovels for patrolling the fire lines. And we had sand points we used to drive down for
water to run down little hoses where we could use them.‖ They sometimes fight fires in
peat bogs as the bogs burn under their feet.
My husband and the other men work hard to train the enrollees to fight fires. One
described fire fighting training to me: "Sometimes they would conduct school right out in
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the forest. I remember one was pertaining to fighting fires. And I learned from the old
timers, the foremen, many of whom were former loggers. There were a lot of old
lumberjacks around and many of them made very good foremen. I remember them telling
us about conditions in fighting forest fires, how the best time to fight the fire would be
early morning and late afternoon, at sunrise and sunset. The reason why, the wind
commonly goes down at that time of the day. And, of course, the wind was our worst
enemy in fighting fire.‖
The reason this scares me so, though, is because of the stories about fighting fires
I have heard from enrollees. One enrollee described fighting a fire in the Namakan-Crane
Lake area of northern Minnesota: "It [the fire] lasted over 30 days. We slept on the
ground. They woke us up in the dark. We had our breakfast and took off for the job area.
Stayed there until just before dark. Came back in, had our evening meal, and, of course,
we was pretty tired. Soon as we got done with that, you were looking for a place to lay
down for the night. And that was on the ground. No tents, on the ground. ... In them
days, it was all hand work. Shovel, grub hoe, mostly that, and an axe. [We would] clear a
path, a fire break, they called it. Right down to the ground, so nothing could burn. But if
a wind comes up, it was so dry, the spark would fly over and start in again.‖ Another
enrollee summed it up: ―Believe me, nobody will ever know what it is to face an inferno
until they actually get into it, with roaring flames above threatening to collapse on top of
you and roaring flames on both sides wanting to engulf you, not to mention the searing
heat.‖
My husband and I live in a little cabin just outside the side camp. It is pretty
primitive – one room, log building with a cookstove and an outhouse. We rent it from a
local forester. It gets pretty hot in the summer and the mosquitoes can get bad. We have
some black goo made out of tar that we put on when they get too bad. But when I get
everything done, I sometimes go on a hike or come up here to see what is going on. I‘ve
learned how to do some things so that I can help out.
We come over every Sunday to have dinner. The cook here isn‘t too bad. There
isn‘t much variety in the food but there always is plenty of it. You should see the boys
(enrollees) eat. Most of them grow a couple of inches and put on about ten pounds during
their six months in the CCC. They come in looking kind of weak and, by the time they
are ready to go, they are rugged and tan and strong and healthy.
29
Buildings and Structures – Forest History Center Minnesota Forest Service Site
The Cabin
Passage of the Transfer Act of 1905 by the United States Congress, which
moved management of U.S. forests from the Department of the Interior to the newlynamed United States Forest Service (USFS), began an era of change in U.S. forest
management. It ushered in a period of increased administration and scientific resource
management of forests. Gifford Pinchot, the first USFS Chief Forester, coined a term for
this work – conservation. It became a part of forest service management policy.
As part of this change, forests were organized into local management areas. This
structure, used by national and state forests, led to the need for additional buildings to
house work personnel and equipment. Funds and labor to do this work, however, were
limited. It was not until the establishment of the Civilian Conservation Corps in 1933 that
a source of labor to help build this infrastructure became available. CCC enrollees built
ranger stations and other personnel and equipment buildings in national and state forests
throughout the country. Most of the buildings were small and utilitarian – warehouses,
water towers, latrines, and others – similar to this cabin. Some forest service buildings,
however, have been recognized for outstanding design and construction; many of these
now are listed on the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP). Minnesota‘s CCCbuilt forest service buildings on the National Register of Historic Places are:
Marcell Ranger Station, Marcell Ranger District, Chippewa
National Forest, listed on the NRHP on May 19, 1994. This complex of
six buildings, five of which remain, was built as the headquarters for the
Marcell Ranger District in the Chippewa National Forest in 1933 and
1934. Enrollees at the Inger (F-27) and Day Lake (F-34) CCC camps
provided the labor. All buildings at the ranger station are examples of
rustic style architecture, an environmentally sensitive, non-intrusive
building design developed by the National Park Service. The ranger
station is still in use and it is considered the best example of rustic style
ranger station design in Minnesota.
Isabella Ranger Station, Isabella Ranger District, Superior National
Forest, listed on the NRHP on February 1, 2006.
Kabetogama Ranger Station, Kabetogama Ranger District,
Chippewa National Forest, listed on the NRHP on June 18, 1993. The
Kabetogama Ranger Station was built by enrollees from Kabetogama
Lake (S-81) CCC camp under the direction of Local Experienced Men
(LEMs) experienced in carpentry, forestry, survey, and masonry work.
Enrollees from S-81 also built the Woodenfrog Campground.
Chippewa National Forest Supervisor‘s Headquarters, Chippewa
National Forest, Cass Lake, listed on the NRHP on January 31, 1976. This
building was built at a cost of $225,000 by enrollees at the Pike Lake
(Pike Bay – F-12) CCC camp in 1935 and 1936. It is a Scandinavian-style
notch-and-groove (chinkless) style of log construction. Ike Boekenoogen,
an expert in this log-building technique, supervised construction. Nels
Bergley designed and built the 50‘ stone fireplace. The wooden stairway
and ironwork on the doors and hinges were made by the camp blacksmith.
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Minnesota Department of Natural Resources building on the State
Fair grounds. This building was built in six months by CCC enrollees
using machined logs. Costing $73,000 to build, it opened on September 1,
1934, when state fair tickets cost $.25/person. It has been open for every
state fair since.
In addition, there are CCC-built forest buildings eligible for, but not yet
listed, on the National Register of Historic Places. The Kawishiwi Field Laboratory in the
Superior National Forest near Ely is an excellent example. This set of buildings, eligible
as a historic district, includes a main lodge, office, bunkhouse, warehouse/garage,
boathouse, pump house, oil house, sauna, and root cellar.
The cabin at the Minnesota Forest Service Site is a reproduction patterned after a
1930s forest service design. It was built in 1976 by Joe Reese during a Minneapolis
Home and Garden Show. Reese used tamarack logs for the walls and balsam for the
rafters. Cabins like this were used to house patrolmen and fire fighting crews. They were
made with local materials and designed to meet the needs of the area.
The Grounds
The Fire Tool Cache
The Garage/Warehouse
Insert Forest History Center (FHC) Minnesota Forest Service (MFS) manual pp. 38-55.
The Fire Tower
Insert FHC MFS Manual pp. 55-66.
The Tree Nursery Seedbed
Reforestation policies of the CCC gave the program one of its most enduring
nicknames – Roosevelt‘s Forest Army. The policies also created a demand for tree
seedlings. To meet this demand the CCC developed an extensive seedling-growing
operation. This operation followed standard practices of the time which, for Minnesota,
were based on Cloquet Forestry Center research and recommendations for northern Great
Lakes states.
Seedling-growing was (and is) a multi-step process, labor-intensive process. To
begin, enrollees gathered seeds from trees recommended for planting. They cleaned and
sowed the seeds in tree nursery seedbeds. When the seedlings were about two years old,
they moved them to larger transplant beds. After several more years, when the seedlings
were viable for transplanting, enrollees planted them by the millions in state and national
forests and in areas needing soil conservation. In Minnesota they planted a total of
123,607,000 trees – white pine, red (Norway) pine, Scotch pine, and jack pine. All of this
work was done by hand with CCC enrollee labor.
The seedbed at the Minnesota Forest Service site is a common design, patterned
after 1917 Cloquet Forestry Center research recommendations. It is 4‘x12‘ in size with a
loose soil bed, sloped topsoil layer, and a shade frame. Construction on it began by
marking out the seedbed size, followed by a thorough spading of the bed area to loosen
the soil and remove debris and stones. A form made of 2 x 4s was put around the
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seedbed. Soil was added to make a level surface. Using a scraper, the surface was
smoothed and sloped from the center to the edges to promote drainage.
After preparation of the bed, seed was spread over it in amounts recommended by
the 1917 Cloquet Forest Center study. Seed was wetted down if needed to hold it in place
before finely sifted soil was shoveled over it. Topsoil was scraped to the 1917
recommended depth using a scraper with a tongue that could be raised or lowered to
match seed specifications. The sides of the seedbed were built up if needed and topsoil
was covered with moss or burlap pinned to fit the seedbed as closely as possible. The
seedbed was then covered with a lathe or metal shade frame. Four men could build 40
seedbeds in a day, beginning to end.
Seedbeds were watered according to nursery specifications. Basic standards were
.25 (1/4)‖ of water over the beds every twenty-four hours. Rainfall lessened watering
needs.
The Palisade Building
The palisade building style uses logs standing on end and either pinned or bolted
together. Basic log construction techniques are used to build palisade buildings.
Palisade building style was used in Civilian Conservation Corps camps in a
number of ways. Camps built during the first years of the CCC often featured palisade
construction throughout. Even after the United States Army began using a more
standardized portable construction design, camp service buildings used palisade style
construction.
Minnesota CCC camps using palisade style buildings as the dominant building
style include Itasca State Park (SP-1), Side Lake (S-53), and Owen Lake (S-54). In
addition, palisade buildings were used for smaller outbuildings in many camps. Wood
sheds, well houses, bath houses, latrines, ranger stations, offices, warehouses, and lumber
sheds commonly featured palisade style construction.
Insert: ―Fire Tower Administration Pamphlet,‖ CCC Legacy Project 4 on project
thumbdrive
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Tree Nursery Seedbed and Palisade Building Guidelines
In addition to interpreting existing buildings and structures at the Forest History
Center Minnesota Forest Service site, the four CCC interpreters will be doing work
projects that would have been done by CCC enrollees. The work projects selected for this
site are building and tending a tree nursery seedbed and erecting a palisade building. Both
are typical CCC forest camp work projects and are representative of the work of the CCC
in Minnesota‘s CCC forest camps.
The tree nursery seedbed helps the FHC visitor understand the importance of
reforestation as a CCC work project. Because of its intensive tree planting work
nationally, the CCC became unofficially known as ―Roosevelt‘s Forest Army.‖ In
Minnesota, alone, CCC enrollees planted 124,000,000 trees – most on cutover, marginal,
northern Minnesota land. To meet the growing demand for trees to plant, CCC enrollees
work project assignments included tree nursery duty. The interpreters at this site will be
re-enacting a part of that work assignment – developing a seedbed to start the tree
growing process that provided seedlings for CCC reforestation work. The Tree Nursery
Seedbed information below helps guide this interpretation.
CCC enrollees also were responsible for building and maintaining camp buildings
and structures. Especially in the early years of the program, before the United States
Army standardized building construction guidelines in 1937, enrollees in Minnesota used
palisade-style construction for camp buildings. It was a common building style for outbuildings such as garages and woodshed in many camps. In addition, several Minnesota
camps were built entirely in palisade-style. The Log Construction information below,
with related attachments, helps guide this interpretation.
Tree Nursery Seedbed
For many people, the Civilian Conservation Corps became synonymous with
planting trees. This became a symbol of New Deal conservation – defined broadly as
preservation and development of all forms of public values and, in a more focused sense,
as care for natural resources. In 1940, in response to the loss of the historic western
frontier, one writer called conservation ―the new frontier.‖ The work of the CCC dealt
with conservation of natural resources but through its work, it spread an understanding of
the importance of public conservation values.
As scientific and coordinated forest conservation policies were developed in the
decades prior to the CCC, the importance of tree planting was discussed and taught. Tree
nurseries grew and sold trees with instructions on how to plant. The Cloquet Forestry
Center, also called the Cloquet Forest Center and the Cloquet Forest Experiment Station,
was founded in 1909 as part of forestry studies at the University of Minnesota. Its
purpose was, and is, to support scientific research into tree planting and growth. It now is
part of the University‘s College of Food, Agriculture, and Natural Resource Sciences.
During the early decades of the twentieth century, the Center not only grew and sold
trees; it was a leader in developing new scientific processes for produce strong planting
stock.
For many years, including the 1930s, the Center was directed by Dr. Thorvald
Schantz-Hansen. The following information is taken from his correspondence, held in the
Cloquet Forestry Center collection at the University of Minnesota archives, and from
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University of Minnesota Agricultural Extension bulletins from 1915-1930 – specifically
―Report of the Cloquet Forest Experiment Station‖ by W.H. Kenety, University of
Minnesota Agricultural Extension Bulletin #169, October 1917. It summarizes tree
nursery practices common during the CCC era.
Tree types grown and studied at the Forestry Station during this period included
those most common to the upper Great Lakes states: white pine, Norway pine, jack pine,
spruce, balsam, tamarack, cedar, birch, and poplar. In addition to forested areas, the
Cloquet Forestry Station encompassed and studied a muskeg swamp and cut-over or
burned over land. It also included a 10.9 acre tree nursery where a wide range of forest
cultural practices were studied including seed extraction, production, growth, and
transplanting techniques. From these studies came recommended northern Minnesota
practices used by CCC enrollees.
Common tree types in northern Minnesota
White pine are tall and straight with bark that goes from green to dark, greenishbrown, and furrowed as it matures. They can grow to a height of 130‘ and a diameter of
44‖ or more. The needles, which are bluish-green on top and white underneath, occur in
bundles of five. The cones are cylindrical, 4-6‖ long, with thin, gummy scales – each of
which contains two winged seeds. Cones requires two years to mature or ripen.
Norway pine, also called red pine, was becoming an increasingly common tree in
the 1930s, sometimes taking the place of white pine in plantings because of its resistance
to disease. Norway pines can reach a height of 100‘ and 30-40‖ in diameter. At maturity,
their bark looks like it is divided into large red-reddish-brown plates or sections. The
cones are about 2‖ long and ripen in two years. They mature in the fall but, for the most
part, stay on the tree through the winter. Seeds are about 1/8‖ long, mottled, and winged.
Jack pine grow in sandy soil and usually are the first to appear after a fire. They
are hearty and grow rapidly especially in areas where white pine and Norway pine don‘t
thrive. These trees can grow to 90‘ and are characterized by a spreading crown. Lower
branches die but remain on the trunk for a long time. The needles grow two to a bundle,
are about 1‖ long, and are rigid and sharp. The cones are about 2‖ long, curved, and
either brown or gray. Seed are small, winged, and triangular in shape. Cones can remain
on the trees with viable seeds for many years. In the 1930s, it was considered the least
valuable of Minnesota‘s native pines.
White spruce can grow to 100‘ in height and 2‘ in diameter, but usually are
shorter. Their bark is brown and scaly. Needles are about ½‖ long and grow thickly along
the branches. They are bluish-green, sharp, and pointed. The cones are slender, about 2‖
long, rounded at the ends, and flexible. Seeds mature in one season and the cones drop
off the tree after they open and lose their seeds. White spruce are popular Christmas trees.
Black spruce are smaller trees that often grow in swamps. They have dark, scaly
bark and short, pointed, bluish-green needles that grow close together on the branches.
Cones are about ½‖ long with small, winged seeds that mature in one season.
See ―Common Forest Trees of Minnesota‖ for information about additional
species.
Seed collection
34
The importance of tree planting as a CCC conservation technique led to need for
stock to transplant. This fueled development and growth of tree nurseries and expansion
of all aspects of the transplanting process. As a result, enrollee work programs
increasingly began to include tree nursery work. Pine trees were the most common trees
used for transplant in the northern Great Lakes states. The process of growing pine trees
from seeds collected in the wild begins with collecting cones for seeds. This is not an
easy process now and it wasn‘t an easy process in the 1930s. The general rule of thumb
during the New Deal years was that one man could collect 4-5 bushels of fallen cones a
day, including raiding squirrel hoards. When following loggers and taking cones from cut
trees, the number of bushels picked in a day could triple.
Cones also were collected from standing trees. Collecting from standing white
pine was done by climbing a tree and, using a long tool with a sharp hook on the end,
cutting off branches with cones. Norway pine cones are more difficult to collect from
standing trees because the cones are hidden in tufts at the ends of branches, but the
process, though slower, was generally the same.
After collecting, cones were put in burlap bags and spread in a single layer in a
seed extraction building to dry. This usually was done by air drying – allowing air to
circulate around them. If cones were wet, they were turned often so they could dry
evenly. They also could be heated in ovens to speed the drying process. As they dried,
cones opened to allow access to the seeds.
Cone and seed maturation schedules vary among tree types. Jack pine trees
produce seeds annually; an average cone yields thirty seeds. White pine trees produce
seed every four years and Norway pine produce seed every seven years. One Norway
pine tree yields 1-2 bushels of cones and an average Norway pine cone contains thirtyseven seeds – this works out to an average of 1,240 Norway pine seeds per bushel of
cones. An average bushel of white pine cones yields 330 seeds.
Seed extraction
Heat speeds pine cone extraction. Sunlight works but, since much seed extraction
takes place in the fall, extra heat sources are needed in northern states like Minnesota.
Heating cones on a tray in an oven or a kiln in the seed extraction building provides a
workable solution. Care was taken on the number of cones per tray to give them room to
expand as they opened. Jack and Norway pine cones open best at 135-145 degrees. The
length of time it takes to heat cones to open depends on tree type, condition, and age.
Seeds were extracted from cones by putting them into a large mesh-covered
rotating container with a handle on one end and a tray underneath to catch the seed as it
was dislodged from the cones. Turning the handle rubbed the cones together, dislodging
the seeds. Throughout the harvesting process, care was taken to check for health of seeds.
Drought, insects, and fungous diseases detract from seed health.
A former CCC enrollee described collecting seeds: ―Then in the fall, another job
that came was picking pine cones. I had a crew out and we'd pick pine cones, not out of
the tree itself but we had an area where there was a lot of Norway boughs and branches
lying all over the area there, it must have been 80 acres of them. And we actually just
picked them, stand right on the ground and pick them right off those boughs.‖
Seed cleaning
35
Extracted seeds have quite a bit of foreign matter that needs to be cleaned out.
This process starts, as it did in the 1930s, with removing seed wings. A recommended
process during the New Deal years was to put the seeds in bags on the floor and carefully
step on them with rubber-soled shoes – removing wings without damaging seeds.
After wings were dislodged, bags of seeds were spread out on mesh trays with
mesh tops. The trays were sent through a fanning mill to blow away the lighter wings and
other debris. A second run through the fanning mill removed any remaining debris. The
size of mesh on the fanning mill trays was set according to seed types. Sometimes a
smaller mesh was used for the second run through the fanning mill.
A former enrollee described this process: ―[T]hey [the seeds] were sent to Cass
Lake, [where] they would extract the seeds from the cones - they had boxes with electric
light bulbs in them to produce the heat, to open the cones for the seeds to fall out, and
they had little pans underneath to catch the seed. And I remember it was so fascinating to
me - I saw a huge (about 20-30 gallon) GI can with jack pine seeds in it one time and it
reminded me of flax seed.‖
―A very small seed?‖
―Yes. Another thing that was fascinating, if you ever see one drop out of a tree it has like
a little feather fin on it and it would whirl as it comes to the ground.‖
Storage
Extracted seeds were stored in large metal or earthenware crocks with tight-fitting
lids and kept in a cool place until needed. Care had to be taken to make sure the
containers were squirrel and chipmunk-proof.
Sowing Seeds
Tree-planting and growing research at the Cloquet Forestry Center in the decades
before the CCC helped define tree nursery practices for northern Great Lakes states.
These practices helped guide reforestation work of the CCC in northern Minnesota.
Research showed tree types varied in recommended sowing times. White pine
seeds benefited from being sown in the fall and allowed to lie in the ground during the
winter. Jack pine and Scotch pine seeds did better in spring sowing. Norway pine seeds
did well in either spring or fall sowing. Recommended sowing times were based on how
fast seeds germinate and how well they winter over. Germination took, on an average,
25-35 days in early spring (April) and 10-15 days in July. Warmer soil temperatures
encouraged faster germination. Seeds sown in October remained in the ground,
germinating in the spring – an average of 215 days from sowing.
April or early May were the recommended sowing times for optimum
germination and healthy first-year growth. If sowing in the fall, waiting until October
prevented premature germination and resulting frost or freezing damage. Nurseries often
kept three productions going at one time – seedling sowing and growth, transplanted
seedling growth, and a fallow area covered with rye or another green crop to maintain
soil fertility. Blocks were rotated annually.
Fertilizers include manure, muck, tankage, acid phosphate, and nitrate of soda
with varying results.
Seeds usually were sowed in seedbeds and after one-two years, were moved to
transplant beds. Experiments with numbers of seeds sown indicated white pine could do
36
well at a thickness of 1,000 per square foot while Norway pine did better at 200-400 per
square foot. Covering seeds evenly with soil after planting was found to be important to
successful growth. Each seed type had recommended depth of cover specifications: white
pine - .5‖ of soil, Norway pine - .25‖ of soil, Scotch pine - .12-.25‖ of soil, Douglas fir .12 - .36‖ of soil, and balsam – no more than .12‖ of soil. Seeds covered more heavily
were prone to damping-off, a fungus caused by excessive moisture. Seeds germinated
best in unshaded, covered plots. Mulching seedbeds with sphagnum moss or burlap was
beneficial to all types of seeds although Norway pine were more prone to damping-off
when burlap was used. Norway and white pine seeds sometimes benefited from being
soaked in water for two days before planting.
Transplanting Seedlings from Seedbeds
Seedlings need a large and well-developed root system to survive. Root systems
supply them with nutrients needed to survive being transplanted.
According to studies, four-year-old seedlings had the best transplant survival rate
in northern Great Lakes states including Minnesota. The transplant process was as
follows: Seedlings were lifted from seedbeds in bunches to protect their roots. The lifting
process began with undercutting the seedbed with a lifter or shovel to loosen soil around
the roots of the seedlings. Enrollees then hand-lifted bunches of seedlings from the
seedbed and shook soil from the root systems. Each bunch of seedlings was moved to
transplant beds in the tree nurseries. They were put in rows about 100‘ long and tended
for two years before transplanting into the forest.
Seedlings were carefully watered. Water systems for nurseries included a pump
house, centrifugal pump, main water distribution line, and overhead sprinklers. The pump
was set to deliver 200 gallons of water per minute at a pressure of 45 pounds. This
provided .25 (1/4)‖ of water over the beds every twenty-four hours. Rainfall lessened
watering needs.
A former CCC enrollee remembered working in a tree nursery: ―Well, yes, one
summer I took a crew over to Cass Lake Nursery and we spent the whole summer there,
we were actually like gardening, weeding the little pine trees which were in rows. Well,
they were about 100-foot rows and they had built up siding on each side and they had
screens over them. And then we would uncover them and weed them, I think it was some
kind of screen to keep the sharp sun away from the small seedlings.‖
Planting Seedlings
The process for planting seedlings was as follows: Furrows were plowed 6-8‖
deep to prepare the ground for transplanting. Seedlings were bundled in soaking wet
burlap, up to 1,000 seedlings per bundle, and kept cool and damp until putting in the
ground. Care was taken to keep the roots moist at all times. A two-man planting team –
one putting the seedling in the furrow in the proper position (roots down, planted to the
knob on the stem) and the other putting dirt around it and tamping it with the feet – could
plant 1,000-1,200 seedlings, about one acre, in an hour.
A CCC reforestation pamphlet described the planting process: ‗Field planting is
done in the spring and the fall when the ground is moist. … Planting crews are usually
made up of two-man units. One with a grub hoe or a mattock digs the hole and prepares
the soil for planting. The second man, carrying the seedlings in a box or other container
37
which keeps them moist, follows and places the seedling in the hole, packs the earth
around it, and stamps it down. In some localities, particularly in the Lake states, where
the soils are sandy, and there is heavy growth of grass and brush, furrows are made by
special tractor or horse-drawn plows, and the trees are planted in the furrows.‖
A former CCC enrollee described the tree planting procedure as it was taught to
him: ―That [tree planting] was a procedure we had to follow very carefully. They had
furrowed in the woods and we could come along with a little box [of seedlings] and we‘d
have a tool where we‘d make a little wedge in the soil and we‘d take the young seedling
[from the box]. … We had to put it way down as far as we could and draw it back up.
And where the branches start, there is a little knob. That had to be level with the surface
of the soil. The reason for dipping it down, the roots had to be downward. If they bent up,
the tree would die. … And then we took our foot and tamped it.‖
Insert: CCC Reforestation pamphlet, Where and What to Plant, Tips on Tree Planting
Reforestation by the CCC (CCC Legacy Project 1 on the thumbdrive)
―Report of the Cloquet Forest Experiment Station,‖ U of MN Bulletin #169,
October 1917, CCC Legacy Project 3 on the project thumbdrive
―Common Forest Trees Pamphlet‖ and ―Tree Planting in Minnesota,‖
U of MN Bulletin #10, August 1918, CCC Legacy Project 2 on project thumbdrive
Log Construction
The United States Army oversaw CCC camp construction and ran the camps. As a
result CCC camps were military-style camps. During the first years, camp construction
styles varied. Most camps in northern Minnesota were built of logs that were sawn on
site. In 1937 the Army standardized camp construction using portable building
techniques. CCC camp building sections were transported to a work site on trains or
trucks and bolted together on site. This was a more efficient process and was used till
construction of CCC camps ended in 1942. Camp Rabideau in the Chippewa National
Forest is one of three intact CCC camps in the United States; it was built using portable
camp construction.
Prior to the introduction of portable camp construction, many Minnesota CCC
camps were built using palisade style construction. Palisade building style uses logs
standing on end and either pinned or bolted together. Many basic log construction
techniques are used in construction palisade-style buildings. The log building pamphlet at
the end of Section 5 includes detailed log construction guidelines.
Insert: ―Building with Logs Pamphlet,‖ CCC Legacy Project 6 on project thumbdrive
Resource Information
38
The following appendices provide background information about the Great
Depression and the Civilian Conservation Corps in the United States and in Minnesota.
Each appendix has a specific topical focus; together they provide material to support
interpretation of the Forest History Center Minnesota Forest Service site and the
suggested interpreter roles for the site.The appendices are as follows:
Appendix A. The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) – United States and
Minnesota
Appendix B. Civilian Conservation Corps Enrollee Manual
Appendix C. CCC-Indian Division Enrollee Manual – first two sections
Appendix D. CCC Camps and Camp Life – Minnesota
Appendix E. CCC Work Agencies – United States and Minnesota
Appendix F. CCC Work Programs – Minnesota
Appendix G. Early 20th Century United States Conservation History
Appendix H. Minnesota Forest, Park, and Soil Conservation History
Appendix I. The Great Depression and the New Deal
Appendix J. Minnesota in the Great Depression Years
Appendix K. Personal Stories – Minnesota during the Great Depression
Appendix L. Popular Culture during the Great Depression
Appendix A. The Civilian Conservation Corps – United States and Minnesota
39
The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) was one of President Franklin Delano
Roosevelt‘s first New Deal programs and is often thought to be his favorite. It grew out
of his and his cousin‘s, President Theodore Roosevelt‘s, decades-long interest in
conservation. Franklin Roosevelt‘s idea was to provide employment for young men
through work on conservation projects. He first discussed the idea with aides on the
evening of March 4, 1933—Inauguration Day. He sent the bill for the program to
Congress seventeen days later, on March 21, 1933. Congress acted quickly, passing the
legislation ten days after that, on March 31, 1933. The program‘s original official name
was the Emergency Conservation Work program (ECW) but it quickly became known by
the name Roosevelt gave it in his message to Congress: ―I have proposed the creation of a
civilian conservation corps to be used in simple work, confirming itself to forestry,
preservation of soil erosion, flood control, and similar projects.‖ It became known as
Roosevelt‘s Tree Army because of the number of trees the enrollees planted. Enrollees
planted three billion trees nationally. 124,000,000 of these were in Minnesota.
The Civilian Conservation Corps
President Roosevelt was closely associated with the CCC. A CCC forester
remembered this connection: ―Of course, this was [Franklin] Roosevelt's big project, his
dream to get everybody back to work. There were a lot of people that were in deep
depression, and I mean emotional depression, during those periods. So they were just
happy to have something to do.‖
The CCC operated in all forty-eight states and in Hawaii, Alaska, Puerto Rico,
and the Virgin Islands. It was managed from a small office whose personnel worked
closely with their liaisons in the United States Departments of Labor, Agriculture,
Interior, and War. The War Department, run by Chief of Staff Douglas MacArthur,
oversaw the U.S. Army, which managed camp operations. Franklin Roosevelt appointed
Robert Fechner, a Southerner, machinist, American Federation of Labor union official,
and Army veteran, as CCC director. Fechner served from 1933 until he passed away from
a heart ailment in December 1939. He was succeeded by James J. McEntee, CCC
assistant director, who ran the CCC until funding ended in 1943.
The CCC was a work/relief program. Enrollees were accepted four times a year in January, April, July, and October. Enrollment requirements for junior enrollees, who
made up the majority of CCC enrollees, were:
men only (women not allowed)
ages 18-25
U.S. citizen
unemployed
unmarried
able to pass a physical exam
eligible for relief or from a family eligible for relief
One enrollee described early eligibility in an oral history interview as: ―You had to be
really poor‖ to get into the CCC.
In May 1933, responding to the needs of unemployed World War I veterans, the
CCC also began to accept veterans. Veterans requirements were:
certified eligible by the Veterans Administration
no age restrictions
40
could be single or married
All enrollees, juniors and veterans, received room, board, and clothing. They
enlisted for a six-month enrollment period and were eligble to re-enlist once in the early
years. This was changed to options for multiple re-enlistments in later years.
After enlisting, enrollees were given physicals and shots, issued clothing (surplus
World War I until supplies ran out) and personal items, and were organized into 200person companies. Each company was given a number. For administrative purposes,
Minnesota was in the Seventh Army Corps area (part of the Third Army Area) along with
Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri, North Dakota, South Dakota, Iowa, and Nebraska. Seventh
Army Corps headquarters were at Fort Crook in Omaha, Nebraska. Company numbers
indicated which army corps area a company was in; because Minnesota was in the
Seventh Army Corps area, CCC companies in the state had a 7 in the hundreds position
(Company 712, Company 1728 and so on).
Within the state, Minnesota was divided into four Army administrative
subdistricts. Three of these were in forest areas: the East Superior Subdistrict
headquartered in Two Harbors, the International Falls Subdistrict headquartered in
Hibbing, and the Chippewa Subdistrict headquartered in Cass Lake. The fourth, the
Southeastern Subdistrict, in Rochester, was in an area of widespread soil erosion. CCC
camps were run by a camp commander, either a reserve or regular army officer, several
subordinate officers, a work program director, and work program aides called Local
Experience Men (LEM). LEMs were hired because of their experience on work program
needs.
Enrollees worked about eight hours a day, five days a week, on the camp‘s
conservation work programs. They were paid $30 a month and had to designate a
dependant who would automatically receive $25 of this amount (later lowered to $22).
Camp commanders handed out the remaining $5-$8 in cash to each enrollee at the end of
each month. The $25 dependents‘ allotment is the equivalent of about $400 in 2010.
There were options for advancement in the CCC. Crew (section) leaders earned
$45/month (enrollee promotion). Assistant crew (section) leaders earned $36/month
(enrollee promotion). Enrollees also had opportunities to work in camp at the regular pay
level or with a slight increase. In-camp work assignments included first-aid attendant,
latrine orderly, night fireman, canteen clerk, office clerks, truck drivers, assistant cooks,
and bakers. LEMs taught enrollees specific skills such as stone working, log construction
techniques, and the like. They earned around $100 a month.
Forest service personnel earned standard professional wages. In 1935, camp work
project superintendents earned $2,600/year. Junior foresters earned between $1,800 and
$2,000/year and foremen earned between $1,680 and $1,860/year with technical foremen
earning slightly more.
Camp work project leaders sometimes established side or spike camps at work
sites away from the main camps. Side or spike camps usually had no more than twentyfive enrollees and were for temporary, short-term work project needs only. They were
managed by work program leaders rather than the army personnel.
As the CCC became more established and the worst of the depression began to
lift, stringent relief restrictions for junior enrollees were removed. In 1937 when the CCC
was established as an independent agency (ending the Emergency Conservation Work
program) and given three years of work program funding, the relief requirement was
41
eliminated. From that time on, enrollees could not be regularly ―in attendance at school,
or possessing full time employment.‖
The 1937 bill also changed the purpose of the CCC. Although the program still
focused on employment and conservation, for the first time it included a formal education
component. From then on it became mandatory for enrollees to receive ten hours of
vocational and academic training per week.
The CCC changed again in 1939. Federal legislation transfered it to the new
Federal Security Agency (FSA) along with the Social Security Board, the Works
Progress Administration (WPA), the National Youth Administration (NYA), U.S.
Employment Service, and the Office of Education. By 1940 with war on the horizon,
CCC work projects and education programs changed further. The emphasis on the CCC
as a relief program continued to decline and work projects increasingly included
vocational training and defense work.
The years 1935-6 saw peak enrollment and work project numbers for the CCC
nationally and in Minnesota. Between 1937 and 1939, even as it was administered an
independent agency, the numbers of enrollees began to decline. The program began to
move toward war footing in 1940 and limped along for several months after Pearl Harbor
(December 7, 1941). With army officers fighting in World War II and young men being
drafted, however, most camps in Minnesota and throughout the country had closed by
June 1942. Funding for the CCC ended on June 30, 1943, the same day funding for the
Works Progress Administration (WPA) ended. These work relief programs, along with
the National Youth Administration (NYA), were considered unnecessary in America‘s
wartime economy.
Nationally, the CCC spent a little less than $3 billion total for food, shelter, camp
construction, and enrollee transportation. Of this amount, $662,895,000 was paid in
allotments to dependents. The cost of running a camp was $900-$1,000 per enrollee per
year. In Minnesota, the CCC spent $85 million and received an estimated work value of
$664 per enrollee. It paid over $17.5 million in allotments to dependents‘ families.
CCC Enrollees
Who were the CCC enrollees? Approximately 55% of enrollees were from rural
communities, a majority of which were non-farm; 45% came from urban areas. Enrollee
education levels were, on the average: 3% illiterate, 38% less than eight years' of school,
48% did not complete high school, 11% were high school graduates. A typical enrollee
was white (African American enrollment was capped at 10% of the CCC population) and
one of six children with little or no work experience. When they enrolled, 70% were
malnourished (about ten pounds underweight). They were on the average, 5‘8‖ tall and
poorly clothed. Enrollees ate $.50 worth of food a day, gained ten pounds, and grew half
an inch during a six-month enrollment period. Over 40,000 enrollees learned to read and
write in the CCC.
Nationally, a little less than 3.5 million men served in the CCC. In Minnesota,
more than 77,000 (some figures go as high as 85,000) people served in Minnesota‘s 148
CCC camps. An educational advisor later described early enrollees as ―hungry, broke,
some were poorly clothed, some had dropped out of school, and a few had gotten into
mischief …because they had no gainful work to do.‖ At the beginning, when relief
42
standards were the strictest, a former enrollee remembered ―[i]t was kind of a deal that
you had to be really poor.‖
CCC enrollees were among those hit the hardest by the Great Depression. Juniors
– often called boys – the young men between the ages of eighteen and twenty-five who
made up the largest number of enrollees, had a 50% unemployment rate. Unemployment
for their parents hovered between 25-30%, with 70% unemployment regularly reported
on the Iron Range. Out-of-work World War I veterans, unable to get payments due them,
were desperate enough to organize two marches on Washington, D. C. (the Bonus
Armies) to demand help. After the second march, the CCC was modified to include a
veterans division.
Many years later, enrollees remembered the hard times:
―[My parents and grandparents] worked all year, produced a crop, and then,
when they sold it, they weren‘t able to pay their feed bills.‖
―The banks went broke, and [my father] lost all his money. In fact, [my
parents] were quite wealthy, and they lost it all. It didn‘t make any difference
whether you were rich or poor, when the banks went broke, everybody was
treated the same.‖
―I left school in the eleventh grade, just like most everybody else. I could have
made it through twelfth grade easy. I was pretty good at school. But it was
tough times, you know. And I had to help my dad.‖
―I dropped out [of high school] because I was taking care of myself. . . . One
of my sisters went with my grandparents, and one went with my aunt and
uncle. My mother went to Rochester and worked for two dollars a week, and,
quite frankly, I was left standing on the streets.‖
―I had a paper route. Any money that I got, my mother and I went to Eveleth
and got flour and things. And we had a garden and a few calves and hogs and
chickens. That‘s the way we kept alive.‖
―[A relief grocery] . . . order for my family went into one large bag. That was
for the month!‖
―I was going to reach for that second slice of bread, and my mother didn‘t say
anything. But she raised her finger. And I understood: we needed something
for the next meal.‖
―I didn‘t know how I was going to eat from day to day.‖
―You were a marked individual when you put on a pair of pants that you got
from the relief places; welfare gray, starchy, some company must have made a
million pair and sold them to the government.‖
―I was probably seventeen years old. I had never really been away from home
before for any time at all.‖
―We were pretty scared kids.‖
After enrolling, recruits were sent to processing centers. In Minnesota, for the first
years of the CCC, Fort Snelling was the processing center. Here enrollees got their
physicals and shots. They took a civilian Oath of Enrollment, were issued clothing
(surplus World War I uniforms until they ran out) and personal supplies, and were given
a two-week conservation work program training course. Lastly, they were assigned to
companies and sent, usually by train, to a camp.
43
The CCC Oath of Enrollment, ca. 1940
I, ________, do solemnly swear that the information given above as to my status is
correct. I agree to remain in the Civilian Conservation Corps for the period terminating at
the discretion of the United States between ____________________ unless sooner
released by proper authority, and that I will obey those in authority and observe all the
rules and regulations thereof to the best of my ability and will accept such allowances as
may be provided pursuant to law and regulations promulgated pursuant thereto. I
understand and agree that any injury received or disease contracted by me while a
member of the Civilian Conservation Corps cannot be made the basis of any claim
against the government, except such as I may be entitled to under the act of September 7,
1916, and that I shall not be entitled to any allowance upon release from camp, except
transportation in kind to the place at which I was accepted for enrollment. I understand
further that any articles issued to me by the United States Government for use while a
member of the Civilian Conservation Corps are, and remain, property of the United
States Government and that willful destruction, loss, sale or disposal of such property
renders me financially responsible for the cost thereof and liable to trial in the civil
courts. I understand further that any infraction of the rules or regulations of the Civilian
Conservation Corps renders me liable to expulsion therefrom. So help me God.
The unofficial motto of the CCC was: ―We can take it!‖ Enrollees, quick to find
nicknames for almost everything, called the army ―mother‖ because it fed, clothed, and
sheltered them. Camp commanders maintained discipline through use of dishonorable
discharges. Although they didn‘t carry the weight of dishonorable discharges from the
armed forces, it was a deterrent to breaking camp rules.
44
Appendix B. Insert CCC Enrollee Manual
Appendix C. Insert first two sections of CCC-Indian Division Enrollee Manual
45
Appendix D. CCC Camps and Camp Life - Minnesota
Minnesota had close to 150 CCC camps. Many enrollees, especially those from
the first years of the CCC, remember being trucked to an empty site. Their first work
program was to build the camp. They lived in large army canvas tents with wooden floors
until camp buildings were completed.
CCC camps were army-style work camps. Camp buldings were built according to
basic army layout and design. Camps generally had the following buildings:
enrollee barracks, usually housing fifty enrollees each
officers/technical staff quarters
infirmary for illnesses or injuries that were not serious enough to warrant
hospitalization in town
mess hall
recreation hall
education building (formalized in 1937)
lavatory and showers
technical/administrative offices
tool room/blacksmith shop
motor pool garages
During the first years of the CCC, buildings were of palisade or sawed lumber and
tarpaper construction. They were uninsulated and were heated with wood or coal stoves.
Since camps usually were beyond the end of any electrical lines in an area, most had an
electrical generator.
In 1937, the army standardized camp design and directed use of portable
buildings for CCC camp construction. The number of camp buildings and the camp
layout remained essentially the same but construction specifications changed. Portable
buildings had no foundations and board-and-batten or clapboard exteriors. Roofs were
covered with rolled roofing or shingles. Interior walls had some paneling and windows
were six-pane, swing-out types. Long bolts held the buildings together. As with the
earlier buildings, they were uninsulated and heated with wood or coal stoves. Camp
Rabideau in the Chippewa National Forest, a surviving CCC camp and National Historic
Landmark, is an example of CCC portable building construction.
CCC camps had distinctive features. The camp entrance was built by enrollees
who sometimes vied with other camps for the most distinctive design. All camps had a
flagpole in a central location and a camp bulletin board on which information was
regularly posted. Camp beautification projects included flower beds surrounded by whitepainted stones and paved walkways. Camps competed with one another for best camp
recognition.
Interiors of CCC camp buildings were spartan. One enrollee commented: ―One
thing I remember about the barracks was that you could start sweeping the floor from one
end, you never had any dust at the other end. There was space between the boards on the
floor and all the dust went down.‖
Furniture most often was army-issue or made by enrollees. Money earned from
selling candy, cigarettes, and other sundries at the camp canteen sometimes was used to
purchase items the enrollees wanted, such as recreation hall furniture, washing machines,
and books or magazines for the camp library. The only personal space for enrollees were
46
their bunks and CCC footlockers they kept at the ends of their bunks. Officers quarters
and recreation buildings sometimes had native rock fireplaces built by enrollees.
Camps may have been spartan, but they were not always cheap. The first camps
cost $18,000-$20,000 to build – a high price for a facility that would, in some cases, only
be used for six months. At $5,000 apiece, portable camps represented significant cost
savings. Even with an estimated $5,000 moving cost involving twelve railroad cars and
100 truckloads of materials, portable camps saved money.
First-Hand Description of a Minnesota CCC Camp
The following oral history interview excerpt provides a first-hand description of a
working CCC camp. It was recorded in 1977 with Clair T. Rollings, an educational
advisor at Camp Rabideau. In it Rollings describes Camp Rabideau as members of
Company 708 saw it when they were transferred from Camp Winnibigoshish (―Winnie‖)
during the first week of January 1936. Camp Rabideau was new – built in September
1935.
―The entire camp was surprised in late December 1935 to hear Company 708 would
move and Winnie [Camp Winnibigoshish] would probably be abandoned. The transfer
would be to Camp Rabideau at Blackduck. The weather was bitter cold; coldest on record
to date. Enrollees and some staff members would find comfortable quarters within
Rabideau camp but the Educational Advisor and several other staff members would have
to find quarters outside the new camp area. Some decided to live in nearly resort cabins
or in town but I decided I would try a new idea. I would have a trailer house built and live
in it within walking distance of Rabideau camp.
The temperature continued to fall and reached lows of -28 to -44 during the week of our
move. I vividly recall one trip during the week of our move when the truck in which I
was riding slid into the snow-covered creek at the south edge of Blackduck. The truck lay
on its side and I was on the bottom of a pile of three riding in the truck cab. Foul-smelling
sewer water from the creek rushed into the cab and I was a real mess as I finally crawled
out of the cab into the freezing air. Surprisingly forty enrollees pulling in unison on a
rope pulled the truck back onto the road after two trucks with spinning wheels had failed
to do the job.
The final day of the move arrived. It was on or about January 5, 1936. It was a bitter cold
day; the temperature stood at about -25 at noon. It would sink to -40 or -45 after nightfall.
The Army truck was to bring my household goods from Camp Winnie while I towed my
newly-finished, non-insulated, plywood house trailer from Cass Lake to Rabideau camp.
Late in the afternoon I arrived with the trailer at a spot I had previously shoveled in the
snow under the large spruce trees on the southwest corner of Karl Lake. The Army truck
arrived just before sundown with my household goods – everything bu the heating stove
which they had forgotten.
The good wife and I started our little two-burner gasoline camp stove and plugged
unclosed trap doors in the trailer floor as best we could. We put on all the clothes we had
and jumped into our trailer bed piled high with every coat and blanket we possessed. By
47
daylight the next morning our thermometer read -42 outside our trailer and only slightly
higher on the inside. Needless to say my first move that morning was a quick trip into
Blackduck to purchase a heating stove.
Despite the extremely cold temperature, which reached a low of -55 one morning in midJanuary at the Blackduck Ranger Station, our first impression of Camp Rabideau was
favorable. The forest green, white-trimmed camp buildings, standing in deep snow
among sparkling white birch trees, made a pretty picture. I still vividly recall those daily
hikes down that snowy trail, flanked on either side by white birch, which led from my
trailer to the camp schoolhouse. This trail passed the camp wood pile. The wood crew
was busily buzzing wood with the big, one-cylinder gas engine buzz saw as I passed one
cold morning. When I asked how the saw was running that day, one of the crewmen
answered ‗just like a scared Swede.‘ The snowshoe hare, blackcapped chickadees and
Canada jays I saw daily as I passed along this trail became old friends. I often left tidbits
of food to make them ever more friendly and easier to observe.
We found the buildings at Rabideau to be in good condition. I was delighted to find we
had a separate barracks-type bulding for our camp schoolhouse. We needed this newfound space for a camp library, workshop and new classes we had recently added to our
schedule. With some new funds Captain Jim Free, our commanding officer at Rabideau,
had found for us, we soon had our workshop, complete with turning lathe, power saw and
other basic tools. Interested enrollees could spend an entire evening, undistrubed, in the
shop. ‗Greek,‘ or Ed Poeping, was one of the most expert on the lathe. He turned out
lamps and other articles worthy of display in a gift shop. In fact ‗Greek‘ did open his own
gift shop after leaving the camp.
The school library was soon completed and by mid-1936 Camp 708 had built up a
respectable collection of books and other study materials. Always displayed in our library
were several copies of Happy Days, a commercial print newspaper covering CCC
activities throughout the nation. All camps received this newspaper. In addition,
Company 708 put out its own Pine Knots. This was a monthly, mimeographerd
publication. Pine Knots was the only camp paper in the country with a block printed
cover in full color. The center section of the cover was changed with each issue to fit the
season. It was a lot of work but the pride and satisfaction gained in getting out Pine Knots
was well worth the effort.
By late 1936 we had added a good 16mm sound projector to our visual aids. This
projector was used several evenings per week in the camp classrooms and for special
shows in the rec hall.
To complete the remodeling of our Camp Rabideau schoolhouse, we partitioned off
classrooms so enrollees could enter or leave any room without disturbing those in another
class. The addition of some blackboards, desks and classroom chairs gave us a
comfortable and efficient camp school. The slate walk, made from old pool talbe slates,
dressed the fron approach to the school. The final touch was an archway over the front
walk, built in the school shop, on whicn climbing and flowering vines grew.
48
Generally the Rabideau camp buildings were simijlar to those built in all camps a few
years after the program got underway. In the center of the camp area was the latrinelaundry with showers and hot and cold running water. It was always interesting to watch
enrollees do their laundry. Clothes were generally washed on Saturday morning in
preparation for the Saturday night trip to Blackduck. With a washborad and strong
laundry soap, enrollees washed their clothes with vigor. Then came the rinsing or
‗wrenching‘ as some called it. However it was in the wringing that the real ingenuity
developed. Some folded bigger pieces of wet clothes and beat the water out of them over
the side of the laundry tub. Others gave their wet clothes the mightly twist with muscles
bulging in either arm. A few worked in pairs with one enrollee on either end twisting in
opposite directions. This was the ‗super twist.‘ The marvel was that those GI clothes were
not torn asunder with each wash.
There were occassions when it took real ingenuity to get the clothes dry in time for the
big Saturday night trip to Blackduck. If the clothes were washed as scheduled, early
Saturday morning, there was ample time to dry the clothes on the line outside the
barracks. However, some always procrastinated an dgot their wash done late. These
latecomers often tried to sneak their wet clothes into the barracks and hang them over the
barrel stoves. Enrollees on bunks near the stoves made some real caustic remarks about
those wet, smelly socks.
The commanding officer, Captain Jim Free, the assistant CO, and Doctor Ehrenreich,
lived in officers‘ quarters near the southeast corner of the camp area. Ray Mattson and
other foresters lived in Forestry quarters in the south central part of the area.
Headquarters building in the southeast corner of camp provided office space for Army
personnel and forestry superintendent. The supply room was in the rear of headquarters
building.
During a brief period of disagreement between ‗Soup‘ Campbell, [forestry]
superintendent, and Captain Free, CO, when they were on very limited speaking terms,
they wrote letters to each other rather than step through the door in the office particition
and discuss their business. The eight feet which separated their desks was probably the
shortest distance official CCC mail ever traveled. When ‗Knobby‘ Knoblaugh took over
as forestry superintendent, the big feud was settled and ‗Knobby‘ became known as
‗Peacemaker.‘
Doc Ehrenreich, or Doc ‗Splittenrich‘ as he was affectionately known, ruled the camp
hospital in the south-central part of the camp area, just east of the forestry quarters. Doc
‗Splittenrich‘ spoke with a high-pitched, gravelly voice. I shall never forget Doc‘s
lengthy lectures on personal hygiene and V.D. to 200 enrollees seated in the shade on the
hilldide under the white birch near the camp hospital. Doc‘s voice carried only a few feet
and enrollees beyond the front row could only guess what Doc was saying, but they
remained respectfully quiet and enjoyed the serenity and beauty of this outdoor setting at
Camp Rabideau.
49
Doc was also an avid, but strictly novice, fisherman. During his frequest fishing trips on
Benjamin Lake, he always insisted on his orderly rowing the boat. What a picture to see
Doc out on Benjamin Lake, perched high on the rear seat of the boat, casting sildly in all
directions, while the orderly ducked the fishhook and pulled desparately on the oars
trying to keep the boat from tipping or wandering.
The mess hall and bakery on the north-central edge of the camp area overlooked Karl
Lake. On the mess hall walls were large, 10-to-15-foot murals showing beautiful outdoor
scenes painted by an enrollee artist. He first painted a small mural in the officers‘ mess
which to pleased Captain Free that he gave the enrollee a job painting all the the cellotex
walls on the inside of the mess hall.
The rec hall was located just west of the mess hall overlooking Karl Lake near the
northwest corner of the camp area. It contained a canteen, barbershop, pool and pingpong
tables, and a rack containing a few papers and magazines. Mr. Montgomery, a bachelor
recluse living in a cabin on the northeast corner of Karl Lake, made regular trips into the
rec hall to read the magazines. Finally Montgomery began taking the magazines home
and Captain Free gave him the bum‘s rush out of camp. For this Montgomery took pot
shots at Captain Free‘s car as it passed on the road to Blackduck. Later, after Camp
Rabideau closed, Montgomery shot a neighbor right between the eyes and was sentenced
to life imprisonment for murder.
The garage and repair shop were located in the extreme southwest corner of the camp
area, about 100 yeards away from the other buildings. The only building fire I remember
during my five-and-a-half years in camp wiped out the garage with the loss of several
trucks, tools, and other supplies.
Five or six barracks were arranged in a rough circle in the center of the camp area. Care
had been taken to preserve as many of the young white birch as possible when the
barracks and other camp buildings were built. In the more open areas of camp, native
grasses covered the ground while in the more dense shade, wild ferns, violets and other
native flowers and shurbs were found. In summer the dark gree buildings blended nicely
with the deep shade and contrasted beautifully with the sparkling white paper birch.
The camp well and pumphouse were located about 150 feet east of the officers‘ quarters
in the southeast corner of the camp. I recall Captain Free giving ‗Screwy‘ Gireau, the
night watchman, ‗hail Columbia‘ when he thought ‗Screwy‘ had forgotten to check the
oil on the pump engine and it had burned out with a bearing. ‗Screwy‘ later vindicated
himself with it was learned the cause of the burned bearing was not a shortage of oil.
As I recall a light plant did furnish camp with electrical energy and the plant house was
located a little east of the pumphouse in the extreme eastern edge of the camp area. I
vaguely remember the electric current being a little low at times for really bright pictures
from our 16mm movie projector.
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The underground gasoline storage tank and gas pump were located about 150 feet
southwest of the forestry quarters and perhaps 200 feet south of the schoolhouse, just
west of the corner in the main camp trail.
Bulletin borads were strategically located in front of the schoolhouse, the headquarters
building, and the latrine. Evening classes, short-term inspections, recreation trips,
andother important events were posted on the camp bulletin boards and these were
required reading.
By the summer of 1936, the first year for Company 708 at Camp Rabideau, the
educational program had become well-organized. The Educational Advisor and his
assistant, Orville Anderson, and later Allen Windlund, were teaching evening classes in
such basic subjects as public speaking, correspondence, practical mathematics, typing,
and etc. Army staff members taught first aid, personal hygiene et.al. Foresters and LEMs
[local experienced men] contributed to the program by giving special on-the-job training
in the field, supplemented by evening classes in the schoolhouse.
In the camp school, enrollees plugged holes in their training which they had missed in
elementary or high school. Hundreds of completion certificates were given for these
courses. A few enrollees were able to complete their elementary or high school training
in preparation for entering college after leaving camp.
Many of the on-the-job training enrollees became proficient in operating builldozers,
earth-moving equipment, draglines and heavy trucks. Others learned how to build roads
and bridges and recreation areas and the fireplaces, picnic tables and other structures
needed in these areas. Still others learned enough about general forestry management to
lead cres in tree planting, timber stand improvement, logging, fire fighting, surveying,
and othe forest management jobs.
It has been great satisfaction to have enrollees say to me, years after leaving camp, they
learned much in their camp training program and were holding down responsible jobs as
a direct result of this training. Typical of these was Lloyd Sather who took both evening
classes and on-the-job training seriously and worked hard at both. After leaving camp he
became a foreman in heavy equipment operation and construction work and has held
responsible and rewarding jobs in this field since he left Company 708. Many more
Company 708 enrollees have told me how they benefited from the training and
experience gained in the CCC. These testimonials from former Company 708 enrollees
are my greatest reward for my five-and-one-half years as camp Educational Advisor.
Meeting the chaplain and arranging for camp church services was a duty usually
performed by the Educational Advisor. Services were often held in the schoolhouse
library or one of the classrooms. One chaplain was responsible for several camps so
services were sometimes held on days other than Sunday. I recall the portable altar made
by enrollees in the camp workshop which the chaplain was pleased to use. The singing
was usually led by an enrollee on the piano. On a few special occassions several enrollees
contributed on other instruments.
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Payday was one of the most important days of the month in camp. Captain Free,
Commanding Officer, the assistant CO, and John Harrington, first sergeant, all in Class A
uniforms, sat at the had of a long table in the rec hall. A fully-loaded Army Colt .45
caliber automatic pistol lay on the table beside the ready hand of the assistant CO. The
first sargeant called out each enrollee‘s name and the amount of his pay as he approached
the table. Captain Free had a huge stack of bills and a box of coins from which he
carefully counted out each enrollee‘s pay. At the door of the rec hall stood the money
lenders collecting the capital plus good interest on loans made to fellow enrollees during
the month. Although it was discouraged, some high-powered poker and crap games
usually developed in the barracks immediately after pay; and most enrollees jammed a
few greenbacks into their pocket for that payday fling in Blackduck.‖
Camp Life
Life in a CCC camp was carefully structured and enrollees were expected to
follow the rules. The day usually began with reveille, followed by roll call, a flag-raising
ceremony, and breakfast. After breakfast on weekdays, enrollees reported for
conservation work project assignments. They were assigned to 10-20 person crews with a
crew leader and worked a seven-hour day with time out for lunch and morning and
afternoon breaks. Returning to camp, they had free time before and after dinner. Bed
check at the end of the day made sure everyone was accounted for. Inspections, vehicle
maintenance, and other camp clean-up work was scheduled on Saturday morning. When
Saturday chores were completed, enrollees stayed in camp, were issued a pass to go to
town, or took one of the two trips home they were allowed each enrollment period.
A CCC daily schedule typically followed this routine (from CCC Handbook,
1939):
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A former enrollee described the daily routine like this:
6:30 AM Wake up, get dressed, make bed, clean up barracks for day
7:15 AM Breakfast. Food served family style. Stood by seat until mess sergeant yelled
―Seats,‖ then could sit down and eat. Everyone sat at once and ate together.
7:45 AM Roll call, fall out for field work detail, pick up work tools for the day from the
garage/tool shed. Either walk or get in truck to go to work site.
If not feeling well, reported to camp infirmary
12 noon Broke for lunch (called dinner if eaten in camp). Either went back to camp for
hot meal of stew, meatballs, or hot dogs, potatoes, fruit, bread, pie, and coffee, or,
if work site too far from camp, ate lunch at the site. At work site, truck driver
would bring out sandwiches, fruit, pies, donuts, and would either bring coffee out
or make coffee
1 PM Back to work for the afternoon
4:45 PM Work ended for the day. Headed back to camp to clean up for the evening.
Reporting to the evening meal in work clothes earned KP
5:30 PM Dinner (also called supper). Menu similar to noon dinner – always served
family style and all you could eat
6 PM Free time. Went to rec hall to play pool, ping pong, or other games or to read
53
Attended classes at education center, did hobbies such as wood working,
watched movies, sometimes on conservation topics, took forestry or other
conservation classes, got together to play music or talk, wrote letters home,
played poker, whist, cribbage or other card games, listened to radio if one was
available, played on sports teams
10 PM Lights out, bed check by camp commander or his assistants
Camp Meals
Some of enrollees‘ strongest and best memories of the CCC were about food.
Enrollees received three full meals a day. Breakfast and supper were in the mess hall.
Dinner – the noon meal - was eaten in the mess hall or as lunch brought to enrollees on a
work site. An enrollee described camp meals: ―After we got to the mess hall we all got to
go in there and eat together. We had KPs that brought in the food and they served you the
food. They put the food in one big bowl and different big bowls and set them on the table.
Then you help yourself.‖ With three square meals a day, enrollees grew. One enrollee
even remembered, ―Some of the boys got pretty husky.‖
Typical CCC camps meals were not fancy. They were meat-and-potatoes fare –
plain but substantial food that could be cooked for 200+ people at a time. Examples of
several Minnesota CCC camps meals are:
May 1934
Breakfast: Cream of what, creamed beef on toast, stewed prunes, milk, coffee, doughnuts
Dinner: Chili con carne, boiled potatoes and gravy, buttered beets, cabbage slaw, bread,
butter, coffee
Lunch in the field: cold meats, potato salad, stringless beans, raisin pudding, bread, jam.
orange punch
Supper: Baked pork steaks, mashed potatoes and gravy, creamed peas, lemon pudding,
bread, apple butter, cocoa
October 1934
Breakfast: Fried eggs (sometimes alternating with French toast), fried bacon, dry cereal,
bread, butter, sugar, coffee
Dinner: Boiled frankfurters, boiled potatoes and gravy, sauerkraut, rice custard, bread,
butter, coffee with cream and sugar
Supper: Hamburger balls, mashed potatoes and gravy, fried hominy, cole slaw,
bread, butter, cocoa
July 1935
Breakfast: Fried eggs, toast, stewed apricots, milk, butter, coffee, bran flakes
Dinner: Baked beans, boiled potatoes, cream gravy, pickled onions, sliced dill pickles,
bread, butter, chocolate pudding, coffee
Supper: Beef stew, boiled potatoes, stewed tomatoes, bread, butter, cake, coffee
Sunday Dinner: Roast beef, washed spuds, brown gravy, creamed peas, lettuce salad,
cream of tomato soup, bread, butter, apple pie, coffee
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October 1935
Breakfast: Fried eggs, fried ham, milk, dry cereal, grapefruit, bread, butter, coffee
Dinner: Vegetable beef stew, boiled potatoes, lettuce salad, bread pudding, bread, butter,
coffee
Field Lunch: Sandwiches, fruit, coffee
Supper: Baked franks, sauerkraut, boiled potatoes, cream gravy, fried hominy, pickles,
doughnuts, bread, butter, coffee
A CCC truck driver described a field lunch: ―I‘d … get the coffee and their
sandwiches…four sandwiches apiece. I come back and put the coffee by the fire so it
keeps warm.‖ Another enrollee remembered field lunches of summer sausage or baloney
sandwiches with cake or cookies for dessert.
Most enrollees remembered getting enough food, although some complained
about a monotonous diet. One enrollee remembered "some of the people taking the food
and throwing it on the wall and calling it ‗pig's food.‘ But when you're talking about
cooking for two-three hundred people, you can't please everybody. It was good
wholesome food."
A camp commander kept track of the cost per day of feeding an entire CCC camp.
His menus included: fresh milk, stewed prunes, griddle cakes, scrambled eggs, butter,
syrup, coffee, and sugar for breakfast at a cost of $17.92; roast beef, mashed potatoes,
brown gravy, buttered peas, cole slaw, blackberry pie, bread, butter, coffee, and sugar for
dinner at a cost of $24.36; and barbecued ribs, mashed potatoes, pan gravy, Italian
macaroni, sliced pickles, canned peaches, bread, butter, ice tea, and sugar for supper at a
cost of $16.93. The total food cost for one day of meals in his CCC camp was $59.21.
For holidays, especially Thanksgiving and Christmas, enrollees got special meals.
Newspaper articles sometimes described CCC holidays meals like ―mother used to
prepare.‖ Illustrated menus for holiday dinners in camps were printed for these meals:
Thanksgiving dinner, 1936
fruit punch
celery
olives
dill pickles
roast turkey and dressing
giblet gravy
candied sweet potatoes
mashed potatoes
cranberry sauce
asparagus tips
lettuce salad and French dressing
Parker House rolls with butter
bananas
grapes
apples
nuts
candy
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mince pie
pumpkin pie
Neapolitan ice cream
mints
wafers
coffee
Christmas dinner, 1934
vegetable soup
roast turkey
mashed potatoes
brown gravy
baked sweet potatoes
lettuce with French dressing
creamed cauliflower
sliced tomatoes
celery
rolls and bread with butter
plum pudding
mince meat pie
coffee
sugar
milk
candies
nuts
assorted fruits.
Liquor was not allowed in most camps, although enrollees sometimes got a bottle
of beer with a holiday meal.
If there was not enough food, enrollees complained or refused to work, as they did
at Wanless camp in 1934. Seagull camp also had food problems in 1935 and again in
1938. One enrollee from Company 3709 wrote to President Roosevelt in 1935: ―The head
officers are to blame. … they don‘t know what fruit means, nor pies or cake. Just canned
milk once in a while.‖ When they didn‘t get enough to eat or when meals didn‘t improve,
enrollees didn‘t just write letters. As another enrollee remembered: ―Seagull could have
been run better. The food was pretty bad for awhile and there wasn‘t much of it, either.
The camp commander was selling it. We had a couple of food riots. We had some guys
who had done time at St. Cloud [State Penitentiary] and they knew the ropes. Finally, we
wrote Washington [D.C.] and somebody came and investigated and then things were a
little better.‖ The official report from this investigation described the reasons for the
complaints: ―breakfast … consisted of yellow corn meal served as cereal, one small meat
ball, and two doughnuts to each man, stale bread and coffee. … At noon … the dinner
[was] [t]hree sandwiches … - one jelly, one cheese, one peanut butter. They had been
made the night before and were dry and hard. The boys complained that there was no
butter on them. There was no fruit, cake or pie. Nothing to drink, except water.‖
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Food Preparation
Enrollee work assignments included serving with the mess sergeant as cook‘s
helpers and bakers. All enrollees took turns helping with food preparation, however.
They were put on Kitchen Patrol – KP – just as if they were in the army. ―Everyone had a
crack at that KP,‖ as one enrollee remembered. Everyone also seemed to have a KP story.
KP also was used as a form of discipline. One woman remembered hearing her brother
was always being put on KP probably because, as she said, ―He had a mouth on him.‖ An
enrollee remembered a camp commander using KP as a punishment for enrollees who
came to the evening meal in their work clothes without washing up. Another enrollee said
he learned to peel a garbage can full of potatoes in two hours when he was on KP. An
enrollee described the KP routine at his forest camp: "It wasn't bad, but you wash a lot of
dishes and kettles and had to keep it clean. The mess sergeant, he kept you on the ball.
You had to clean and scrub the Mess Hall and scrub the tables. You had to clean the
refrigerator and the big walk-in cooler. He kept everything clean. It had to be clean."
This was more than an arbitrary rule. The Fernberg camp had a typhoid epidemic in 1936
because of lack of proper procedures for cleanliness. At least three people died before the
situation was corrected.
John Cackoski described his work assignment an assistant cook:
―I was an assistant cook. I learned how to cook, roasts and that. Our captain wouldn‘t
allow any wieners or sausages or baloney. He wouldn‘t allow any of that kind of meat to
come in. It all had to be fresh.
As far as the food was concerned, we had the best food there was. You had your rolls for
breakfast and you had either fried eggs or sometimes boiled eggs and pancakes. It was a
variety of food. Our steward prepared the menu.
One night, a Saturday night, we were in Chisholm and we got back late to camp there,
midnight. I took two of my buddies in the kitchen and opened up the cold storage. I can
remember that right to this day. I took a couple of steaks and cut them and fried them in
butter, and fried some onions, and made each one a sandwich. And I was making one for
myself when somebody from behind me said he‘d like one, too. I had an idea who it was.
I made the sandwich. I didn‘t even look. I just handed it back to him and he took it. Then
I started fixing one for myself. Just to show you what kind of a fellow he was, after I got
my sandwich (my two buddies, they disappeared), I turned around and I seen Captain
Wipf there. He come up to me and said, ―Well, Cackoski, you really make good
sandwiches. But if the rest of the company found out about it, then do you know how
many people we‘d have in here?‖ I didn‘t say anything. That was just a hint to knock it
off. So that didn‘t happen again.
When the day baker quit, I took his job. I made cakes, pies, cookies, donuts, everything,
for the crew. I remember one time we had donuts up to our eyeballs. The steward told me
to make the big batch. I told him I thought that was too much. He didn‘t agree; he wanted
the big batch. So I made a big batch. It was three of these big mixing bowls. I had to mix
everything by hand. We started frying off them donuts and I think we had three of them
bowls full, and I don‘t know how many cake pans, and we were still baking. Well, we
57
had cake donuts that evening. We had cake donuts for breakfast, cake donuts out in the
field for lunch, and when they come in from the field, they had cake donuts again.
Then one day, they decided to make an upside-down cake. And I looked at the recipe and
I hoped we could make them. I didn‘t think we had the right pans for them. The steward
told me to make them. So I made the upside-down cake. And I put the pineapple and
juice in the batter and slid them into the ovens. When I looked at them about 15 minutes
later, juice was coming out over the side of the pans into the oven. It took me about an
hour to clean up. The fellows, they ate that upside-down cake and kept saying, ―More,
more.‖ This one fellow from Hibbing, every time he sees me now (and we meet pretty
often), he always tells me about the best cake he ever ate in his life. The upside-down
cake.
I made pie once for Christmas, cherry pie. I didn‘t like to put starch in pies. I decided to
boil some tapioca and fruit juice from the cherries in the can. I used the tapioca as a
thickener. We had that cherry pie for Christmas Day. And, by golly, the officer‘s wives
come in there, the captain‘s wife and the educational advisor‘s wife and the doctor‘s wife,
they come in there because they wanted the recipe for that pie.‖
Another enrollee remembered camp open houses: ―[T]hey did try to build up their
image and I think they did. They had a lot of events and sponsored a lot of things. They
had open houses at the camps and let the public know how they were operated.‖
Camp Free Time
Enrollees had little time to spare during the six months they lived and worked in a
CCC camp. When they weren‘t working, they were encouraged to participate in formal or
informal recreation and education activities. They played sports, hiked, swam, fished,
watched movies, and attended dances, either in camp or at the nearest resort or town.
They got to know one another and played practical jokes, especially when a new group of
enrollees – rookies – arrived in camp. Camp libraries had newspapers, magazines, and
books. Movies were shown once a week in the recreation hall. Ministers and priests
visited the camps on a regular schedule and enrollees could be taken by truck into town to
attend church services, movies, and dances.
Following army tradition, new enrollees were called rookies. Each camp had its
own routine, but it became CCC tradition for rookies to undergo initiation. They were
sent out in the woods with a sack and a lantern on a snipe hunt or to the supply room for
striped paint, left-handed monkey wrenches, or elbow grease. Their beds were shortsheeted or they were told to water the flagpole. "When we first started and we got in the
camp, they always try to break you in, call you rookie. They would say, 'Go down there
and bring that shoreline up.' There were lots of gimmicks like that. Trying to break them
in and stuff. 'Go see if you can push that flag pole [down], it is a little too high. See if
you can bring it down.' So you'd go up there and start grabbing that flag pole."
Once in camp, enrollees often gave one another nicknames: "Cue Ball, Cue Ball
with Hair. Almost everybody had a nickname. Sadie Brooks. Ruthie Hollister. Eldon
'Seldom' Smart." One enrollee said, "I didn't have a nickname. My brother-in-law, he
was not my brother-in-law at the time but he became my brother-in-law later, he was a
58
very stern-looking person and he had the name of 'Stoneface.' Another fellow, a friend of
mine who was in camp, kind of a rough sort of a character, he got the name of 'Goon.'
Another kid who was fighting all the time got the name of 'Tiger.' Another one who was a
little bit owly and growly all the time, they named him 'Cinnamon' after a bear. A lot of
fellows wound up with nicknames and it stuck with them for a long, long time."
Enrollees remembered they had to make their own recreation. But camps weren‘t
lacking in organized activities either. Camp inspection reports list golf, baseball,
horseshoes, volleyball, tennis, football, basketball, turning bars, ping pong tables, and
pool tables as recreation for the enrollees. They played hockey in the winter and swam in
the summer. Depending on the season, they went skating, ski jumping, fishing, sledding,
swimming, and hiking. "You could go out walking anytime you wanted to, if you wanted
to walk. We explored a lot, really. Mostly it was looking for deer and whatever else we
could find." In the winter, enrollees raided bear dens and brought back baby bears as
camp mascots.
Organized sports were an important part of camp recreation programs. Enrollees
played on sports teams against other camp teams and town teams. One enrollee
remembered how important sports teams were: ―When I joined the CCs, I was in the rec
hall…with my buddy. We played basketball together in high school. We were standing,
talking about how we were going to go out West. Then, across the floor came the
lieutenant from the CCC camp at Side Lake. He and the sergeant walked right toward us.
And my buddy said, ‗Oh, no. We‘re going to Side Lake.‘ And that lieutenant come over
to us and told us we were going to Side Lake. And we knew why, because we played
basketball and he was looking for basketball players. He got himself a good team.‖
On weekends enrollees could go into town for shopping, movies, or a dance. An
enrollee remembered, ―At dances, the guys monopolized the local girls a little ‗cause
there were so many CCC boys.‖ Camps also hosted dances, as one remembered: ―We‘d
have a company dance. … I drove up to Duluth and picked up – ooh I liked that – a
whole truckload of girls. … I hauled a whole doggone bunch of girls out there and then I
had to haul them back again.‖
Camps had rivalries with other camps and with town men. An enrollee described
how it was in his camp: ―The guys didn‘t fight much among themselves. But they‘d go
out and fight the locals. [And] it kind of got to be a war with … another camp in the area.
A little rivalry. You could almost count on it if you went certain places. Nobody ever got
hurt. They didn‘t tolerate guys who wouldn‘t give a fair fight. If somebody would pull a
knife, he‘d be almost blackballed right out of camp. … There was a rivalry between Jay
Cooke and our camp. We‘d still go over there and visit with the guys, though.‖
Enrollees also took classes through the camp education program. One educator
described the program at his forest camp: "As a qualified high school instructor, I was
able to teach such basic and practical courses as English, math, public speaking et.al. My
assistant taught spelling, typing, etc. Foresters taught some on-the-job instruction and
field experience. One forester specialist taught ornithology or bird study. The camp
doctor taught personal hygiene and first aid. One of the forester's wives, a music
instructor, helped develop a good enrollee band. The clarinet player had played a year
with a good St. Olaf College band. One person on the trumpet and one on the piano also
had a year or more of music training in college. At the end of one and a half years of
training, the Company 708 band became quite good and was in demand for local events."
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An enrollee remembered this educational program: "It was a very well equipped school—
it wasn't the best of everything, but it was very good. The boys spent a lot of evenings
there and Saturdays and Sundays, leisure hours. The school was equipped with
woodworking tools, typewriters, motion pictures, projectors. They showed a lot of
educational pictures in teaching and forestry classes, woodworking classes, diesel
engines, mechanics. There was a Junior Audubon Club. They even had garden clubs
during the summer." True to the mission of the CCC, educational films focused on
conservation themes with titles such as "From Seed to Sawmill‖ and "Fighting Forest
Fires.‖
People listened to radios during leisure time. An LEM at a forest camp
remembered ―the radio was all you had. I used to listen to Wayne King every night at 11
o'clock from Chicago." A work program supervisor wrote to his girlfriend about listening
to Jack Benny at another forest camp. ―He‘s good tonight,‖ he said in a 1936 letter.
Some enrollees brought musical instruments to camp. A forest service camp
foreman remembered trying ―to get our concertina player to give us a few songs before
we go to bed.‖ An enrollee said, "In camp, we had accordions. We always had music. It
was Slovenian music, mostly. The ones who had the accordions were Slovenians,
mostly. We had some guitars. We had one guy with a saxophone. I used to sing with
them. That's where I learned some Slovenian songs.‖ An African American enrollee in a
forest camp remembered ―one fellow, they called him 'Slim.' He was from the Deep
South and he picked a banjo. He used to play the banjo at night and we'd sit around and
sing the blues and things like that.‖
End of the CCC
1935 and 1936 were the peak years for the CCC when enrollment and camp
numbers were at their highest points. In 1937, enrollment slowly began to decline. The
CCC continued to function, however, with new enrollees entering the program and new
work programs being developed. In Minnesota work programs continued in the national
and state forests, state parks, and soil conservation districts.
On June 28, 1937, the Civilian Conservation Corps was legally established,
transferred from its original 1933 designation as the Emergency Conservation Work
program. Funding also was extended for three years through Public No. 163, 75th
Congress, effective July 1, 1937. Congress changed the age limits to 17-23 years old, and
eliminated the requirement that enrollees be on relief, saying instead enrollees could "not
[be]regularly in attendance at school, or possessing full time employment." The 1937
law, in addition to providing employment and performance of useful work made the
inclusion of vocational and academic training a mandatory minimum of ten hours per
week, to provide enrollees with necessary training for employment after discharge.
Enrollment also was extended to those without dependents; orphans could make an
enrollee deposit with the army finance officer that earned 5% interest returned in full at
discharge or in emergency. Another change allowed for those in school to enroll in the
CCC during (summer) vacation. In one Minnesota community, the school football team
enrolled for the summer. This gave team members a job and helped with conditioning for
the fall sports season.
On June 30, 1939, federal legislation ended the CCC program as an independent
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Agency. Administrative responsibility was transferred to the Federal Security Agency
along with the Social Security Board, National Youth Administration, U.S. Employment
Service, the Office of Education and the Works Progress Administration. With war being
waged in Europe and Asia, an increasing number of CCC projects focused on national
defense. By 1940 the CCC was no longer wholly a relief agency, was rapidly losing its
non-military character, and was becoming a system for work-training for younger
enrollees.
The end of the CCC came after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and the start of
World War II. The draft and enlistments in the Armed Forces caused a drop in CCC
enrollment. As a report for a Minnesota camp noted in May 1942, the company was at
very low strength – a ―condition prevailing almost continuously … during the past 18
months.‖ Companies that once had three or four applicants for each position now were
operating at 30% capacity with ―rapid turn-over of enrollees … [because] the general war
situation has drawn the normal number of boys away from the camp‖ This also is in
contrast with earlier years when enrollees often stayed in the CCC for as many
enrollment periods as they could.
The turnover among army personnel was equally dramatic. A May 1942 camp
report stated there had been four changes in command at one camp between February and
May. The camp commander on duty at the time of the report had been at the camp ten
days and was due to go on active duty in three weeks. Another camp report from
February 1942 stated a camp did not have a ―regular company commander.‖ When the
commander was taken for active duty, a former enrollee was appointed subaltern and
designed temporary acting commander
CCC conservation work programs suffered as the number of enrollees and camps
declined. A May 1942 inspection report noted there was one camp left in the Chippewa
National Forest ―which at one time contained 29 camps!.‖ This last camp was due to
close soon.
Most CCC camps had closed by the summer of 1942. CCC funding ended on June
30, 1943. Camp buildings and materials were sold or given away. Portable camps were
taken apart and moved. In some cases, local communities used one or two buildings as
offices or storage facilities. Lumber from camp buildings was used for home construction
in nearby towns. Eight Minnesota CCC camps were kept intact and used as German
POW camps during World War II.
Today there are few remaining intact CCC camps. Camp Rabideau, the only
remaining fully intact CCC camp in Minnesota, is in the Chippewa National Forest. It
was one of the last camps in the state to close. From 1946-1972 the University of Illinois
used it as an on-site facility for its forestry and engineering schools. It recently was
named a National Historic Landmark (NHL) and currently houses the Rabideau
Conservation Academy and Learning Center.
Comments about the CCC
Years after the end of the CCC, enrollees discussed the good and bad. As they
looked back, they were very proud of their conservation work but the stigma of being
associated with a relief program brought back other memories:
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Comment [MSOffice1]:
My family was on relief at the time. There was definitely a negative feeling about
the CCCs as relief. ... We were marked; we had to wear CCC clothes. ... There
was a feeling to some extent that you were into welfare.
I'm sure a lot of people kind of looked down on the CCs.
Some enrollees remembered signs in store windows saying ―No Dogs or CCC
Allowed.‖
There was a social stigma attached to the fact that you had gone in. … Wearing
that uniform, when I walked in [to a business], I was very conscious of the
comments that were made at certain times.
There were others criticisms, too.
Anna Dickie Olesen, the state director of the National Emergency Council (NEC),
was contacted by the secretary of the Minnesota Division of the Izaak Walton
League about accusations of poaching by CCC enrollees. Olesen said, however,
when she contacted people living near the camps about these charges, they
supported the CCC "one hundred percent."
A young North Dakota woman said her community had been filled with ―goodhearted…helpful‖ people before it was overrun with ―lallygagging sidewinders‖ –
a ―tribe‖ of city boys in the nearby CCC camp. The enrollees were ―different.‖
They were unwelcome outsiders who meddled on the land. ―After all the changes
the government is making, it isn‘t home to me anymore.‖
In oral history interviews recorded fifty or more years after its end, in spite of
remembered difficulties alumni spoke about their years in the CCC with pride:
I heard the statement that among all of President Roosevelt's national recovery
acts...the CCCs were the least criticized and the most beneficial to the nation.
I watched a lot of people that had been in trouble [before going] in the CC camp.
They got their life straightened around in there. They found they could do
something.
They [the enrollees] matured. Next thing you know they were young men and
they were responsible and they got work done because they knew how to work.
The CCCs gave me discipline. It gave me a work ethic. It gave me knowledge
how to deal with people on a large basis that I had never experienced before.
I knew a lot of guys that went in [to the CCC] that gained fifteen to twenty
pounds after six months. They went in pretty weak looking and in six months they
looked rugged and tan and strong and healthy.
It came along as a wonderful blessing. ... It gave us a new lease on life.
It was good, just a good deal.
Overall the CCC served its enrollees well. Many learned a trade. One Minnesota
enrollee talked in his oral history interview about becoming a cartographer after
"pestering [his] superiors‖ in the camp to teach him. He worked on maps and
photographs in the CCC, preparing many of his camp‘s work records. Then, "I got myself
up to a good profession," working for the U.S. Geological Survey in Washington D.C.
Other Minnesota enrollees became machine operators, road builders, landscape workers,
radio operators, bookkeepers, restaurant cooks, and employees at Hormel, radio station
WDGY, Red Wing Potteries, and Northwest Airlines among many others. Many went
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into the Armed Forces and fought in World War II. Some stayed in the military after the
war. John Blatnik, a camp education coordinator, became a long-time member of the
United States House of Representatives for Minnesota‘s Eighth Congressional District.
CCC Slang
Much of CCC slang was taken from U.S. Army terms.
Bleached worms – spaghetti or macaroni
Boy – Junior enrollee
Chow – meal
CO – Commanding Officer
Crud or Crumb – dirty or slovenly person
Dishwater – coffee
Dog-robber – enrollee assigned to officers‘ quarters
Fisheyes – tapioca pudding
Furp – search
Go Furping – go out on a date
Goldbrick – loafer
Go-to-Hell Drawers – WWI vintage knee-length underwear
GI – Government Issue
John L‘s – winter long underwear
Kitchen Furp – cook‘s helper
KP – Kitchen Patrol
Mess – meal
Monkey Jacket – dress uniform
O.D. – olive drab (khaki)
Rat – tale teller
Rated Man – enrollee in a leadership position
Rookie – new enrollee
Old Man – company commander
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Appendix E. CCC Work Agencies – United States and Minnesota
CCC work programs focused on forest management, park development, and soil
conservation. They followed the conservation concepts of the time as defined by the
United States Forest Service, the National Park Service, and the Soil Conservation
Service.
CCC work program tasks fell into the following general categories:
Structural Improvements: bridges, fire lookout towers, service buildings
Transportation: truck trails, minor roads, foot trails and airport landing fields
Erosion Control: check dams, terracing and vegetable covering
Flood Control: irrigation, drainage, dams, ditching, channel work, riprapping
Forest Culture: planting trees and shrubs, timber stand improvement, seed
collection, nursery work
Forest Protection: fire prevention, fire pre-suppression, fire fighting, insect and
disease control
Landscape and Recreation: public camp and picnic ground development, lake and
pond site clearing and development
Range: stock driveways, elimination of predatory animals
Wildlife: stream improvement, fish stocking, food and cover planting
Miscellaneous: emergency work, surveys, mosquito control
For administrative purposes, all CCC camps were divided into work agency types
identified by type and a number. Work agency types in Minnesota were Migratory Bird
Refuge (BF), Biological Survey (BS), Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS), National Forest
(F), State Forest (S), Private Forest (P), State Park (SP), Department of State Parks
(DSP), National Park (NP), Private Land Erosion (PE), Drainage Private Land Erosion
(DPE), Soil Conservation Service (SCS), and Private Land (D). Many of these, such as
the varying park and soil conservation designations, reflect internal administrative
changes during the CCC years rather than changes in conservation work or project focus.
The work agency type, such as SF, NF, SCS, or SP included as part of camp
identification, indicated the type of conservation work done by the enrollees.
The CCC ran its work programs according to the specific conservation tasks the
enrollees did. Each camp had a number of work programs defined by location and size of
work area along with length of time needed to complete the project. Throughout the
CCC, camp work programs were developed by camp work agency superintendents along
with regional, state, and national officials in accordance with accepted conservation
principles of the time. Forest service personnel developed and supervised conservation
projects for the federal and state forest camps, while soil conservation service personnel
were in charge of work programs at soil conservation camps and state park personnel
directed work programs at state park camps. Work programs included detailed
information about the project, the number of men and days (often referred to in reports as
man days) needed for completion, the amount and type of materials to be used, the tools
and equipment needed, and an expected completion date. Camp work agency personnel
included superintendents, engineers, construction assistants, mechanics, and foremen.
Local Experienced Men (LEMs), chosen because of their skills and, as one forester said,
for their "knowledge of the particular [work] area," assisted the work agency personnel.
Within this general structure each state developed work programs that fit its specific
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needs. In Minnesota these focused generally on forest work, soil conservation, and state
park development.
National Forest Work Agencies
Minnesota has two national forests. The Minnesota National Forest was
established on June 23, 1908; its name was changed to the Chippewa National Forest on
June 22, 1928. The Superior National Forest was established on February 13, 1909. In
1933, the state Department of Conservation estimated that these two forests contained
about 75% of the state‘s remaining virgin or original stands of timber. Management
objectives for the forests were based on national forest policy of the "greatest sustained
good for the greatest number of people."
CCC federal forest work programs were supervised by the United States Forest
Service (USFS) under the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). Minnesota
was in the sixth of the nine federal forest regions headquartered in Milwaukee,
Wisconsin. In Minnesota the headquarters for the Superior National Forest was (and still
is) in Duluth, while the Chippewa National Forest headquarters was (and still is) in Cass
Lake. Superior National Forest district offices were located at Tofte, Two Harbors, Grand
Marais, Isabella, Aurora, Brittmount, Cook, and Ely. The Chippewa National Forest
district offices were at Cass Lake, Walker, Remer, Bena, Cutfoot Sioux, Marcell,
Blackduck, and Dora Lake. Regional, state and district offices worked together to
develop and coordinate CCC work programs in Minnesota‘s two national forests.
State Forest Work Agencies
The Minnesota State Forest Service was established in 1911. In spite of this, state
forest (also called state forest preserve) administration was, at best, loosely managed
prior to the CCC. The organization of the Department of Conservation in 1925, and its
1931 re-organization with four divisions including the Division of Forestry, improved the
situation. William T. Cox was Minnesota‘s first Commissioner of Conservation; he was
succeeded by E.V. Willard, Herman C. Wenzel, and W.L. Strunk during the CCC years.
Grover Conzet was director of the state Division of Forestry throughout the CCC. In his
administration of the state forests, Conzet was guided by the ―economic principle that all
lands be put to their highest and most productive long time use for the permanent good of
the greatest number of people.‖
After becoming state director, Conzet called for the establishment of nine new
state forests – Beltrami Island, Cloquet Valley, Finland, George Washington, Grand
Portage, Kabetogama, Savanna, Third River, and White Earth—and suggested they be
developed on cutover lands to encourage reforestation of these areas. The Minnesota
legislature approved his plan and expanded it, adding Fond du Lac, Foot Hills, Land
O‘Lakes and Pine Island. In 1933, Minnesota Laws, Chapter 419 created these thirteen
new state forests, defined the boundaries for each, and gave the state the authority to
acquire privately held lands in their boundaries for forest management and development.
This legislation provided Minnesota with the legal grounds to establish CCC camps in
state forests.
By the end of the CCC, Minnesota had another thirteen new forests—Bay Lake,
Buena Vista, Crow Wing, Mille Lacs, Mississippi Headwaters, Nemadji, Northwest
Angle, Paul Bunyan, Pillsbury, Rum River, Smoky Hills, Waskish, and Blackduck—and
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enrollees had worked in twenty-one state forests—Beltrami Island, Blackduck, Cloquet
Valley, Crow Wing, Finland, Fond du Lac (including the university experimental
station), Foot Hills (including Baudora State Forest), George Washington, Grand Portage,
Kabetogama, Land O‘Lakes, Mille Lacs, Mississippi Headwaters, Paul Bunyan, Pine
Island, Savanna, Smokey Hills, St. Croix, Third River, and White Earth, as well as doing
forest conservation work at Camp Ripley, Miller Trunk, Itasca Annex, the Anoka Game
Refuge, and Nimrod.
Conservation work was overseen by the Division of Forestry, under the direction
of Conzet, assisted by the Director of Waters and Drainage. Leslie R. Beatty served as
state CCC Forest Service Director. Rangers at each forest determined work program
needs and developed plans which they sent to state conservation officials for approval.
After approval, rangers worked with camp work agency superintendents to carry out the
work programs. Camp work project superintendents oversaw the work. J.C. ―Buzz‖ Ryan,
a forest superintendent at the Sullivan Lake state forest camp, described the process:
"When you talk of the forest service, you're talking about the work agency of the CCCs.
The men [enrollees] were turned over every day and they were in charge of the work
agency until they came back at night and were turned back to the army. The [forest]
superintendent's duties ended when they were turned back to the army. But he was
responsible for them when they were out in the field."
State Park Work Agencies
Minnesota was one of the first states in the country to develop a state park system.
The first State Monument was established at Camp Release in 1889 and the first state
park, Itasca State Park, was established in 1891. By 1925, the number of state parks had
grown but their management was uneven. Although the Department of Forestry, Game
and Fish Commission, and the State Auditor each administered some of them, in reality,
local advisory committees provided daily management. This began to change in 1925
when the Department of Conservation was established and given jurisdiction over the
park system. It changed again in 1931 when the Department of Conservation was reorganized and supervision of Minnesota‘s parks was consolidated under the Division of
Forestry led by Grover Conzet.
In 1934, in response to CCC administrative needs, Harold W. Lathrop was
appointed supervisor of CCC state park work in Minnesota. The Department of
Conservation expanded the next year, 1935, to include a separate Division of State Parks
and Lathrop was made its first director. State park CCC work was coordinated through
the National Park Service under the jurisdiction of the United States Department of the
Interior until Lathrop‘s appointment and subsequent organization of the Division of State
Parks after which it was administered through the state parks office under National Park
Service guidelines.
For National Park Service coordination Minnesota was first included in the
Midwest National Park Service district. One of four districts in the country, it was led by
Paul Brown and headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana. The four districts were expanded
into eight regional offices on March 1, 1935, and Minnesota was moved under the
jurisdiction of the Omaha, Nebraska, office. The Omaha office became the Region II
office, headed by Thomas Allen, Jr., in August 1937. It continues to serve as a regional
office today.
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The goals of the National Park Service were to use the CCC for conservation
work in existing parks and to coordinate development of new parks that would be built to
park service standards, including designing man-made features that fit into, and were
subordinate to, the natural features of an area while using native or local materials, such
as log and stone, for park buildings. Conrad Wirth, son of Minneapolis park developer
Theodore Wirth, was named the first National Park Service CCC state parks
administrator to oversee this work. In Minnesota, architects and landscape architects in
the state office led by Edward W. Barber, working with regional office personnel,
developed master plans which were then approved by the National Park Service before
CCC enrollees could start work. State park work projects were supervised by regional
inspectors with training as engineers, landscape architects, and park specialists. U.W.
Hella, who would become Director of the Minnesota Division of State Parks in 1953,
served as a traveling CCC parks inspector for the Omaha office.
Soil Conservation Service Work Agencies
When the CCC began in 1933, the United States Forest Service (USFS), acting as
the agent for the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), was responsible for
CCC soil conservation work in Minnesota. It collaborated with the Department of
Agriculture at the University of Minnesota, the Division of Drainage and Waters in the
Department of Conservation and the Minnesota Highway Department to develop work
programs for the first camps. From the headquarters in Rochester, it oversaw CCC
enrollees who provided the labor. This situation changed in 1934 when Soil Erosion
Service (SES) work began in Minnesota. A temporary agency, the SES was established
on August 25, 1933, under the United State Department of the Interior (USDI) and given
$5 million from the Public Works Administration for private land soil conservation
projects along with access to CCC labor to carry out the projects. It was headed by Hugh
Hammond Bennett and provided support for development of soil conservation
demonstration projects within naturally defined areas such as watersheds (the drainage
basins for lakes or rivers). The first of these projects, the Coon Creek (also called the
Coon Valley) Project near La Crosse, Wisconsin, was organized in October 1933. Also in
1933, Congress passed the Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA) to control agricultural
production by paying farmers to reduce the amounts they produced back toward preWorld War I levels. The Act was declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court several
years later.
On March 25, 1935, SES jurisdiction was moved to the United States Department
of Agriculture (USDA) and on April 1, 1935, administrative responsibility for all USDA
soil conservation work was formally transferred to the SES. This was followed with the
passage of the Soil Conservation and Domestic Allotment Act on April 27, 1935, in
response to the Supreme Court declaration of the unconstitutionality of the AAA. The
Soil Conservation and Domestic Allotment Act formed the Soil Conservation Service
(SCS) and placed it in the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) under
Bennett‘s leadership.
The Agricultural Adjustment Act, after being passed by Congress, was signed on
May 12, 1933. This Act authorized production adjustment programs that were a direct
outgrowth of the experience of the Federal Farm Board. The Agricultural Adjustment Act
of 1933 also authorized the use of marketing agreements and licenses, which had been
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used already by producers to promote orderly marketing of perishable fruits and
vegetables. Under authority of the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1933, large quantities
of surplus food were distributed to needy households and to school lunch programs.
In 1936 the Supreme Court of the United States declared major portions of the
Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1933 unconstitutional as an encroachment upon the
reserved rights of the states. (United States vs. Butler, 297 U.S. Code 1, 68, 1936)
Congress instead tried to solve the problem of price instability by providing incentives
for farmers to reduce production and conserve land resources. The first general authority
to conserve soil resources dates back to the early 1930s when dust from wind erosion in
the Great Plains darkened the skies across America all the way to our eastern shores.
Congress and the Administration moved quickly and replaced the 1933 Act with the Soil
Conservation and Domestic Allotment Act of 1936. The Act established land and water
conservation as a national policy and created the Soil Conservation Service (SCS) to
develop and implement a long range conservation program.
After the Soil Conservation Service was formed, the country was divided into
regions for CCC supervisory purposes. Minnesota was in the Upper Mississippi Valley
Region, created on December 11, 1935. Known as Region 5 with an office in Des
Moines, Iowa, it was led by the Regional Conservator R.E. Uhland, who began work on
January 17, 1936. After the La Crosse Regional Office closed in 1937, the Des Moines
office had overall responsibility for nineteen demonstration projects, five tree nurseries
and ninety-seven CCC camps in five states—Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, and
Wisconsin. Among them, they represented a combined total of 63.6% of the Grade I
farmland in the United States. In March 1939, the Des Moines office moved to
Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where it was known as the Upper Mississippi Region office. It
closed in 1942.
SES work in Minnesota began in September 1934 when Regional Director R. H.
Davis transferred Herbert Flueck, Minnesota‘s first soil conservationist and first SES soil
conservation work program administrator, from the SES Wisconsin-Minnesota Regional
Office in La Crosse, Wisconsin, to Spring Valley, Minnesota, to organize demonstration
areas and work programs. State soil conservation work was administered from the La
Crosse office until it closed in 1937. At that time, the Minnesota soil conservation
coordinator‘s office opened in St. Paul with Flueck as Acting State Coordinator, and
individual soil conservation demonstration project offices were given responsibility to
manage their work programs. The next year, Minnesota project management was
consolidated under the Faribault project office; it became the Faribault area office on
April 1, 1939, and served as the CCC area office until 1942. State input on CCC work
plans and programs was clarified through an agreement with the Department of
Conservation Division of Drainage and Waters requiring it approve all soil conservation
projects.
In 1934, as Minnesota‘s first three demonstration projects were organized, the
cooperators, as the landowners were called, were encouraged to organize associations to
become better informed about soil conservation practices. When the SCS was formed
association leadership was consolidated in the Southeastern Soil Conservation
Association. Representatives from the new agency worked with the University of
Minnesota College of Agriculture and Extension Service to educate the farmers in each
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area about soil conservation and to encourage cooperation with the agencies working on
the soil conservation projects that were developed as part of the SCS work programs.
Support also was provided through organization of Minnesota's Soil Conservation
Districts. The districts, which had the status of a local government subdivisions led by
locally elected officials, were organized through a national initiative of President
Roosevelt that ended up moving soil conservation work from an emphasis on
demonstration projects to a focus on district assistance. Their purpose was to make sure
that the new soil conservation techniques were ―implemented beyond the demonstration
areas.‖ Minnesota passed its Soil Conservation District Law on April 21, 1937, and the
state‘s first soil conservation district (SCD), the Burns-Homer-Pleasant District, was
organized on May 3, 1938. Today, Minnesota has ninety-one Soil and Water
Conservation Districts. They are administered through the Board of Soil and Water
Resources (BWSR) consisting of representatives from the SWCDs, the University of
Minnesota Extension Service, the Department of Natural Resources, the state Pollution
Control Agency, the state Department of Agriculture and the state Department of Health.
Throughout the CCC, the SCS encouraged work collaboration with other
agencies. In Minnesota, cooperative agencies included the Federal Biological Survey, the
United States Bureau of Fisheries, and several other partners that had been responsible
for overseeing the program prior to the SCS—the University of Minnesota Agricultural
Experiment Station, the state Conservation Department, and the state Highway
Department.
Civilian Conservation Corps–Indian Division
On June 18, 1934, Congress passed the Indian Reorganization Act, also known as
the Wheeler-Howard Act. Its purpose was to ―conserve and develop Indian lands and
resources; to extend to Indians the right to form business and other organizations; to
establish a credit system for Indians; to grant certain rights of home rule to Indians; to
provide for vocational education for Indians; and for other purposes,‖ beginning a
process of working to reverse federal policies of a century or more. As Edmund Jefferson
Danziger, Jr., has described it, ―it reversed allotment, Americanization, and assimilation
policies.‖
The Civilian Conservation Corps–Indian Division (CCC-ID) was formed during
this period of change and its design was influenced not only by the stated needs of the
CCC—providing work to unemployed men on conservation projects—but also by this
reform movement. Administered by the Bureau of Indian Affairs, work of the CCC-ID
was coordinated through personnel at the regional and local level, enrollment was tied to
tribal membership, and enrollees were given several enrollment options. In addition to
standard conservation work programs, as part of the movement toward support for tribal
cultural renewal, its leaders developed work programs that supported tribal cultural
history and needs.
The United States was divided into nine regions or districts for CCC-ID
administration. Minnesota, Wisconsin, and North Dakota were the Lake States region
with headquarters in Minneapolis. The region was administered by J.H. Mitchell, district
supervisor. William Heritage, working with Norman Scherer, was production
coordinating officer. Reservation program participation was coordinated through
agencies serving bands of Minnesota Indians: the Consolidated Chippewa Indian Agency,
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the Red Lake (Chippewa) Indian Agency, and the Minnesota Sioux Indians at Pipestone.
The Consolidated Chippewa agency served the six Minnesota Chippewa Tribe (MCT)
reservations: Fond du Lac, Grand Portage, Leech Lake, Mille Lacs, Nett Lake (Bois
Forte) and White Earth. The Red Lake agency served the Red Lake Band of Chippewa,
and the Minnesota Sioux agency covered the Pipestone, Prairie Island, Upper Sioux,
Lower Sioux, and Prior Lake communities and reservations in central and southern
Minnesota. Work programs were designed to benefit the communities and reservations
while promoting conservation concepts common to the CCC. The Minnesota program
started so quickly that Heritage was notified of his appointment on the morning of May
12, 1933, and left for Red Lake to begin developing a work program there that afternoon.
By the end of the first month, work program outlines were in place for Minnesota‘s
Chippewa agencies. The Minnesota Sioux Indians became part of the program in October
1933.
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Appendix F. CCC Work Programs – Minnesota
During Minnesota‘s early years, conservation laws did not effectively protect the
state‘s resources. By 1932, the year before the CCC was established, the need for
conservation of the state‘s natural resources was evident. Farms on cutover land were
failing in record numbers in the northern parts of the state and 35% of the land area was
tax delinquent, meaning the owners had abandoned it rather than pay the taxes. The state
and national forest systems, which contained most of the remnants of the state‘s original
forests, were underdeveloped at best. In the rich farmlands of southern Minnesota, 20%
of the area suffered from sheet erosion, 25% was affected by wind erosion, and 15% had
gullying. In addition, the state park system, which in some cases helped manage forest
land, was in its infancy and parks were unevenly managed. As Governor Floyd B. Olson
said in 1931, "Commercial exploitation in the past has despoiled our forests, marred our
landscapes, and dissipated our resources. It has robbed our people of the greater part of
their heritage of natural resources. Let us guard what is left diligently and zealously."
By 1933, the year the CCC began, although some changes still were needed, the
basic structure for conservation of natural resources in the state was in place. What it
lacked were the resources to effectively carry out needed conservation work. A forester‘s
description of the "lone biologist in the St. Paul office that tried to get things done"
described the situation well. It would take the CCC, one of President Franklin
Roosevelt‘s New Deal agencies, to provide the resources that would help meet
Minnesota‘s conservation needs.
Summary - Minnesota CCC Work Program Sites
Chippewa National Forest
Chippewa National Forest headquarters
Camp Rabideau
Norris Camp – Beltrami Island Project
Chippewa National Forest Supervisors‘ Office
Marcell Ranger Station
Tree planting areas in original forest boundaries by year
Tree planting area in expanded forest boundaries by year
Fire protection, road building, built campgrounds, campsites, portages, trails, fire
fighting, timber and biological surveys, wildlife surveys, cleaned up lakeshores, cut and
burned slash, improved fisheries
Superior National Forest
Kabetogama Ranger Station
Cusson Camp
Tree planting areas in original forest boundaries by year
Tree planting areas in expanded forest boundaries by year
Fire protection, road building, built campgrounds, campsites, portages, trails, fire
fighting, timber and biological surveys, wildlife surveys, cleaned up lakeshores, cut and
burned slash, improved fisheries
Baudora, Lydick, Knife River, Eveleth, Willow River national and state forest tree
nurseries
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State Forests
Nimrod, Camp Ripley, Miller Trunk Highway – work done outside state forest areas
Blackduck tree planting areas by year
Cloquet Valley tree planning areas by year
Crow Wing tree planting areas by year
Finland tree planting areas by year
Fond du Lac tree planting areas by year
Foot Hills and Baudora tree planting areas by year
George Washington tree planting areas by year
Grand Portage tree planting areas by year
Kabetogama tree planting areas by year
Land O‘Lakes tree planting areas by year
Mille Lacs tree planting areas by year
Mississippi Headwaters tree planting areas by year
Paul Bunyan tree planting areas by year
Pine Island tree planting areas by year
Savanna tree planting areas by year
Smokey Hills tree planting areas by year
St. Croix tree planting areas by year
Third River tree planting areas by year
White Earth tree planting areas by year
Drought relief expanded lake sizes
Drought relief Red River Valley
DNR headquarters, Minnesota State Fair
Fire protection, road building, built campgrounds, campsites, portages, trails, fire
fighting, timber and biological surveys, wildlife surveys, cleaned up lakeshores, cut and
burned slash, improved fisheries
State Parks
St. Croix RDA
Mississippi River headwaters
Camden
Flandrau
Fort Ridgely
Gooseberry Falls
Itasca
Jay Cooke
Lake Bemidji
Monson Lake
St. Croix
Scenic
Sibley
Whitewater
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Drought relief expanded lake sizes – map locations
Stone quarry locations
Soil Conservation
Gilmore Creek demonstration project
Beaver Creek demonstration project
Dear and Bear Creek demonstration project
Root Soil Conservation District
Winona
E. Fillmore Soil Conservation District
Jordan
Maple Lake
Rollingstone-Stockton-Gilmore Soil Conservation District
Bayport
Fergus Falls
Drought relief, Fargo to Breckinridge including
Otter Tail, Red Lake, and Clearwater Rivers
Limestone quarry locations
Roadside Development Division
Highway improvement projects
Mille Lacs and Leech Lakes wayside rest stops
Knife River and Lutsen wayside rest stops
Cascade River overlook
Other
Bird Refuge
Owen Lake, Gheen, Wilton game food nurseries
Bustios Lake wild celery bed – one of largest in Midwest
Thief Lake, Rice Lake, Tamarac Lake natural flyway habitat
Twin Cities
Lake Vadnais park
Como Zoo buildings
CCC-ID
Pipestone National Monument
Grand Portage National Monument
Red Lake tree nursery
Forest fire training schools – Consolidated Chippewa, Red Lake, and Pipestone
Sugar bush sites
Nett Lake water management site for wild rice production
Wild rice camp sites including one where Dakota pottery was found in a rice roasting pit
Tree planting
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Fire protection, road building, built campgrounds, campsites, portages, trails, fire
fighting, timber and biological surveys, wildlife surveys, cleaned up lakeshores, cut and
burned slash, improved fisheries
CCC Federal and State Forest Work Programs - Minnesota
The guiding principles of the United States Forest Service, the backdrop against
which CCC forest conservation work projects were developed, emphasized conservation
beliefs of the time—the ―greatest good for the greatest number‖ and the multiple use
concept, both of which combined aesthetics with usefulness of products. To support an
understanding of these concepts and their relationship to camp work programs, the U. S.
Forest Service developed teaching materials for enrollees such as Gateways to Forestry.
This pamphlet began with a definition of the multiple use concept and information about
forest conservation work types to ―furnish an outline which the enrollee in the forestry
camps of the Civilian Conservation Corps within the North Central Region may follow to
the point of having established a sufficiently informed interest in the subject which it
introduces to enable him to carry on under his own initiative.‖ Forest Service and camp
personnel developed priorities for work that would help achieve these ends:
increasing the size and number of forests
game habitat improvement
lake surveys
long-term planning surveys
Work projects included:
forest culture such as tree planting, forest stand improvement, tree nursery work,
and tree seed collection
building and improving forest structures such as bridges, buildings, telephone
lines, and water supply systems
transportation improvements
forest protection such as fire hazard reduction and fighting forest fires
wildlife improvement such as stocking lakes and emergency wildlife feeding
other activities such as mapping, reconnaissance work, surveys, and timber
estimating.
All met Minnesota conservation needs by developing, enlarging, and improving the
state‘s existing forests and putting bare, cut-over, and tax-forfeit lands back into
productive use through development of new forests.
Minnesota enrollees remembered forest work. Timber stand improvement was
one of the most common conservation work projects. Thinning trees and clearing
underbrush helped maintain forests by encouraging healthy tree growth. A former
enrollee described the work: ―[We did] timber stand improvement. This was an action
that had no real rule of thumb. You just went into a given area and removed some and left
some—the object being removing where too thick to make good timber. The weak and
crooked and the bent had to go.‖ Another former enrollee said: ―We thinned the forest. In
some cases where trees were starting to die, we could cut them down and bring them in.‖
The goal was forests with strong stands of trees resulting in a vital, renewable resource.
Disease control also was important in maintaining healthy forests. One of the
most common tree diseases in Minnesota during the CCC years was blister rust, a fungus
that grows on white pine trees, usually killing them. Still a problem today, it was brought
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to the United States from Europe around the turn of the twentieth century. Although trees
in Europe generally were immune to it, it spread rapidly in this country and was first
reported in Minnesota in 1916. It had become enough of a problem that the state enacted
a blister rust control law in 1929. A forester described what it took to get rid of it: "I
started work at Cass Lake in the Chippewa National Forest as a junior forester. My first
job was when they gave me a crew of about 40 men to start out on blister rust control
work, which I had had one day's experience in [school] at the Cloquet Forest Experiment
Station. This is a job confined to white pine stands…it was removing all of the
gooseberry and currant bushes that you could find and pulling them up and hanging them
up, because they were the ones that transferred the blister rust disease to the white pine.
In other words, they were the alternate host. From Cass Lake, I was moved to several
different camps within the Chippewa National Forest…Whatever you got started on, you
got stuck with. So, every place I went, I was the blister rust control man. My boss was a
federal forest service employee who was in charge of the whole blister rust control
program for Minnesota.‖ Blister rust control work was labor-intensive, but effective. As
another former enrollee said, they could ―only pull the gooseberries and currants when
the plants were leafed out. ... They had to make sure they got all the bush, all the roots. If
you pulled out a gooseberry bush and left some roots, it would grow back.‖
During the CCC era, one of the strictest national forest management policies was
the no-burn policy. Influenced by the destructive forest fires of the late nineteenth and
early twentieth centuries and dry conditions at the time, forest service leaders placed a
high priority on preventing and fighting fires. Building fire trails was part of this work. A
former enrollee described it this way: "This one year, I was in charge of fire trails. I had
a 75-cat [caterpillar] with a huge grader on it, and we had a bulldozer, and we had four
trucks. We used to grade the road, then, wherever there was fill [areas where the road
wasn‘t flat], we would use the trucks to haul dirt in there and make fills. A crew went
ahead to chop the smaller trees down for the fire trails, and we made some pretty good
roads." An enrollee who worked his way up from enrollee to squad leader remembered
starting work with the road crew when he first got to the camp: ―They would build roads.
The grader would roll rocks up on the road. I worked behind the grader throwing the
rocks off the side of the road so that they didn‘t have the rocks on the road. I worked with
them pretty near a year and then I got a chance to work a little on the grader and also on
the cat (caterpillar). Later on I went on steady on the cat and on fire protection roads.‖
Some sections of Minnesota‘s well-known trails were built by CCC enrollees for
conservation and fire prevention access. Another enrollee said: "If you ever go up on the
Gunflint Trail [which runs from Grand Marais to the Canadian border], I can say I was
part of that."
Fire prevention work also included stringing telephone wires to link prevention
centers and building fire towers. Fire towers were built on high ground whenever
possible, standing taller than the trees around them, and were used to help spot forest
fires. Building them was a "tough proposition." Enrollees remembered drilling and
blasting into solid rock: "It was kind of a slow dog-gone job. It was all hand work."
Although most have been removed, there are still a few CCC-built fire towers in northern
Minnesota.
Enrollees also fought forest fires. During the fall fire season, regardless of
anything else, fighting fire became everyone‘s job. Fully equipped trucks were kept ready
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to go at all times, passes to town were canceled, and enrollees were kept on standby,
waiting for the call, often from an enrollee in a fire tower, that smoke had been sighted.
Fighting fire was some of the hardest and most dangerous work enrollees did.
Depending on the size of the fire, enrollees from all camps in the area were brought in. If
more people were needed, they were brought in from camps across the state. When
fighting forest fires, enrollees often stayed out for days at a time, supplied with food and
water by runners. They dug fire breaks by hand and used hand pumps to spray water. An
enrollee remembered: "We used [these tools]: the pump tank you put on your back. It
was about a five gallon pump can. Had a hand pump on it. And, of course, the shovels
for patrolling the fire lines. And we had sand points we used to drive down for water to
run down little hoses where we could use them.‖ Fires in peat bogs sometimes were
fought as the bogs burned under enrollee‘s feet.
Memories of fighting fires are some of the most vivid and intense the enrollee's
have about their time in the CCC. One man remembered the training he received:
"Sometimes they would conduct school right out in the forest. I remember one was
pertaining to fighting fires. And I learned from the old timers, the foremen, many of
whom were former loggers. There were a lot of old lumberjacks around and many of
them made very good foremen. I remember them telling us about conditions in fighting
forest fires, how the best time to fight the fire would be early morning and late afternoon,
at sunrise and sunset. The reason why, the wind commonly goes down at that time of the
day. And, of course, the wind was our worst enemy in fighting fire.‖
An enrollee described fighting several big fires, including one in the NamakanCrane Lake area of northern Minnesota: "It [the fire] lasted over 30 days. We slept on the
ground. They woke us up in the dark. We had our breakfast and took off for the job area.
Stayed there until just before dark. Came back in, had our evening meal, and, of course,
we was pretty tired. Soon as we got done with that, you were looking for a place to lay
down for the night. And that was on the ground. No tents, on the ground. ... In them
days, it was all hand work. Shovel, grub hoe, mostly that, and an axe. [We would] clear a
path, a fire break, they called it. Right down to the ground, so nothing could burn. But if
a wind comes up, it was so dry, the spark would fly over and start in again.‖ Another
enrollee summed it up: ―Believe me, nobody will ever know what it is to face an inferno
until they actually get into it, with roaring flames above threatening to collapse on top of
you and roaring flames on both sides wanting to engulf you, not to mention the searing
heat.‖
Many enrollees remember 1936 as the year of fires. With an extended period of
low humidity, high temperatures and extremely dry conditions, fires broke out almost
continuously across northern Minnesota in July and August and again in October. Many
enrollees spent a month or more fighting fires. The situation was severe enough to
warrant a special section in the state Department of Conservation annual report that year.
Enrollees also helped establish new forests. Of all the forest conservation work
they did, tree planting was the most well known and well remembered, and for many, it
was the symbol of the CCC. Tree planting helped reclaim cutover land and introduced
quality plantings into existing forests, such as white and red pine, as well as trees once
thought economically worthless such as jack pine, aspen, poplar, and other "scrub
growth" trees. Advances in uses of wood products and a growing understanding of the
importance of renewable resources put a higher value on all the types of trees so enrollees
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planted them. Norway or red pine, a tree that took hold and grew easily and was sturdy
and disease-resistant, was one of the most common planted by the CCC in Minnesota.
As part of conservation field training, enrollees were taught strict planting
procedures. An enrollee remembered those lessons almost fifty years later: "That [tree
planting] was a procedure we had to follow very accurately. They had furrowed in the
woods and we would come along with a little box and we'd have a tool where we'd make
a little wedge in the soil and we'd take the young seedling. We had to put it way down as
far as we could and draw it back up. And where the branches start, there is a little nob.
And that had to be level with the surface of the soil. The reason for dipping it down - the
roots had to be downward. If they bent up, the tree would die. Then we took our foot and
tamped it.‖ Enrollees sometimes worked in pairs with one person making the hole, the
second carrying the bag of trees and putting it in, and both tamping down the soil around
it. Tree planting was not easy. Enrollees carried bags or boxes of seedlings on their
shoulders and bent over to plant each tree. They described it as back-breaking work.
CCC enrollees planted millions of trees in Minnesota, often putting in thousands
per day. A forest service foreman described one situation: ―I‘ve got a crew of the boys
sorting trees…that will be planted tomorrow. We have about 100 men on planting now
and they plant between 16,000 and 18,000 trees a day.‖ United States Forest Service
superintendent remembered how he got his teams to work: "Most of the planting crews
was about a 20-man crew and we started a competition between whoever planted the
most trees this week got a keg of beer. We'd try to get competition to get more trees
planted."
Tree planting led to another project for enrollees—gathering thousands of pounds
of pine cones to supply the seeds needed to start the trees. After being collected, the
cones were taken to the nurseries where they were opened and the seeds were extracted
and planted. When they were large enough, they were sent to camps to be planted.
Enrollees on job sites worked in many different conditions. They remembered
going out in intense cold in the winter, although there were some controls: ―[In the
winter] if the temperature dropped below 30 below, we didn't have to go out. Up to 30
below, you went out for all day. I guess they figured you had adequate clothing for that."
And they remembered mosquitoes in the summer. An enrollee described this, as well:
"In the summertime, in some of those areas, the mosquitoes were so bad that we wore our
wool shirts and had head nets on to keep the mosquitoes away. And, they would bite right
through that stuff. We wore gloves, and when you took those off, I tell you, they were
right there. That was rough.‖ A forest supervisor described one mosquito remedy: ―We
have a wonderful black liquid that we call fly dope that is about half tar that we smear all
over our faces and hands that does a little bit toward keeping the bloody little black flies
and mosquitoes away. It has quite a smell too.‖ In spite of sometimes adverse conditions,
however, enrollees generally were proud of being able to withstand just about anything.
A former enrollee summed this up: ―We worked in all kinds of weather. We were young
and healthy and there was a pride in being able to do that.‖
Another enrollee, using an army term for slacking off, remembered the work ethic
that helped make this possible: ―Everybody worked and worked hard. You didn‘t see any
goldbricking.‖ The Sullivanite, the newspaper for the Sullivan Lake camp, published a
short poem written by an enrollee that stressed the importance of this attitude:
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Ode to a Griper
If you wish to gripe
Thou scandal-hound
Do it when
No one‘s around.
The state‘s forests still benefit from the work of the CCC. By 1943, when the
program ended, both national forests were larger than when it started. The Chippewa
National Forest had expanded to 1,313,000 acres and the Superior National Forest to
3,725,000 acres (including lands held in state trust and allotments to Native Americans),
with much of this new forest land classified as cutover or tax forfeit. State forests
benefited, too. Enrollees worked in twenty-one of them—Beltrami Island, Blackduck,
Cloquet Valley, Crow Wing, Finland, Fond du Lac (including the university experimental
station), Foot Hills (including Baudora State Forest), George Washington, Grand Portage,
Kabetogama, Land O‘Lakes, Mille Lacs, Mississippi Headwaters, Paul Bunyan, Pine
Island, Savanna, Smokey Hills, St. Croix, Third River, and White Earth—and had done
additional forest conservation work at Camp Ripley, Miller Trunk, Itasca Annex, the
Anoka Game Refuge, and at Nimrod. Working under the direction of professional
foresters, enrollees in the fifty-one federal forest camps and forty-four state forest camps
developed the first comprehensive forest inventory (covering 3,729,500 acres) in the
state, performed fish surveys or counts on 336 lakes, stocked lakes with over 275,000,000
fish, and built hundreds of dams as part of water conservation work. They planted
24,786,000 trees in state forests and on adjoining land areas and a total of 123,607,000
trees (white pine, Norway or red pine, Scotch pine and jack pine) on local, state, and
federal lands. They collected thousands of bushels of pine cones for seeds, provided over
267,000 days of work in the state‘s tree and game food nurseries, and did 113,000 days of
disease control. They spent 283,000 man-days in fighting forest fires and over 225,000
more in fire suppression and prevention, such as fire tower duty and state fire school
attendance. They built 149 fire lookout towers and support buildings and 795 other
buildings and structures, strung 3,338 miles of telephone lines, built 4,500 miles of new
roads, including those for fire fighting, and did roadside maintenance on another 23,000
miles. In all, they provided 3.5 million days of labor for the United States Forest Service
and for forest-related work through the Minnesota Department of Conservation.
In keeping with conservation concepts of the time, intensive protection and
management were identified as the primary conservation goals for the state‘s forest lands.
The conservation projects done by the CCC in Minnesota advanced forest conservation at
least twenty years. A forester described the results: ―The CCC program was, without a
doubt, the most beneficial [forest and conservation] program of the ‗Roosevelt New
Deal‘.‖
CCC State Park Work Programs – Minnesota
By the time the CCC was established, the National Park Service (NPS) had
several decades of experience in park development and management, and NPS personnel
were in a position to make this knowledge available to states through the CCC. Work on
Minnesota's state park system began quickly when, just days after Robert Fechner
approved NPS recommendations for CCC involvement in state park work on April 29,
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1933, NPS officials contacted Minnesota conservation department personnel and asked
them to begin to develop architectural and landscape designs for the state‘s parks. In
Minnesota, from offices known as the Minnesota Central Design Office on the fifth floor
of the Post Office and Federal Courts Building in St. Paul, Edward W. Barber, Duluth
native and Chief Architect, V.C. Martin, Architect, N.H. Averill, Landscape Architect,
and Oscar Newstrom, Engineer, began this task. Working with NPS regional office
personnel, they began to develop plans for Minnesota parks, with design concepts, master
plans, and site plans that insured an "appropriate relationship between the built
environment and the natural landscape would be achieved. By June 1933, enrollees in
Minnesota‘s first state park camps, following designs approved by the NPS regional
office, began work in Scenic State Park, Jay Cooke State Park, and Itasca State Park,
fulfilling national park conservation concepts by preserving and maintaining natural areas
and making them available for public use. Enrollee work projects included removing
unneeded or undesirable structures, building new park structures, clearing lakes and
ponds, improving beaches, landscaping the grounds, developing campground and picnic
grounds, and restoring historic structures.
In spite of Minnesota‘s quick response to the CCC and good basic design and
management planning resources, the state did not have an adequate administrative
structure in place for the CCC. To overcome this, Harold W. Lathrop was appointed
supervisor of ECW state park work in Minnesota with a salary paid from federal funds. In
January 1935, a joint session of the state legislature heard several speeches strongly
encouraging they add a Division of State Parks to the Department of Conservation and
hire a director who was as highly trained in state park management as the director of the
Division of Forestry was in forest management. The legislature responded, creating the
new division in the Department of Conservation and appointing Lathrop director of a
system, which had, by this time, grown to thirty sites. With this change, in spite of 1935
federal cutbacks on camps which left unfinished projects stacked up in the parks for a
time, one of the two greatest periods of expansion the Minnesota park system has ever
experienced began.
In all, fifteen architects were employed to design state park buildings in
Minnesota. Led by Edward W. Barber, they developed master plans and designed
buildings in most of the state parks. Working in the rustic style, an architectural style in
which buildings are designed to reflect the site, the architects fit buildings into the natural
setting and cultural context of each park, incorporating native materials into their designs
wherever possible. After approval of the master plans and designs, work plans to carry
them out were developed and approved. The parks then were built using CCC labor under
the direction of a camp work superintendent. While it was the work superintendent's duty
to make sure projects were done on schedule, as an LEM at the Gooseberry Falls State
Park camp remembered: "He [the architect] and the engineer were in charge." Each
superintendent was allowed up to ten foremen, at least two of whom had to have training
in landscape architecture, to provide technical support.
Designs by Barber and his staff of architects are in twenty-two of Minnesota‘s
parks – Blue Mounds, Buffalo River, Camden, Charles Lindbergh, Flandrau (originally
known as Cottonwood), Fort Ridgely, Gooseberry Falls, Interstate, Itasca, Jay Cooke,
Lac Qui Parle, Lake Bemidji, Lake Bronson, Lake Carlos, Lake Shetek, Minneopa,
Monson Lake, Old Mill, St. Croix, Scenic, Sibley, and Whitewater. CCC enrollees
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worked in twelve of them – Camden, Flandrau (formerly called Cottonwood River), Fort
Ridgely, Gooseberry Falls, Itasca, Jay Cooke, Lake Bemidji, Monson Lake, St. Croix,
Scenic, Sibley, and Whitewater. Some of Barber‘s most well-known CCC-built designs,
all classified as rustic style architecture, are the Refectory, Concourse, Caretaker's Cabin,
and Entrance Portals at Gooseberry Falls State Park, the River Inn at Jay Cooke State
Park, the East Contact Station, Old Timer's Cabin, Headquarters Building, and Forest Inn
at Itasca State Park, and the Shelter Building and Bath House at Whitewater State Park.
Visitors to Minnesota‘s state parks still can see the planning and design that,
along with workmanship, represent the contributions of the CCC. Many of the buildings
in Whitewater State Park, for example, were constructed from limestone quarried in that
park. The buildings at Flandrau (formerly Cottonwood River) State Park were made from
local quartzite in a design that reflects the German heritage of the area. The River Inn at
Jay Cooke State Park, one of the largest CCC buildings in the state, was made from local
gabbro, a dark rock quarried in the area. Jay Cooke State Park enrollees also re-built the
swinging bridge over the St. Louis River in 1934-5 and reconstructed the historic Fond
du Lac Trading Post, now no longer standing, in 1935.
The stonework at Gooseberry Falls State Park is some of the best-known in the
state. Built by CCC enrollees under the guidance of John Berini and Joe Cattaneo (also
spelled Catanio), Italian-American stonemasons from Duluth, and Axel Anderson, a
Swede, it features red, blue, brown, and black granite laid in artistic patterns. An LEM
remembered finding the colors. The blue granite was quarried along the North Shore of
Lake Superior near an area not far from East Beaver Bay known as "A Bit of Norway."
The red rock was found in the same vicinity and the dark rock came from an area near the
College of St. Scholastica in Duluth. Identifying the attention to detail common in CCC
state park development in Minnesota, he described the importance of the colors: "Like
that highway wall, that is all black rock. It didn't need any dressing up there. The
buildings, you want more than just somber gray color. And that is where we hired a
stonemason to come in. … He was a great man on laying out, making it look good.
Artistic.‖ An enrollee remembered the sense of pride he felt in helping build these
buildings: "[Some] boys could see the camps being more beneficial in the years to come,
because a lot of the things that we had done were going to be on a permanent basis. Take
Gooseberry State Park, with those rock constructed buildings. We could see where stuff
like that would outlast us."
CCC enrollees also built log buildings. The newsletter of the veterans CCC camp
at Sibley State Park, Sibley Speaks, described how Burt Morton, an LEM, selected trees
to build one of the buildings: ―The park was combed thoroughly for suitable dry white
oak. The logs had to scale to a certain size. They had to be just so long and straight as a
die. No large knots or dry rot would be considered. All in all it was quite a task to find
material that would measure up to Mr. Morton‘s specifications. Many a day was spent in
his company, tramping over the park in an attempt to find exactly what he wanted. Red
oak, bur oak, and scarlet oak would not do. Nothing but the straightest, soundest, and
finest of white oak.‖ This VCC (veterans‘) company also helped build the Forest Inn at
Itasca State Park.
The Old Timer‘s Cabin at Itasca State Park, one of the first CCC-built state park
buildings, used logs so large it only took four of them to make a wall. The log and stone
Forest Inn in that park is the largest CCC-built park building in the state. Ole Evensen, a
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local woodsman, supervised the log work, while the metal fixtures in the building were
made by CCC blacksmith John Wiber. In addition to the buildings at Itasca State Park,
enrollees hauled 40,000 cubic yards of fill to create a 44‘ dam topped with stepping
stones across the headwaters of the Mississippi River and created a pageant grounds.
At Scenic State Park, described as a gem and the most ideal of any park in the
state, the CCC developed a campground location for tourists. In 1935, the park‘s log and
stone Shelter Pavilion, designed by Barber and built by enrollees, was featured in the
1935 National Park Service publication Park Structures and Facilities, which stated the
ideal park structure ―would assuredly specify logs and log construction from Minnesota.‖
The building contains rustic style furniture built by CCC enrollees under the direction of
Ole Evensen along with paintings by enrollee William Lewis.
The CCC played a major role in building and developing Minnesota's state park
system. A total of twenty-two camps were established in twelve state parks for varying
periods of time and several parks (Itasca, Whitewater, Gooseberry Falls, and Jay Cooke
among them) had two camps at different times. The camp at Scenic State Park was one
of the first CCC state park camps established in Minnesota, along with those at Jay
Cooke State Park and Itasca State Park. The second camp at Itasca State Park, a
veterans‘ camp, was the last CCC state park camp to close in the United States. The
second Gooseberry Falls State Park camp was the longest operating CCC state park camp
in Minnesota when it closed in 1941.
As with the forest camps, enrollees in the state park camps took pride in working
all year round and in all conditions. An enrollee remembered: "[Some work] had to be
done in the wintertime when it was all ice and everything was frozen. We never went out
if it was more than ten degrees below zero."
The 3.5 million days of labor given for forest-related work includes the time spent
building Minnesota‘s parks. Between 1935 and 1942, Minnesota's state park system grew
from thirty to forty-seven units and attendance tripled. The buildings and landscape
design at each park changed from a haphazard development to a cohesive set of buildings
and structures, with each design specific to its site. State park development moved ahead
fifty years and Minnesota's parks took on the distinctive look they now have. In tribute to
the work of Barber and his staff, along with the skill and hard work of everyone
associated with building Minnesota‘s parks during these years, in 1989 the National Park
Service listed the buildings and structures in twenty-two parks, including the twelve in
which CCC worked, on its National Register of Historic Places. And, Edward W.
Barber, the designer of at least forty-five of the state park buildings currently listed in the
National Register of Historic Places, is considered the major designer of Minnesota's
rustic style state park buildings and the man who gave the Minnesota parks the distinctive
look that they have today.
CCC Soil Conservation Work Programs – Minnesota
Soil erosion was one of the most severe conservation problems in the United
States at the time of Roosevelt's visit to Rochester. Photographs of huge clouds of topsoil
blowing off fields are some of the most remembered and easily identified images of the
Great Depression. They gave rise to the term Dust Bowl—the first of these great dust
storms occurred on May 11, 1934, several months before the president‘s visit. Although
Minnesota was not one of the Dust Bowl states, it suffered from a variety of different
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types of water and wind erosion, with topsoil losses ranging from less than a fourth of
total depth on almost twenty-eight million acres to almost three-fourths of total loss on
over ten million acres (20% of the state‘s total land area). In all, approximately 46% of
the state‘s total land area was affected including the Minnesota River valley and much of
the cultivated area of southern Minnesota. The worst-hit area, however, covered all or
parts of Houston, Fillmore, Winona, Olmsted, Wabasha and Goodhue Counties, with
other areas, such as Rice County, also heavily affected.
CCC soil conservation work began in Minnesota in the spring of 1933 when the
state‘s first soil erosion camps were established. Their work programs focused on
conservation objectives of flood control and introducing erosion-control programs to
stabilize farmland and encourage long-term productivity. During the summers of 1933
and 1934, they were run as temporary private erosion camps. Their administration
changed when the Soil Conservation Service (SCS) was formed in 1935 and they were
moved to permanent status.
The soil conservationist at the CCC camp developed the specifics of the plan,
including identifying what the CCC would do (typically cut fence posts, provide lime,
furnish and plant trees, and so on) and what the landowner would do. The work plan was
carried out by the CCC enrollees, often, according to the plan, helped by the landowners
themselves. Work projects included stream and lake bank protection, gully treatments
such as building ditches and check dams, terracing, sheet erosion planting, and quarrying
and making limestone available for erosion control use.
The availability of CCC labor was critical to the success of the soil conservation
work program. While the Soil Conservation Service furnished planning assistance along
with equipment and materials, such as seed, seedlings, lime, wire, fertilizer, and cement,
the CCC furnished much of the labor. Working in a radius of about 8-20 miles from each
camp, CCC enrollees quarried and crushed limestone to build erosion control dams in
gullies and de-acidify the soil. An enrollee remembered this work: ―We quarried the rock
by hand…It was hard work.‖ Using the rock, they built flumes to direct water flow,
retaining dams in gullies and walls along highways and roads, after which they graded,
sodded, and seeded ditches and side slopes when needed. Another enrollee described
building flumes by hand, many of which are still in use today: ―We done a lot of sod-rock
flumes. Rock and sod laid in a big ditch with the banks sloped down, so they don‘t wash
out any deeper. Done for soil erosion.‖ A former enrollee remembered building dams to
stop the gullying: ―We worked on the dams. We built brush dams and dams built out of
native stone. [Brush ravines were used] in a small ravine or pasture where the soil was
washing down there. And so we would dig it out and pile brush in there. And we would
keep all that dirt back that was washing away. Save that farmland from going to New
Orleans. The big gullies, that was where we put the native stone [dams] in. We had to
learn how to do that. It wasn‘t built with cement blocks or bricks. We had to shape the
native stone. You didn‘t dare have it over a quarter of an inch off. I learned on the job.
The work was done by the enlisted men [enrollees] themselves. The native stone dams
are hard to find now. They conserved all that soil. It‘s built all up now. You have a hard
time even finding them. In other words, it‘s reclaimed land. It worked.‖
Enrollees also planted trees. And as with forest service and state park enrollees,
many years later, they clearly remembered what it took to do this. An enrollee described
the process: ―We used to plant trees. Every spring, plant a lot of trees. We planted oaks
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and maple and walnut and pine. We never planted any willow. They weren‘t too hard to
plant, but it was hard on the back. We planted them where the farmers wanted them. We
dug a hole with a round rod and then filled it in again with a spade. We had a lot of small
trees. Planted them three-four feet apart. Had the trees in gunny sacks. We carried them
on our backs. They weren‘t too terribly heavy, but the worst job was bending over all the
time.‖
Tree planting was an important part of the soil conservation process, helping
protect vulnerable land and rebuild some of the lost hardwood forests in the area. In
1937, enrollees planted almost 1.4 million trees in southeastern Minnesota, including
460,000 conifers, 790,000 hardwoods, and 145,000 shrubs, while collecting almost
20,000 pounds of hardwood seeds to support future plantings. Tree planting supported a
nursery in Winona, which started in 1935 and operated until 1954. In 1938, it had 18.5
million conifer and deciduous trees, mostly raised from seed, ready for enrollees to plant.
An enrollee described the renewable results of this work more than fifty years later: ―The
boys planted them [trees]. They cut them last year [1992]. Selective cutting. They were
hardwoods.‖
Work conditions for the enrollees were not always perfect. As with the forest and
state park camps, the difficulties of working outdoors in all kinds of weather were clearly
remembered. An enrollee described summer conditions: ―The mosquitoes were so bad
they finally gave us mosquito netting for our cots. The fish flies hit another time. They
had to go out with big highway scrapers and get them out of there.‖ Another enrollee
remembered winter conditions: ―If it got real cold, I think we didn‘t go out that day. But
then, some days we worked on Saturday to make up for it.‖ And, as with all Minnesota
CCC enrollees, they fought forest fires. Even though enrollees from the soil conservation
camps did not have fires in their own areas, they were sometimes needed in the state‘s
federal and state forests. During fire seasons in the late summer and fall, convoys of
trucks carrying men from the soil conservation service camps were regularly sent north.
There soil conservation service enrollees worked alongside CCC enrollees from camps
throughout the state in difficult and often uncomfortable conditions, staying as long as a
month when needed, before they were sent back to their own camps.
The results of the work of CCC enrollees in Minnesota‘s nineteen soil
conservation service camps may still be seen on the more than 160,000 acres of land on
which the enrollees worked. Instead of rectangular fields, straight rows and pastures on
uncultivatable land, there are now the curved rows of contour farming matched to
topography, terraces, and woodlots on steep slopes. The land is free of gullies and other
marks of erosion and has clean streams and silt-free lakes.
CCC-Indian Division Work Programs - Minnesota
The list of CCC-ID work projects in Minnesota included bridge maintenance and
construction, fire tower maintenance, development of water supply systems, trail
maintenance and construction, minor road maintenance and construction, hazard
reduction, telephone installation, ditch drainage, dam construction and maintenance, and
garage, cabin, warehouse construction. Enrollees also worked on CCC-ID camp
construction and maintenance, razing structures, restoration of historic structures, signs,
and markers, monuments construction and maintenance. They ran a fish hatchery, did
lake development, seeded wild rice lakes, worked on forest plantings, did forest stand
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improvement, white pine blister rust control, and fire fighting and fire prevention
including firebreak construction and maintenance. They also built public camp grounds
and picnic grounds, did stream development, and worked on wildlife preservation
projects, map making, and miscellaneous surveys. Working under the direction of the
Minnesota Historical Society, enrollees at Grand Portage did archeological work and
building reconstruction that laid the basis for the American Fur Company post site being
named a national monument. In 1940, CCC-ID director John Collier described the
program‘s impact: ―There is no part of Indian country, there are few functions of Indian
life, where it has not made an indispensable contribution.‖
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Appendix G. Early 20th Century United States Conservation History
This interpretive information includes background on national and state forest and
park history that led to development of the conservation concepts that guided the work of
the Civilian Conservation Corps.
Forest and Park Conservation Theory
John Muir, one of the founders of the Sierra Club, and Gifford Pinchot, the first
USFS Chief Forester, fought for protection of public open spaces. But their thinking and
goals were very different. In July 1896, when Muir met Pinchot, Pinchot was a national
leader in the conservation movement and a leading spokesman for the sustainable use of
natural resources to benefit people. His views eventually clashed with Muir and
highlighted two diverging views of the use of the country's natural resources. Pinchot saw
conservation as a means of managing the nation's natural resources for long-term
sustainable commercial use. As a professional forester, his view was that "forestry is tree
farming," and it could be done without destroying the long-term viability of forests. Muir
valued nature for its spiritual and transcendental qualities. In one essay about the national
parks, he referred to them as "places for rest, inspiration, and prayers." He often
encouraged city dwellers to experience nature for its spiritual nourishment. Both men
opposed reckless exploitation of natural resources, including clear-cutting of forests.
Even Muir acknowledged the need for timber and the forests to provide it, but Pinchot's
view of wilderness management was far more utilitarian and it angered Muir.
The association between Muir and Pinchot ended late in the summer of 1897
when Pinchot released a statement to a Seattle newspaper supporting sheep grazing in
forest reserves. Muir confronted Pinchot and demanded an explanation. When Pinchot
reiterated his position, Muir told him: "I don't want any thing more to do with you." Their
philosophical divide continued to expand, splitting the conservation movement into two
camps: the preservationists, led by Muir, and Pinchot's camp, who adopted the term
conservation. The two men debated their positions in popular magazines, such as
Outlook, Harper's Weekly, Atlantic Monthly, World's Work, and Century.
The contrasting views of Pinchot and Muir can be seen in the work of the CCC.
State and national forest conservation work bore the utilitarian stamp of Pinchot‘s
philosophy – ―the greatest good for the greatest number.‖ The National Park Service,
following more closely to Muir‘s philosophy, developed the state and national parks but
always with the goal of maintaining their natural beauty. To this end, the NPS developed
rustic style architecture – the only architectural style developed by a governmental
agency. In rustic style architecture, buildings are designed to fit into the natural setting
and cultural context of each location. They are made using materials from the site and
region wherever possible. CCC-built state park buildings in Minnesota all are of rustic
style architecture. They were listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1997.
The United States Forest Service, United States Department of Agriculture
The United States Forest Service (USFS) guided the forest work of the Civilian
Conservation Corps. Forest Service history began in 1876, when the United States
Congress appropriated funds to establish the office of commissioner of agriculture.
Franklin B. Hough was appointed first commissioner of agriculture. In 1881 the Division
of Forestry was established and Hough was named its chief; the division was given full
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statutory recognition in 1886. Gifford Pinchot, America‘s first professionally trained,
native forester, was appointed chief in 1898. The Division of Forestry was given bureau
status in 1901 and it became the United States Forest Service in 1905 with Pinchot
serving as its first chief until 1910. According to Pinchot, the purpose of the United
States Forest Service was ―to provide the greatest amount good for the greatest amount of
people in the long run.‖
Pinchot was a close friend of President Theodore Roosevelt. Both believed in
what was, for the first time, called conservation of natural resources. Pinchot organized
the forest service to guide conservation of its resources under Theodore Roosevelt‘s
leadership. In the 1920s, two men developed this concept further. Aldo Leopold, the
founding father of wildlife ecology and author of The Sand County Almanac (published
in 1949), and Arthur A. Carhart, a landscape architect for the United States Forest
Service who wrote a 1921 set of recommendations that led to development of the
Boundary Waters Canoe Area (BWCA) on the northern Minnesota-Canadian border,
developed the multiple use concept. According to this concept, forest management should
include a combination of commercial, recreational, and aesthetic values and programs.
Also developed in response to the interest in scientific and technological discoveries that
marked the early years of the twentieth century and forest management, the multiple use
policy was characterized by active management of resources for a variety of aesthetic and
material purposes. Pinchot‘s policy, along with Leopold‘s and Carhart‘s multiple use
concept, guided forest conservation in Minnesota and throughout the country during the
CCC years and beyond.
The National Forest System is defined ―as federally owned units of forest, range,
and related land consisting of national forests, purchase units, national grasslands, land
utilization project areas, experimental forest areas, experimental range areas, designated
experimental areas, other land areas, water areas, and interests in lands that are
administered by the Forest Service or designated for administration through the Forest
Service.‖ The national forest concept began with the Forest Reserve Act of 1891 which
authorized withdrawing land from public domain as forest reserves to assure predictable
supplies of water and timber.
In 1902, the Morris Act allowed the federal government to reserve specified forest
tracts. In 1911, Congress allowed federal purchase of forestlands damaged by fires,
logging, and farming. The General Exchange Act of 1922 allowed private land to be
exchanged with public land in federal forest boundaries. Through the Clark-McNary Act
of 1924 land could be purchased for timber production. It also laid the groundwork for
fire prevention, supported tree planting, and encouraged establishment of state forest
agencies.
The United States Forest Service is the world‘s largest forest research agency.
This work was supported by the McSweeney-McNary Act of 1928 which authorized
research and a comprehensive nationwide survey of forest resources on public and private
lands. Forest research stations, which began to be established in 1909, carried out forestry
research throughout the country. According to the Forest Service, ―Overall, the Forest
Service manages the National Forest System to provide a variety of harmonious uses and
to produce continuous yields of timber and other renewable resources without reducing
their productive capacity and with careful regard for aesthetic, recreational, and
environmental values.‖
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Major landmarks in United States Forest Service (USFS) history:
In 1876, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) was tasked with assessing
the quality and size of forest in the United States.
In 1881 the work expanded into the more-focused Division of Forestry within the
USDA.
The Forest Reserve Act of 1891 allowed land to be withdrawn from public
domain as forest reserves to be managed by the U.S. Department of the Interior.
The Division of Forestry became the Bureau of Forestry in 1901.
Management of forest reserves was transferred to the Bureau of Forestry in 1905,
at which time it was renamed the United States Forest Service (USFS).
Gifford Pinchot was the first Chief Forester of the United States Forest Service
(1905-1910). He later went on to serve as Governor of Pennsylvania (1923-1927,
1931-1935). He coined the term ―conservation ethic‖ and believed in scientific
management of forests – ―the greatest good for the greatest number.‖
The National Park Service, United States Department of the Interior
The National Park Service (NPS) guided Civilian Conservation Corps work in
state and national parks. Development of a national parks concept began in the late 1800s
when momentum began to build for an agency to preserve and care for the growing
nation‘s natural wonders. This led to creation of the National Park Service (NPS) in 1916.
When it was established, several national parks already were in place. Originally
created in areas without state government, which triggered Federal involvement, the
following parks were organized under Federal management and control prior to
establishment of the NPS: Yellowstone National Park, the first to be created, became a
national park on March 1, 1872. It was followed by: Yosemite (1890), Sequoia and
General Grant (1890), Mount Rainier (1899), Crater Lake (1902), Mesa Verde (1906),
Glacier (1910), and Rocky Mountain (1915).
In spite of its growth, the park system lacked a coherent policy. United States
Forest Service conservation policy encouraged use public lands to produce the greatest
good for the greatest number of people. This conservation policy allowed logging and
other actions that national park supporters felt destroyed the natural beauty of an area.
National park supporters, an environmental constituency led by John Muir and the Sierra
Club, believed parks should be protected and preserved for their ―scenic beauty and
natural wonders.‖ Tension between conservationists and environmentalists, led by
Gifford Pinchot and John Muir, became one of the major clashes defining federal forest
and park policies. The act creating the National Park Service turned the environmental
preservation beliefs into reality, stating the fundamental purpose of the NPS ―is to
conserve the scenery and the natural and historic objects and the wild life therein and to
provide for the enjoyment of the same in such manner and by such means as will leave
them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations.‖ Writer and historian Wallace
Stegner has called national parks ―the best idea we ever had. Absolutely American,
absolutely democratic, they reflect us at our best rather than our worst.‖
Major landmarks in National Park Service (NPS) history:
In 1872, Yellowstone National Park was designated a national park under
management of the U.S. Department of the Interior
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In the 1880s and 1890s, Yosemite, Sequoia, Mount Rainier, Crater Lake, and
Glacier were added to the list of national parks – all under supervision of USDI.
In 1906 Congress passed the Antiquities Act to protect ―historic landmarks,
historic and prehistoric structures, and other objects of historic or scientific
interest‖
President Theodore Roosevelt used the Antiquities Act to identify eighteen
national monuments and put them under USDI management
Management of the growing number of national parks and national monuments
was formalized with the establishment of the National Park Service in 1916.
Stephen T. Mather was named first NPS Director. He was assisted by Franklin K.
Lane.
Management of the park and monuments was guided by the mission "to conserve
the scenery and the natural and historic objects and the wild life therein and to
provide for the enjoyment of the same in such manner and by such means as will
leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations.‖ Parks and
monuments should be preserved for posterity in essentially their natural state.
This was in part the legacy of John Muir, an early crusader for wilderness
preservation who believed wilderness had spiritual and economic value.
National park conservation-for-beauty goals were at odds with the scientificallybased conservation management goals of the forest service. This difference in
vision was the major debate over management and preservation of public lands
through the early years of the twentieth century.
The Soil Conservation Service, now known as the National Resource
Conservation Service, United States Department of Agriculture
The Soil Conservation Service oversaw Civilian Conservation Corps soil
conservation work. Major landmarks in Soil Conservation Service (SCS) history:
The idea for a national soil conservation service was developed by the Hugh
Hammond Bennett, first SCS director, in the 1920s in response to widespread and
diverse soil conservation needs.
In 1933, the Soil Erosion Service (SES), predecessor to the Soil Conservation
Service and what would later become the National Resources Conservation
Service (NRCS), was established in the U.S. Department of the Interior.
Personnel began working with farmers in Wisconsin on the first SES project.
Hugh Hammond Bennett was SES director.
The Soil Conservation Act, establishing the Soil Conservation Service in the U.S.
Department of Agriculture, was passed in 1935. Hugh Hammond Bennett was
named its first director.
Hugh Hammond Bennett is considered the father of soil conservation and
sometimes is called the Gifford Pinchot of soil conservation. He described soil erosion as
a ―national menace‖ and believed in integrating various disciplines and sciences into a
plan for a whole property. He felt that tailoring soil conservation practices to ―fit the
capability of the land and the desires of the landowners‖ contributed to quality of life
throughout the entire region in which it was practiced.
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Appendix H. Minnesota Forest, Park, and Soil Conservation History
During the early years of the state‘s history, Minnesotans mirrored the rest of the
country in general lack of interest in conservation of natural resources. Starting with the
first years of statehood, the legislature tried to manage some of the state‘s resources but
the laws passed often were ineffective at best. Among the few decisions of lasting
impact, legislators established Minnesota's first state park, Itasca State Park, in 1891 and
its first state forest preserve, Pillsbury State Forest, in 1900, although they did little to
manage or administer them. In 1908, during the heyday of logging activities in the state,
efforts to preserve some of the virgin or old-growth forests resulted in the U.S. Congress
creating the Minnesota National Forest (it became the Chippewa National Forest in
1928). The Superior National Forest, located along the North Shore of Lake Superior,
was created by proclamation of President Theodore Roosevelt the next year.
Credit for leadership of Minnesota‘s early forest conservation efforts is generally
given to one man, Christopher Columbus Andrews, an attorney and former United States
ambassador to Sweden. Andrews' efforts resulted from his learning about Sweden‘s
reforestation projects and policies during his time there. Realizing similar policies could
help Minnesota, he went to work. He supported the concept of state forests and helped
found a state tree nursery and several state parks. He encouraged the state legislature to
set aside land for forest reserves, supported expansion of the state forest service, and led
the efforts to create Minnesota‘s two national forests. In spite of much public opposition
during these years of clear cutting of Minnesota‘s northern forests, he supported
conservation concepts that focused on sustainable and managed use—forests should
occupy land unsuitable for agriculture, cutting or harvesting of trees should be allowed
but annual cutting should not exceed annual growth, and forests, as renewable resources,
should be protected and continually renewed through reforestation. Although his views
were not popular, the massive forest fires that periodically swept through northern
Minnesota (Hinckley, 1894; Chisholm, 1908; Spooner-Baudette, 1910; Cloquet/Moose
Lake, 1918) were reminders something needed to be done.
In the 1920s, influenced by national policies and guided by Andrews and his
ideas, the Minnesota legislature began to develop a stronger system of land, forest, and
water management—major areas of interest to conservationists at the time. Under the
leadership of Governor Floyd B. Olson, the legislature enacted laws that re-organized the
Department of Conservation in 1925 and again in 1931. With this, for the first time,
Minnesota had a Conservation Commission and a Department of Conservation that
recognized and assigned specific areas of responsibility: Forestry, Game and Fish,
Drainage and Waters, and Lands and Minerals. William T. Cox became the first
Commissioner of Conservation. Grover M. Conzet was named Director of the Division of
Forestry in 1924 and ran this division during the CCC years. They practiced Pinchot‘s
governing tenet of forest management—the best use for the most people—
and the multiple use concept, along with Andrews‘ conservation beliefs, and used these
principles to guide forest conservation work of the CCC in Minnesota. As Cox said, this
was an important epoch in Minnesota for it ―marked the beginning of a unified control
of...resources... [and laid] the foundation for the carrying out of a comprehensive,
scientific conservation program.‖
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Minnesota Logging and Lumbering History
The logging and lumbering industry in the United States began in the forests of
New England and generally followed the path of settlement westward across the northern
states. Interest in Minnesota‘s pineries, as they were sometimes called, began in the early
years of the nineteenth century. Treaties with Dakota and Ojibwa Indians dating from
1837 began to open the land. Shortly after treaties were signed, loggers went to work in
the forests. The post-Civil War boom and rapid settlement of the post-war period in the
United States increased demand for lumber and Minnesota‘s industries boomed. The
heyday of logging in Minnesota lasted until the early twentieth century when most of the
white pine trees, the most valued trees for their lumber, had been cut. The logging
industry then moved west to the forests of Montana and the Northwest Coast states.
Logging and lumbering still continue throughout the country, though in a smaller and
more controlled environment.
Minnesota‘s historic pineries were in the northern and northeastern parts of the
state. In these forests, spruce, balsam, tamarack, white cedar, and jack pine mixed in with
scrub oak, maple, birch, and aspen. There also were stands of red pine (also called
Norway pine). Red pine is a tall, straight tree with dark green needles and flaky, reddish
bark. But of all the trees in Minnesota‘s northern forests, white pine was the most valued.
These trees grew in an area southwest of Duluth, west and south along the Snake River
and Rum River areas and along the Mississippi River to Leech Lake with the best stands
found in Carlton County. By the end of the American historic logging era in the midtwentieth century, only about 1% of virgin white pine trees were left standing. In
Minnesota, native stands of virgin white pine trees can be found in the Boundary Waters
Canoe Area (BWCA) and on the Lost 40 Scientific and Natural Area (SNA) near
Blackduck.
White pine trees grow to be about 100-150‘ tall. They have a diameter of 2.5-3‘
and have white, straight-grained wood prized by builders. Their needles are long, bluishgreen, and grow in bundles of five. The cones are long and slender and the bark is dark
gray. Mature trees often live 200-250 years and some 400-500 year-old-trees have been
found. White pine are somewhat resistant to fire but susceptible to blister rust, a fungus
disease that migrated here from Europe early in the twentieth century.
Logging and lumbering in Minnesota became big business in the years following
the Civil War. In 1889, more than one billion board feet of lumber were cut in Minnesota
forests alone. This amount doubled in 1900 and Minnesota became a logging and sawmill
center. With the development of railroads throughout the state in the 1870s, the demand
for white pine increased. The trees were cut for ties, trestles, and bridges as well as for
lumber for building construction.
Lumber mills were established in Winona, Stillwater, St. Anthony Falls, and
Marine on St. Croix during the 1850s. At the time, Minnesota‘s white pine forests were
thought to be so large, they could not be exhausted. With this, the myth of Minnesota‘s
inexhaustible forests was born. But Minnesota‘s forests were not inexhaustible.
Production began to decline after 1900. By the early 1920s the logging industry had
moved west. It left, in its wake, millions of acres of cutover land in northern and
northeastern Minnesota. Although settlers were encouraged to develop farms on this
cutover land – farming was seen as the best and most productive use of the land – it soon
became apparent much of the land in northern and northeastern Minnesota was better
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suited for forest development than it was for farming. With the Agricultural Depression
of the 1920s and the Great Depression of the 1930s, many of the farms on the cutover
lands were lost and abandoned. Much of Minnesota‘s cutover, abandoned, formerly
forested lands in northern and northeastern Minnesota became tax forfeit – meaning land
ownership was lost through non-payment of taxes. By 1933 when the CCC was
established, it was available for reforestation as state and national forests and state parks.
Logging and lumbering techniques
Logging took place during the winter months when trees could be more easily
hauled over ice and snow to railroads or rivers for transportation to sawmills. Rivers were
common modes of transportation for logged trees. Cut trees were hauled to riverbanks,
where they waited for the spring thaw. When the ice broke up on the river, the logs were
sent in giant rafts downriver to the mills. ―River pigs‖ guided the log rafts to their
destinations.
Tools used by loggers included two-man saw, peavey (lever with a sharp spike),
cant hook (peavey with hook instead of spike), the go-devil (a sled that hauled a small
load of logs), and oxen- or horse-drawn dray (a sled that hauled a large load of logs).
Minnesota National Forests
Minnesota has two national forests. The Minnesota National Forest was
established on June 23, 1908; its name was changed to the Chippewa National Forest on
June 22, 1928. The Superior National Forest was established on February 13, 1909. In
1933, the Minnesota Department of Conservation estimated these two forests contained
about 75% of the state‘s remaining virgin or original stands of timber. Management
objectives for the forests were based on national forest policy of the "greatest sustained
good for the greatest number of people."
Minnesota State Forests
The Minnesota State Forest Service was established in 1911. In spite of this, state
forest (also called state forest preserve) administration was, at best, loosely managed
prior to formation of the Department of Conservation. The organization of the
Department of Conservation in 1925, and its 1931 re-organization with four divisions
including the Division of Forestry, improved the situation. William T. Cox was
Minnesota‘s first Commissioner of Conservation; he was succeeded by E.V. Willard,
Herman C. Wenzel, and W.L. Strunk during the CCC years. Grover Conzet was director
of the state Division of Forestry throughout the CCC. Conzet‘s leadership was guided by
the ―economic principle that all lands be put to their highest and most productive long
time use for the permanent good of the greatest number of people.‖
The number of state forests in Minnesota grew under Conzet‘s leadership. In
1933, Minnesota Laws, Chapter 419 created thirteen new state forests – most on cutover,
tax forfeit lands, defined the boundaries for each, and gave the state the authority to
acquire privately held lands in their boundaries for forest management and development.
This legislation provided Minnesota with the legal grounds to establish CCC camps in
state forests. The thirteen new forests are Beltrami Island, Cloquet Valley, Finland, Fond
du Lac, Foot Hills, George Washington, Grand Portage, Kabetogama, Land O‘Lakes,
Pine Island, Savanna, Third River, and White Earth.
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By the end of the CCC in 1943, Minnesota had another thirteen new forests –
most also developed on cutover, tax forfeit lands. These new forests are Bay Lake, Buena
Vista, Crow Wing, Mille Lacs, Mississippi Headwaters, Nemadji, Northwest Angle, Paul
Bunyan, Pillsbury, Rum River, Smoky Hills, Waskish, and Blackduck. State forest
management throughout the 1930s and 1940s followed national forest policy of providing
the "greatest sustained good for the greatest number of people."
Minnesota State Parks
Minnesota was one of the first states in the country to develop a state park system.
The first State Monument was established at Camp Release in 1889 and the first state
park, Itasca State Park, was established in 1891. By 1925, the number of state parks had
grown but their management at the state level was uneven. Local advisory committees
often oversaw daily management. In 1925 when the Department of Conservation was
established, it was given general jurisdiction over the state park system. The need for
more effective management was recognized in 1931 when the Department of
Conservation was re-organized and supervision of Minnesota‘s parks was consolidated
under the Division of Forestry led by Grover Conzet.
In 1934, as the volume of CCC work in state parks grew, Harold W. Lathrop was
appointed supervisor of CCC state park work in Minnesota. His position was changed the
following year when the Department of Conservation expanded to include a separate
Division of State Parks and he was named the Minnesota‘s first state parks director.
Soil Conservation Service in Minnesota
When the CCC began in 1933, the United States Forest Service (USFS), acting as
the agent for the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), was responsible for
CCC soil conservation work in Minnesota. It collaborated with the Department of
Agriculture at the University of Minnesota, the Division of Drainage and Waters in the
Department of Conservation and the Minnesota Highway Department to develop soil
conservation work programs for the state. In 1934 soil conservation work through the
newly-formed, temporary Soil Erosion Service (SES) began in Minnesota. This was
followed by passage of the Soil Conservation and Domestic Allotment Act on April 27,
1935, which formed the Soil Conservation Service (SCS) and placed it in the United
States Department of Agriculture (USDA). Its first director was soil conservationist Hugh
Hammond Bennett.
Minnesota‘s soil conservation districts also date from the CCC era. The
Minnesota legislature passed the Soil Conservation District Law on April 21, 1937. The
state‘s first soil conservation district (SCD), the Burns-Homer-Pleasant District, was
organized a little over a year later on May 3, 1938. Today, Minnesota has ninety-one Soil
and Water Conservation Districts. They are administered through the Board of Soil and
Water Resources (BWSR) with representatives of the SWCDs, the University of
Minnesota Extension Service, the Department of Natural Resources, the state Pollution
Control Agency, the state Department of Agriculture and the state Department of Health.
The Civilian Conservation Corps
The Civilian Conservation Corps provided a way to widely and effectively
disseminate the policies of Theodore and Franklin Roosevelt, Gifford Pinchot,
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Christopher Columbus Andrews, John Muir, Hugh Hammond Bennett and others, not
only in Minnesota, but throughout the country. Although the tension between
conservation and environmental philosophies continued, both were incorporated into the
work of the CCC. Forest work was guided by Pinchot‘s ―greatest good for the greatest
number,‖ while park work, with development of rustic style architecture, adhered more
closely to the ―enjoyment but leave unimpaired‖ philosophy. CCC forest and park
conservation work projects, guided by these policies, helped meet widespread need.
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Appendix I. The Great Depression and the New Deal
Most people associate the start of the Great Depression with the crash of the stock
market on Black Friday, October 27, 1929. At the time, however, although the crash was
severe, it was thought to be a stock market adjustment that would soon self-correct.
Instead, the economies of the world began to spiral downward. The situation began to be
called the Great Depression as early as 1934. Prior to that, financial crises and downturns
had been referred to as panics.
The Great Depression
It took several years for the Great Depression to completely take hold but by
1932, when Franklin D. Roosevelt was running for president, the United States was in
terrible trouble. Farm income dropped by 50% between1929 and 1933 and farmers began
to lose their farms by the thousands. Huge dust storms covering many states at once
rolled through the central United States as the effects of drought and wind lifted topsoil
and blew it away. Businesses failed and factories shut down, causing people to lose their
jobs and then their homes. Wages fell by 40% or more for those who had jobs. Farm and
home foreclosures were common. Banks failed and closed by the thousands, taking the
savings of all their depositors. Unemployment was 25% for non-farm workers and hit 8090% in some places. The Iron Range in Minnesota was a particularly hardhit area with
unemployment reaching 90%.
It became common to see long food lines at relief agencies throughout the
country. The costs of caring for growing numbers of poor threatened to bankrupt cities
and townships – traditional sources of aid for the poor. The number of suicides grew as
people lost the ability to cope. People abandoned their homes and became migrant
workers. Shantytowns housing homeless people in cardboard boxes or automobiles grew
up outside of most cities. They were called Hoovervilles as an insult to President Herbert
Hoover, under whom the depression had started. Among the world‘s leading economies,
the United States and Germany were hit the hardest. People referred to ―hard times,‖
though people living today probably cannot fully understand the meaning of this term. In
1939, John Steinbeck wrote about the difficulties of migrant workers during the Great
Depression in The Grapes of Wrath.
The Great Depression resulted in a change in how people perceived government.
Prior to the 1930s, most people had favored small government. But in 1932 when
Franklin D. Roosevelt ran on a platform that promised an activist approach to the
depression that involved large federal relief programs and changes in laws to restrict
practices thought to have contributed to the downturn, he was elected by a landslide. His
package of reforms, which he called the New Deal, was designed to combat the
depression‘s worst effects by having the federal government take on many
responsibilities for the welfare of its people.
As the economy began to turn around, people began to relax. Another downturn,
the Recession of 1937, lasting from 1937-38, caused a spike in unemployment from 14%
in 1937 to 19% in 1938. Unemployment began to fall again in 1939, but it would take
World War II and war production needs (1941-1945) to bring about a large, steady
increase in employment.
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President Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR), 1933-1945
Franklin Delano Roosevelt was elected to his first term as 32nd President of the
United States in the fall of 1932. He was inaugurated and took office in March 1933
before presidential inaugurations were changed to January. FDR, as he was popularly
known, was from a well-to-do New York family. He was well-educated with a degree
from Harvard and a law degree from Columbia University. He had married a distant
cousin, Anna Eleanor Roosevelt, in 1905 and they had five children. Eleanor Roosevelt
became an activist first lady. Beginning when FDR became president and continuing for
the rest of her life, she was a tireless champion of social causes including civil rights for
African Americans.
FDR also was distantly related to Theodore Roosevelt (TR), the 26th U.S.
President (1901-1909). Theodore Roosevelt was a Republican and FDR a Democrat but
they shared some basic views. Both believed in activist presidents. TR stated government
should guarantee justice to all but dispense favors to none. He supported a ―square deal‖
for the American people. According to common lore, one of his favorite proverbs was
―speak softly and carry a big stick.‖
FDR also was committed to public service. Before becoming president, he served
as a U.S. Senator from New York and had been the Democratic nominee for vice
president with James M. Cox in 1920. Republicans Warren Harding and Calvin Coolidge
won the election. In 1921, FDR lost the use of his legs to polio. As he began to recover,
he ordered modified wheelchairs for personal use and began to use leg braces that locked
in place so he could stand to give speeches. He never was publicly photographed in a
wheelchair. Throughout the campaign of 1932, in fact, he projected an air of confidence,
strength, and courage, promising the American people: ―I pledge you, I pledge myself, to
a new deal for the American people.‖ Voters responded in record numbers and the
presidential election of 1932 was a landslide victory for FDR.
Roosevelt took office for his first term during the depths of the Great Depression.
His philosophy was reflected in one of the most often-quoted lines from his first
inaugural address – ―the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.‖ He spoke those words
as the country seemed to be crumbling around him. Almost all the banks had failed (gone
out of business taking everyone‘s savings with them) and unemployment was rapidly
rising to 13,000,000 (an overall rate of 25%, though much higher rates were recorded in
some areas – such as 80-90% on the Iron Range.)
To combat these problems, FDR‘s first one hundred days of his first term were a
whirlwind of activity. He proposed, and Congress enacted, sweeping programs to bring
relief to banks, farms, the unemployed, and people facing foreclosure – his New Deal for
the American people. As the economy slowly began to recover, however, bankers and
businessmen began to question his activist government philosophy. They criticized FDR
for taking the country off the gold standard (1935) and for using government deficit
spending to fund relief programs. FDR responded by proposing new programs including
Social Security, taxes on the wealthy, controls on banks, controls on public utilities, and
the WPA (Works Progress Administration) – the largest work/relief program in U.S.
history. He was overwhelmingly elected to his second term in 1936, but throughout his
second term, he faced fights to protect his programs from an increasingly nervous
Congress and Supreme Court. The 1938 midterm election, a backlash against governing
philosophy, was considered a Republican victory.
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Throughout his presidency, Roosevelt used the media to communicate with and
reassure the American people. Radio, the most popular medium of the time, became his
mouthpiece. In March 1933, he broadcast the first of his fireside chats to talk about the
banking crisis. The fireside chats became an important means of delivering information
about New Deal programs. Other topics included ―Outlining the New Deal,‖ ―The
Recovery Plan,‖ ―The Works Relief Program,‖ and ―On Farmers and Laborers.‖
People‘s impressions of FDR reflected the image he projected. They responded to
his strong voice in the fireside chats and, overall, to his reassuring, commanding
presence. They respected and were inspired by his leadership. They may not have agreed
with everything he did but they knew he was working to bring the country out of the
Great Depression. They got a kick out of his jaunty stance, chin forward, with a cigarette
in a cigarette holder. Some may have known he couldn‘t walk because of polio, but the
knowledge didn‘t detract from their image of him as a strong leader.
After 1936, Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected to two more terms as president,
becoming the only president in U.S. history to serve four terms. He was president on
December 7, 1941, ― a date that will live in infamy‖ as he said when the Japanese
bombed Pearl Harbor and the United States entered World War II. He guided the country
through World War II but would not live to see the end of the war, dying in office of a
cerebral hemorrhage in April 1945. He was succeeded by Vice President Harry Truman.
Germany surrendered to the Allies in May 1945. When Japan continued to fight,
President Truman decided to use a new secret weapon, an atomic bomb, to hasten the end
of the war. The first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945. When
Japan still refused to surrender, a second atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki on
August 9, 1945. Japan surrendered on August 15, 1945, and World War II officially
ended in early September 1945.
New Deal Measures for Relief, Recovery, and Reform
New Deal measures enacted by Congress were popularly known as ―alphabet‖ or
―alphabet soup‖ programs because so many were known by their initials. Historians
generally refer to programs developed in 1933-1934 as the First New Deal and those
developed from 1935-1938 as the Second New Deal. Here is a list of New Deal Relief,
Recovery, and Reform programs:
New Deal Relief Programs
BANK HOLIDAY: 6 March 1933 -- closed all banks; government then
investigated banks and allowed only those that were sound to reopen.
FEDERAL EMERGENCY RELIEF ASSOCIATION [FERA]: 1933-1935 -- gave
direct relief in the form of money as aid to states and localities for distribution to
needy. Ultimately FERA distributed about $3-billion in relief to eight million
families -- one-sixth of the population. When terminated, its work was taken over
by the WPA and Social Security.
CIVIL WORKS ADMINISTRATION [CWA]: 1933-1934 – gave money to states
to build 225,000 miles of roads, 30,000 schools, and 3,700 playing fields and
athletic grounds. Although it didn‘t last long, it served as a work relief model for
the WPA as opposed to general relief, also called the dole, associated with FERA.
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PUBLIC WORKS ADMINISTRATION [PWA]: 1933-1941 – gave loans to
private industry to build public works projects such as electricity-producing dams,
ports, bridges, sewage plants, government buildings, power plants, airports,
hospitals, aircraft carriers, and other useful projects. Designed to spend big bucks
on big projects. Distributed about $6 billion to help prime the pump of economic
growth.
FARM CREDIT ADMINISTRATION [FCA]: 1933-ongoing -- helped the 40%
of farms that were mortgaged by providing low-interest loans (2.25% per year)
through a Federal Land Bank for fifty-year terms. Currently regulates and
examines entities of the Farm Credit System.
CIVILIAN CONSERVATION CORPS [CCC]: 31 March 1933- 30 June 1943 -provided jobs and relocation for young men (18-25) in rural settings under
direction of conservation work program directors. CCC workers lived in camps
run by the U.S. Army and built public parks, cut fire trails, planted trees, fought
forest fires, helped with flood control, reclaimed ruined land, drained swamps,
and helped conserve land according to the scientific management principles of the
time.
HOMEOWNERS' LOAN CORPORATION [HOLC]: 1933-1951 -- lowered
mortgages and refinanced homes to stop foreclosures. It stopped lending in 1936
when its authorization to issue loans ended. Records show it overwhelmingly
helped white people. It liquidated itself in 1951.
NATIONAL YOUTH ADMINISTRATION: 1935-1943 -- Eleanor Roosevelt
helped lobby her husband for this program and became its most well-known
champion. It funded work and training programs for urban youth – men and
women – with pay ranging from $6-$30 per month depending on the work and
level of responsibility. In 1937, it launched an initiative for African American
youth directed by Mary McLeod Bethune. Congress ended funding in 1943.
New Deal Recovery Programs
ABANDONMENT OF GOLD STANDARD: 1933-ongoing -- executive order
by FDR removing gold as the country‘s currency standard and replacing it with
silver. On a gold standard, currency can be redeemed for gold at a specified rate.
But gold is rare, which keeps the supply of money down. Silver is not as rare as
gold, making it easier to get currency based on a silver standard into circulation.
Reconstruction Finance Corporation (RFC) set new value of gold. (As of the
1970s, no country in the world uses the gold standard)
FEDERAL SECURITIES ACT [FSA]: 1933-ongoing -- stiffened regulation of
securities businesses and allowed government to investigate stock market.
Sometimes called the Truth in Securities Act.
WORKS PROGRESS ADMINISTRATION [WPA]: 1935-1943 -- established to
put men and women to work on jobs of public use. 5,900 schoolhouses built or
repaired; parks, playgrounds, and pools built; roads, streets, and sewage plants
built; 1,000 airfields laid out; 2,500 hospitals placed in areas not previously
served. Renamed WORKS PROJECTS ADMINISTRATION in 1939. WPA also
had FEDERAL ARTS PROJECT and FEDERAL WRITERS PROJECT to
provide jobs of cultural usefulness to continue dramas, concerts, writing
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(guidebooks, local history books, personal interviews), murals, and sculptures.
These projects kept the American arts alive and vigorous.
NATIONAL INDUSTRIAL RECOVERY ACT [NIRA]: 1933-1935 -- created
NATIONAL RECOVERY ADMINISTRATION [NRA], which administered
process for devising industry-wide codes of fair business practices. NRA's symbol
was a blue eagle, slogan -- We Do Our Part. The NIRAs recognized the right of
labor to bargain collectively for working hours, wages, and conditions. It was
declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in 1935 [Schechter Poultry Corp.
v. United States] -- but the Wagner Act survived constitutional challenge. (See
below, under REFORM -- NLRB.)
AGRICULTURAL ADJUSTMENT ACT [AAA]: 1933-1936 -- limited farm
production to help raise prices; paid for by taxing food processors. Declared
unconstitutional by Supreme Court in 1936 [United States v. Butler]. 1938 –
ongoing: AAA II enacted, creating the Soil Bank, allotments, parities, surplus
controls, farm insurance, and soil conservation districts. During World War II,
AAAII focused on food production. In 1945 its functions were taken over by the
Production and Marketing Administration.
FEDERAL HOUSING ACT [FHA]: 1934-ongoing -- insures residential
mortgages. Created by the National Housing Act, which also created the FSLIC
(see below). In 1965, FHA became part of the Department of Housing and Urban
Development (HUD).
New Deal Reform Programs
GLASS/STEAGALL ACT: 1933-1999 -- prohibited commercial banks from
collaborating with brokerage firms or participating in investment activities;
protected bank depositors from heightened risks associated with security
transactions. Repeal often discussed in context of early twenty-first century
economic meltdown.
EMERGENCY BANKING ACT/FEDERAL DEPOSIT INSURANCE
CORPORATION [FDIC]:1933-ongoing -- the banking act regulated re-opening
banks and banking practices; the FDIC insured savings of bank depositors and
monitored soundness of insured banking institutions. FDIC was established as a
temporary agency in 1933 and made permanent in 1935.
FEDERAL SAVINGS & LOAN INSURANCE CORPORATION [FSLIC]: 1934ongoing -- insured savings of depositors in savings & loan institutions and
monitored soundness of insured S&Ls. Created with FHA by National Housing
Act.
SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION [SEC]:1934-ongoing -regulated stock and bond trading; regulated exchanges where stocks and bonds
are sold, and legislated requirements for disclosure of fair stock information.
WAGNER ACT created NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD [NLRB]:
1935-ongoing -- affirmed labor's rights to bargain for wages, hours, and working
conditions, to strike, and to arbitration of grievances. This was a major shift in
support of unions and collective bargaining which had been seen as obstructive
and, in some cases, unlawful. The NLRB was established to enforce the Wagner
Act.
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FAIR LABOR STANDARDS ACT [FLSA]: 1938-ongoing -- set minimum
wages, maximum working hours, and banned most child labor. Maximum
working hours were set to reach forty hours/week and minimum wage was set to
reach $.40/hour by 1945. It was the last major piece of New Deal legislation.
TENNESSEE VALLEY AUTHORITY [TVA] and RURAL
ELECTRIFICATION AUTHORITY [REA]: 1933-ongoing -- helped to bring
electricity to rural areas where people could not afford to put in lines. Prior to
TVA and REA, 90% of rural citizens did not have electricity.
SOCIAL SECURITY: 1935-ongoing -- provided for unemployed, aged,
dependent, and handicapped. Financed by FICA taxes paid by employee, matched
by employer and Federal government. Conservatives complained it went against
American traditions, but the bill passed. Although not given much notice when
passed, FDR considered it the cornerstone of the New Deal.
Source: The New Deal: Measures for Relief, Recovery, and Reform
http://www.eduref.org/Virtual/Lessons/crossroads/sec5/Unit_10/Unit_10L1R4.html, accessed March 2, 2010.
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Appendix J. Minnesota in the Great Depression Years
Minnesota, in 1930, had a population of a little less than 2.6 million people. Most
of the state‘s residents had Scandinavian and German/Bohemian heritage. The 1930
census listed 9,445 African American residents of the state. Other groups included
Yankees, Italians, Irish, Slavs, Mexicans, and people of Asian ancestry. The state also
had an American Indian population with most of the residents living either in
southwestern Minnesota (Dakota) or on the Ojibwa reservations in northern Minnesota
(Consolidated Chippewa and Red Lake). The Ojibwa were the largest American Indian
population in the state.
Cities
In 1930, Minneapolis was Minnesota‘s largest city and the fifteenth largest city in
the United States. It had a population of 464,356 and was known for its lakes and parks.
Theodore Wirth, park superintendent from 1906-1935, had built the Minneapolis park
system into one of the most beautiful in the country. The Pillsbury ―A‖ Mill was the
world‘s largest flour producer with a capacity of 14,000 barrels a day. The Foshay
Tower, completed in 1929, was the tallest building in the city.
St. Paul, Minnesota‘s capital city and the Twin City to Minneapolis, had a
population of 271, 606 in 1930. Its skyline was (and is) dominated by the Cass Gilbertdesigned state capitol building. There was a planned but unbuilt symmetrical design plan
for the front of the capitol building that included a central plaza and the Minnesota
Historical Society building.
Duluth was Minnesota‘s third largest city with a population of 101,463. Located
on the eastern end of Lake Superior, its economy was based on its harbor, which had an
annual tonnage second to New York City. Half of this was iron ore; the balance was coal,
limestone, and grain.
Other major Minnesota communities were: St. Cloud (population - 21,000), trade
center for a large agricultural area; Winona (population – 20,850), center of southeastern
Minnesota agricultural and industrial development; and Rochester (population – 20,621),
home of the world-renowned Mayo Clinic.
Agriculture
In 1930 more than half Minnesota‘s population (51%) identified themselves as
rural residents. The state had 203,000 farms working 32, 817, 911 acres. Crops included
wheat (1.5 million acres planted each year with an annual yield of 18,619,500 bushels),
corn (150,000,000 bushels a year, most fed to hogs), flax (4-6 million bushels annual
yield), oats (150,000,000 million bushels a year), barley, and rye. Alfalfa also was grown,
as were potatoes (Red River Valley), apples (Lake Minnetonka area and southeastern
Minnesota), and sugar beets (central Minnesota).
In addition to crops, raising livestock contributed substantially to farm production
and income. The ―prosperity quintuplets‖ – cows, sows, hens, sheep, and steers – yielded
75% of the state‘s farm income. Of this, dairying accounted for 27.6%. The state led the
nation in butter production at 280,000,000 pounds per year.
There were concerns about land and economic conditions throughout the state.
Soil erosion was particularly severe in southeastern Minnesota and large areas throughout
the northern half of the state had cut-over, submarginal land that could not support
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farming. Between 1929 and 1933, farm income fell 60% as prices dropped to historic
lows – wheat was $.38/bushel, corn was $.32/bushel, hogs were $3.83 cwt, and cattle
were $6.70 cwt. Average yields of wheat, oats, barley, clover, and timothy also dropped.
Business and Industries
The state‘s major industries were primarily agriculture and natural resource-based
– milling, mining, and meat packing. Minnesota also had a thriving commercial fishing
industry, several nationally known quarries, and a strong network of cooperatives which
did an annual business of more than $125,000,000 in 1935. It had a growing tourism
industry and already was known as ―The Land of Ten Thousand Lakes.‖ Fishing and
camping were popular and the newly-organized state park system would see its first
1,000,000-visitor year during the Great Depression.
The depression, however, had taken its toll on businesses and industries. Mining
output fell 36% during the decade of the 1930s; during one year, 1932, it came to a
virtual halt. Unemployment, which hovered around 29% in the state, regularly stood at
70% on the Iron Range. In manufacturing, 86% of Minnesota industries operated at a loss
in 1932 with the state‘s capital goods industries, including pulp and paper, machinery,
and metals, suffering the worst downturns.
Minnesota Politics – 1930s
During the 1930s, the Farmer-Labor party, a third-party movement, dominated
Minnesota politics. Minnesota had three Farmer-Labor governors, four Farmer-Labor
U.S. Senators, and eight Farmer-Labor U.S. Representatives.
Minnesota went Democratic in a presidential election for the first time in 1932,
helping elect Franklin D. Roosevelt. In 1936, with the popularity of a third party – the
Farmer-Labor party - at its height, voters elected Farmer-Labor candidates to all but two
state offices. Farmer-Laborites captured the Minnesota House of Representatives, a
majority of U.S. Congressmen from the state, and both Minnesota U.S. Senate seats.
The Farmer-Labor Party in Minnesota
The Farmer-Labor party began in Minnesota in 1918 when farmers and laborers
banded together to fight rising costs and falling farm prices resulting, in part, from U.S.
entry into World War I. The new party was closely tied to the Non-Partisan League and
the Duluth Union Labor Party. Both were radical protest groups. The Non-Partisan
League grew out of farmers‘ discontent over falling farm prices and the difficulties of the
agricultural depression of the 1920s. It advocated socialist ideas such as state-owned
packing plants, grain terminals, and flour mills. The Duluth Union Labor Party was
formed by activists from the American Federation of Labor (AFL) and the Socialist party
to fight anti-unionism and to support union and labor causes.
Following Minnesota‘s lead, a national Farmer-Labor party was organized in
Chicago in 1919. It was a liberal organization drawing its support from the cooperative
movement, farmers organizations, and the labor movement. Although the national party
disbanded in 1920, organizations continued in many states including Minnesota, New
York, Pennsylvania, Colorado, the Dakotas, Montana, and Utah.
The platform of the Farmer-Labor party was liberal. It called for protection of
farmers and members of labor unions, government ownership of some industries, and
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passage of social security laws. The Minnesota Farmer-Labor governors, U.S. Senators,
and U.S. Representatives during the 1920s and 1930s were:
Governors
o Floyd B. Olson (1931-1936); died unexpectedly in office
o Hjalmer Petersen (1936-1937) Lieutenant Governor, completed Governor
Olson‘s term
o Elmer A. Benson (1937-1939), former U.S. Senator
United States Senators
o Henrik Shipstead (1923–1941); became a Republican and served from
1941-1947.
o Magnus Johnson (1923–1925)
o Elmer Austin Benson (1935–1937), elected Governor in 1936
o Ernest Lundeen (1937–1940)
United States Representatives
o William Leighton Carss (1919–1921, 1925–1929), Duluth Union Labor
Party
o Ole J. Kvale (1923–1929)
o Knud Wefald (1923–1927)
o Paul John Kvale (1929–1939)
o Henry M. Arens (1933–1935)
o Magnus Johnson (1933–1935), supposedly campaigned by standing on
manure spreaders, proclaiming he was on the Republican platform
o Ernest Lundeen (1933–1937); had previously served as a Republican
Representative (1915–1917), also served in the U. S. Senate
o Francis Shoemaker (1933–1935)
In 1944, Hubert H. Humphrey, later to become a U.S. Senator and vice president,
led the merger the Farmer-Labor party with the Democratic party to form Minnesota‘s
Democratic-Farmer-Labor (DFL) party. Former Governor and U.S. Senator Elmer
Benson helped Humphrey with the merger.
Governor Floyd B. Olson, served 1931-1936
Floyd B. Olson was the son of Scandinavian immigrants. He grew up poor in the
slums of north Minneapolis, attended the University of Minnesota for one year and
worked at odd jobs in the Pacific Northwest before returning to Minnesota to get a law
degree from Northwest Law College.
Olson was one of Minnesota‘s most popular, colorful, and controversial
governors. Known as the New Deal governor, he was a good politician and magnetic
speaker who effectively used radio to help get his message across. He inspired hope
during the difficult early years of the Great Depression by speaking out against
widespread farm foreclosures, failures of businesses, and unemployment. He fought for
underdogs – farmers and laborers – especially for laborers and the urban poor. His
detractors saw him as a homegrown Red (Communist) and accused him of being in
league with Communists. He had a reputation as the nation‘s most liberal governor.
In his campaigns, Olson spoke against ―the failure of government and our social
system to function in the interests of common happiness of the people.‖ He urged
Minnesota legislators to pass laws, such as postponement of farm mortgage foreclosures,
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that would help Minnesotans get through the worst years of the Great Depression. But, as
governor, even though many reforms he supported were enacted, he did not push for the
most far-reaching changes advocated by his party – public ownership of banks, factories,
mines, transportation, and utilities – which earned him criticism from the left as a
pragmatic rather than a radical politician.
Governor Olson strongly supported conservation of Minnesota resources. In 1925
he organized the state‘s first Department of Conservation (now the Department of Natural
Resources), putting several formerly independent agencies – including the state forest
service – under one department. He said of the need for conservation in 1931:
"Commercial exploitation in the past has despoiled our forests, marred our landscapes,
and dissipated our resources. It has robbed our people of the greater part of their heritage
of natural resources. Let us guard what is left diligently and zealously.‖
Olson‘s power and strength helped make the Farmer-Labor party the most
successful third party in Minnesota history. Despite his power, he was careful to walk a
fine line so as not to undercut Franklin D. Roosevelt‘s Democratic support in the state. In
August 1936 Olson died suddenly of cancer at age forty-four. He was in the middle of his
first campaign for the U.S. Senate, which he was expected to win. His death stunned his
supporters who had hoped he would go on to run for vice president or president.
Governor Hjalmer Petersen, served 1936-1937
After Floyd B. Olson‘s death, Lieutenant Governor Hjalmer Petersen completed
Olson‘s term in office. Petersen was born in Denmark and came to Minnesota as a young
boy with his parents. In 1904, at age fourteen, he dropped out of school and went to work
for the local newspaper. In 1914 he purchased the Askov American, a liberal weekly
newspaper he owned for the rest of his life.
Petersen served in the state legislature before becoming lieutenant governor.
While in the legislature he sponsored the state income tax law and urged tax monies be
spent on public education. During his short time as governor, he called a special session
of the legislature to pass an unemployment insurance bill which guaranteed eligibility for
federal aid under the recently-passed Social Security Act.
Petersen tried for his party‘s nomination for a full term as governor but was
beaten by Elmer Benson.
Governor Elmer Benson, served 1937-1939
Elmer Benson was elected governor on the Farmer-Labor ticket in 1936 and took
office in 1937. He served one two-year term as governor. Benson strongly supported the
rights of farmers (contrasting with Olson who was more closely allied with labor). He
also is remembered for his strong support of some of the liberal causes that Olson refused
to push and for his ties to Minnesota‘s small group of Communist activists.
An ex-banker, Benson sometimes was accused of being a Communist because of
his outspoken criticisms of capitalism. After his election, he tried to push through an
agenda of liberal Farmer-Labor reforms, including tax increases, but was defeated by
Minnesota legislators on most of them. When discussing his radical Farmer-Labor
agenda, people supposedly said of Benson, ―Floyd Olson used to say these things; but
this &^$* believes them.‖ When asked about criticism of his proposals, Governor Benson
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said, ―It would be fine to be right all the time. But it is far better to be honest all the
time.‖
Benson ran for a second term as governor in 1938. He was defeated and returned
to farming in the Appleton area.
U. S. Senators Henrik Shipstead (1923-1947) and Ernest Lundeen (19371940)
In 1922, Senator Henrik Shipstead, a dentist, beat incumbent U.S. Senator Frank
B. Kellogg. After losing the election, Kellogg became Secretary of State for President
Calvin Coolidge and in 1929 was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his part in
developing the Kellogg-Briand Peace Pact, an international agreement to stop war.
Shipstead successfully ran three times for the U.S. Senate on the Farmer-Labor platform
before returning to the Republican Party in 1940 to run for his last term. During World
War II, he was known for his isolationism and in 1945, he was one of only two senators
to vote against approval of the United Nations charter. He was defeated in the 1946
Republican primary.
Senator Lundeen was a Spanish-American War veteran, graduate of Carleton
College in Northfield, Minnesota, and lawyer. He was elected twice as a Farmer-Labor
candidate in the U.S. House of Representatives before being elected to the U.S. Senate on
the Farmer-Labor ticket in 1936. He served as U.S. Senator until his death in an airplane
crash in August 1940.
Relief (not welfare) in Minnesota, 1930s
The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) was established in March 1933 as a
work/relief organization. Although this would change by 1936, during the first years,
eligibility for relief was one of the major criteria for being accepted. As one early
enrollee said ―You had to be really poor to get in.‖
Relief was basically what we now call welfare but it operated differently. Before
the 1930s and the New Deal, the burden of taking care of its poorest citizens rested on
county and local governments – either counties or towns (cities, villages, townships).
Needy families were identified on local charity lists. Minnesota law allowed for minimal
reimbursement to towns from counties until the law was overturned over by the
Minnesota Supreme Court in 1937. Help usually consisted of support at the local poor
farm or workhouse and gifts of groceries and medicines. [Until more modern forms of
welfare came into existence in the post-World War II years, poor farms and workhouses
were common. They provided housing and work for the poor at public expense.]
During the early 1930s, at the beginning of the Great Depression, as the numbers
of people needing relief began to mushroom out of control, private groups organized to
help with what they called the poor crisis. The Red Cross distributed flour, fabric to make
clothes, and surplus clothing from the federal government. Sewing clubs turned Red
Cross fabric into clothes. Churches and civic organizations such as the BPOE
(Benevolent and Paternal Order of the Elks) and American Legion worked together to
develop systematic distribution of items needed by the growing number of poor.
By March 1933, when President Franklin D. Roosevelt took office, dependence
on relief was rising across the country. In Minnesota, for example, dependence on local
charities ranged from 7-10% of the population in some farming areas to 80-90% on the
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Iron Range. Cities were hit hard, too. On March 21, 1933, the same day he requested
formation of the CCC, FDR tackled the growing national relief problem by requesting
formation of the Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA). Congress voted to
establish the FERA in April 1933 and FDR appointed social worker Harry Hopkins to
lead it. Congress allocated $500 million in grants-in-aid to states and funds were divided
as follows:
Half was allocated to states on 3-1 match based on relief expenditures of
preceding three months
Half allocated to meet urgent need where matching requirement could not be met
The goal of the FERA was work relief but in 1933, because of urgent need, most
funds were spent on direct relief. In Minnesota, the funds were channeled through the
State Board of Control, organized later that year by Gov. Floyd B. Olson into the State
Emergency Relief Administration (SERA).
Before counties could receive FERA funds, county commissioners had to sign an
agreement with the State Board of Control establishing an umbrella relief agency with
control over the traditional relief systems. Specifically county commissioners had to
agree to:
accept a five-member Emergency Relief Committee with power to carry out
FERA and State Board of Control orders
make every effort to persuade local subdivisions to contribute a ―maximum
amount‖ for support of the poor
recognize the county relief worker, an employee of the Emergency Relief
Committee, as the person responsible for expenditure of all relief funds in the
county
Minnesota‘s FERA administrator was Fred Rarig. In spite of need, by the end of
1933, due to conservative county commissioners, less than half of Minnesota counties
were set up to receive federal relief aid. The number of Minnesota counties accepting the
program increased as need grew.
From 1933-1934, FERA funds paid for direct relief in the form of food, medical
care, clothing, fuel, dental care, and shelter. Towns remained responsible for hospital and
burial costs. After 1934, relief emphasis shifted to work projects (local clean-up and
community needs). Counties and towns that didn‘t want to use federal funds raised their
poor levies to help pay their share. Cities had different options – they could pay a
percentage of relief costs or a flat fee that would trigger government funds.
Neither FDR nor Congress liked the dole – as direct, welfare-type payments were
called. FERA grants to states ended in December 1935. At that time, relief reverted back
to a state and local responsibility. In early 1936, county relief boards began denying new
charity or relief cases and refusing new applications with the goal of turning full
responsibility for the poor back to local governments. Administrative structure put in
place by FERA continued, however. When counties and townships certified someone in
need of relief, the office authorized they receive food, rent, fuel, utilities, and medical
help. But help was arbitrarily given. In some areas, people with unpaid balances on their
cars or those who lived in non-relief housing were declared ineligible for relief. Families
with young men who were eligible for, but not enrolled in, the CCC could be denied
relief. Some relief recipients were prohibited from using their cars and threats were made
to confiscate license plates.
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Local poor costs skyrocketed again in 1938-1939 and then tapered off from 19401942. By 1943, the relief crisis was over as the country moved ahead on a war economy.
Passage of the Social Security Act on August 15, 1935, relieved the strain on the elderly.
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Appendix K. Personal Stories - Minnesota during the Great Depression
Michael T. Sanchelli, The Great Depression in Swede Hollow
Minnesota‘s Greatest Generation Website
My father was only 47 and out of work but so were a lot of younger men [during the
Great Depression]…[In] those days not too many of the Italians had any proof of birth
and they would tell the bosses that did the hiring on the railroad that they were 45 years
old…the word was that nobody got hired after the age of 45, if you had a job you were
lucky.
There wasn‘t any such thing as Welfare. It seemed that money disappeared from the face
of the earth. I was going to Cleveland Jr. High School at the time and was ready to go to
Johnson High School. I came home and cried because I had no money for books, no
decent clothes, there was nothing to make a lunch, so I didn‘t eat at noon hour. …The
local governments did start a relief plan, it was more a pain in the neck than relief. We
had to go to the old Hamm‘s residence on Gable St. right above on the east side of Swede
Hollow. [You] would get a grocery order. Now when I say grocery order it wasn‘t what I
would call groceries. It was dried prunes, dried applies, apricots and peaches, dried navy
beans, sometimes a can or so of corn, pies [peas] or string beans. [An]…order for my
family went into one large bag, that was for the month! The store that the order was made
out to, was nowhere near home, I had to borrow a coaster wagon and go to Alexander‘s
food market on Como and Western to get an order. Streetcar fare I think was 7 cents at
that time but we didn‘t have 14 cents for the round trip. If we did have it, I‘m sure my
mother would have bought meat with it. One of the most important items in our home
was flour, 100 lbs. of it. We needed it for bread and at a price affordable. It sold for $4.50
a 100 lbs. It was a once a month item. Thank goodness we had rabbits and chickens; old
porky had long since been gone.
Clothes, that was another big problem, shoes even worse. You were a marked individual
when you put on a pair of pants that you got from the relief places; welfare gray, starchy,
some company must have made a million pair and sold them to the government. Most of
the kids in the Hollow went barefooted after school was out for the summer. Tennis
shoes, nobody bought tennis shoes, they wore out too quick. My father had a shoe last
and I learned how to repair the soles and heels of my shoes and also the rest of the family.
We found some heavy conveyor belting and used it for soles and heels; leather was tough
to get. When I didn‘t have any belting we were out of luck. Remember the old saying,
―[The] soles of my shoes were so thin that I could step on a dime and tell if it was heads
or tails‖? Well we had holes in our shoes so large that if we stepped on a dime, we could
pick it up with our toes. When we couldn‘t repair our shoes, we would go down to the
binder dump and look for some old linoleum, this we would cut to size and put on the
inside of the shoe, as an inner sole. Linoleum was always available.
I was 14 when the depression hit. I tried selling paper downtown, my mother gave me a
dime to get started. This is the way it went: you bought the daily paper from the St. Paul
Dispatch or the St. Paul Daily News for 1 cent per copy and then go on to a corner
downtown and sell the paper for two cents, a penny profit. That was easier said than
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done, the corner I was assigned, [only] ten persons went by all morning and I sold only
one paper. The good corners like 7th and Wabasha, 7th and Robert and all the good
buildings like the Great Northern building and places that had people working in them
were taken. You had to know the president of the newspaper company to get one of those
prime places.
We tried junking. Junking is going around to places where people dumped things that
they didn‘t want in places that were being filled in. The upper rim of Swede Hollow had a
lot of dumps. The bluff side was a good place for the people that lived up on the rim of
the Hollow, it was sort of their back yard. We also made the alleys of the east side that
had rubbish collectors. If we were lucky we would pick up the old aluminum pots and
pans, old pewter, copper and some times rags, some were good enough to wear. But there
were a lot of grown men with families also junking, competition was tough…The grocery
stores from downtown would…dump their old produce that had started to turn brown a
little, at the binder dump. We kids would peel off the leaves of the lettuce and the
cabbage until we got to the good part and take it home. We learned of a place on Jackson
St. and Tenth, near the old Market, Tubessing and Nelson‘s. We would ask the boss of
the place if we could have the over ripe bananas, he would give us the OK to go down the
basement and get them. We had gunnysacks and some times we would get a fourth of a
sack apiece. There were usually three or four of us, we filled our stomachs first.
We learned how to eat greens that Mother Earth put before us. The dandelion the Italians
were already acquainted with. I remember my cousin John Bartone and I going up to the
St. John‘s Hospital lawn on Mounds Boulevard and picking two sacks of dandelions in
the spring. When we went swimming down to Allen‘s pond below the bluff near Mounds
Park, we would have to go past the Northern Pacific Commissary. There were two or
three garbage cans out on the dock…There would be bread in the cans, whole loaves,
white, rye raisin and other. We from Swede Hollow appreciated the lucky find; the kids
from the bluff threw bread all over and finally we were banned also from taking bread out
of the cans. In order to feed the chicken and rabbits, my father would carry a gunnysack
and a whiskbroom in his pocket. As he walked along the grain cars that were unloaded he
would get in the car and sweep up the remains on the floor. He did pretty well so that we
had a stockpile in the shed. Some times I would find frozen lettuce and cabbage at the
dump for the rabbits in the wintertime.
Most of the Italian families had grocery bills at the store. It was a kind of a practice
started when they first got here, being short on cash they would charge groceries until
they found work to pay for it. During the depression things got a little out of hand. The
bill would creep up a little at a time because it wasn‘t paid in full and you had to almost
beg for a little more credit because you had little kids at home to feed….Some of the bills
I heard were as high as 900 dollars. We owed the Frisco‘s 400 dollars. We paid every
dime we owed back, some people didn‘t.
Mrs. Dora Frisco‘s mother would sometimes be in the store when my mother was getting
some groceries. My mother never left the store with out her stuffing some extras in my
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mother‘s grocery bag, a can of peas or corn or beans, she never failed to give my mother
something.
We boys started to go to Pig‘s Eye Slough to swim and fish. The slough was south of
Mounds Park, a little past the Milwaukee roundhouse and yards. On the way home we
would stop at Braunig‘s bakery, which was on Hastings Ave. and Mounds Boulevard. We
would sit on the grass on the Tuxedo playground across the street. The garage door on the
rear side of the bakery was open. If it looked like no one was in the garage, one of us
would sneak in and get [an] arm full of stale rolls and eat them sitting at the playground.
It was my brother Noah‘s turn one day. He came out of the garage door with a tray full of
chocolate éclairs. Instead of coming over to the playgrounds, he took off for home at full
speed and all of us chasing him…We almost got him at the bottom of the long steps off
of 7th St. but he screamed so loud we let him go. We didn‘t let him go for stale bakery
anymore, no siree.
There were many freight trains going back and forth, in and out of Saint Paul. Some of
the boxcars were loaded with men and some women, all going somewhere…We even
met a teacher that was seeing the country riding the rails. Downtown St. Paul also had
signs of severe depression. There were people on the street corners selling pencils,
shoelaces, razor blades, neckties, anything to make a living, some were handicapped.
They would be seated near the building and the tin cup would be out in front of them. A
dime was a big offering. If all the people that went past them gave a penny, they would
have done alright…Millions were out of work. That is what everybody including the
newspaper was saying. The way it looked to me, everybody was out of work.
Everybody in the neighborhood blamed President Hoover for the depression. It was
pretty hard for me to see how one guy could be responsible for the depression…It was
about 1932 and Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected president. Things were going to
change. That‘s what everybody said, anyway.
Things did change somewhat for some people. The new president brought in some new
programs: the New Deal, N.E.R.A., C.C.C., even some youth programs where kids that
quit school could work 20 hours a month. The repeal of the Volstead act [called
Prohibition, refers to the18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution prohibiting sale of
alcoholic beverages, ratified in 1920 and repealed in 1933] would open up the breweries.
A lot of lucky people were called back to work, and good pay. The rest of us went on
waiting for lady fortune to knock on our door.
…I remember a few times that I went looking for a job that was really discouraging. The
boss at the bottle house at Hamms Brewery, Mr. Kunze, said, ―Why don‘t you go back to
school kid? Can‘t you see I have to hire these men that have families?‖
I cried out, ―I got a family too! My father is sick, he can‘t work anymore and there‘s four
more at home younger than me.‖
―I can‘t help it,‖ he replied again, ―I still have to hire these older men.‖
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I really had thoughts of going back to school but when I saw the clothes I‘d have to wear
I said to myself ―forget it.‖
Former Sheriff John Wagner owned the land that our house was on. We paid him 20
dollars a year rent, he collected twice a year. My mother always made sure she had the
ten dollars when he came for it. One time he sent his son-in-law for it. I was standing
near the gate when he came by and asked for the rent, my mother went into the house and
came out with the ten-dollar bill. She waved it at him and said, ―I save this for you but I
got nothing for food this month and I got nothing in the house.‖ ―I can‘t help that,‖ he
said, ―My father-in-law wants his money.‖ He continued on towards the other end of the
hollow. When he came back, he passed our yard again. My mother was standing in the
yard. ―Here Mrs. Sanchelli, you pay someday when you got it,‖ and handed her the ten
dollar bill. ―God bless you, you got a heart,‖ she replied as he reached over the fence.
My father was getting better but the only work available was farm work. He did most of
his work for the [Costas] in Little Canada. My brother Noah also went on the farm. He
got 50 cents a day, my father got a dollar. The Costas were good to my father, they also
gave him some vegetables to take home. One time Joe Costa said to my father, ―Tony
take home some meat,‖ and he sawed off a piece of pork from a carcass.
It was still early 1935 when we started hearing about the new program, W.P.A., Works
Progress Administration. The companies that made long handled shovels, would make a
mint; it seemed that everybody that worked on W.P.A. would be given a long handled
shovel to operate.
Many jokes would be made of those shovels. A couple that I remember the most were:
As one man told the other on how to use the shovel effectively, ―Place the blade of the
shovel upright in some firm dirt and press down until the blade disappears, then you
should be able to lean on it comfortably.‖ The other one went like this: Two men in a
small airplane were flying over a W.P.A. project one day. One man said, ―Hey! Look!
What are all those things down there on the ground?‖ The other man answered, ―Well, if
they move, they‘re flies, if they don‘t they‘re W.P.A. workers.‖ In spite of all the bad
publicity the W.P.A. did accomplish much. The workers were given 60 dollars a month
which was better than the grocery order which consisted of surplus that nobody else
wanted, and a little dignity was restored.
When I went to work on W.P.A., I met a lot of workers that had lost their job, skilled and
unskilled, so that when we got to a project, we had to be told what was to be done. This
took a lot of time and the men had to wait for instructions. That made a lot of standing
around time. I took my father‘s place on W.P.A. because he was still sick. What we were
working on was to become Warner Road, cleaning out the brush and trees along the
Mississippi river. The hobo hangout was now gone, the familiar fires along the banks
would no longer be seen as they would cook their famous stews. Some of the old
dilapidated boathouses would also be removed. They were near the Sibley and Jackson
St. landings. I think there was an old wooden dock…there.
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It was getting pretty chilly so I started wearing my father‘s sheepline overcoat and his felt
shoes. My life was going to change a bit that day. We were all told to gather in front of
the warming shack. I got to the warming shack first and pretty soon everybody got in
front of me and I couldn‘t see the boss. I was 5 ft. 4 in. There was a large boulder near me
so I stepped on top of it. Now I could see. He was an old boss and he was a big man, over
6 ft. and over 200 lbs. too. He looked over the men, eyeing back and forth, over and back.
―You,‖ and he pointed at me, ―you report to the foreman on that pile driver that is out on
the river there, the rest of you come with me.‖
I met the old guy [later] during the summer of 1936, on Warner road that had begun to
take shape. I said, ―Hello, don‘t you remember me? You sent me over to haul coal for the
pile driver last fall.‖ ―Cheeze you‘re small! I was supposed to send over a big guy,‖ he
said. How are you doing? he asked. ―I‘m doing great. You did my family and I a big
favor! I‘m getting a dollar an hour and I only work 6 hours a day,‖ I said in a thanking
manner. We shook hands and parted again.
The pile driver crew was mostly Irish. The superintendent was an older Swede, Larson
was his last name. James Middler was the foreman. Jimmy taught me a lot; he showed me
how to splice cable and how to use an acetylene torch to weld and cut steel. I learned a lot
about the pile driver and the men who worked on it. We were cashing our checks at
Rossini‘s bar, which was across from the Post Office on the southwest corner of Third
and Sibley. I ordered a shot of whiskey and a beer. As I looked up and down the bar
everybody else had ordered orange pop. ―What‘s with the orange pop Jim?‖ I asked. He
looked at me and said, ―Well, I‘ll tell ya…Mike, most of us are single, and we travel all
over the country doing this type of work, building bridges and driving piling for a
foundation of a large building and things of that sort… and we do a lot of drinking, so if
some of us were to start drinking today some of us wouldn‘t be here for work tomorrow
so we go on the water wagon until the job is completed.‖ I would learn for myself. As the
job would near completion, I was the only one left. When the pile driver ironworkers‘ job
was done, once they started drinking, they never came back. I still got a dollar an hour as
I guided the power shovel up and down the new Warner road getting it into the proper
grade.
Francis Seifert: Nickel Hamburgers, Quarter Lunches
Minnesota‘s Greatest Generation Website
At the [1936] grand opening of their new lunch room [Frank‘s Lunchroom, Paynesville,
Minnesota], they [Frank and his wife Frances] offered a turkey dinner with pie, ice cream
and a beverage for 35 cents. At that time, plate lunches were 25 cents, hamburgers were
25 cents, and pie and coffee also 25 cents. Frances was quoted as saying "that was a good
price then." Several hundred people were served throughout opening day and evening,
which goes without saying that the proprietors, Frances and Frank Seifert, withstood a
tremendous workload. The large turn-out also highlighted the huge success of Frank's
Lunch Room considering they started the business only a few years earlier. …
A typical daily menu included steak, pork, and chicken, and sometimes fish and shrimp,
with potatoes and vegetables, plus a wide variety of sandwiches and salads, plus
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homemade soups, breads and rolls. Homemade pies included apple, pumpkin, rhubarb,
custard, all kinds of cream pies and fresh fruit pies. It was worth a special trip just for
Frances' homemade pies and coffee for only 25 cents. However, a roast beef dinner or
chopped sirloin steak or barbecued spare ribs were available at a cost of $1.10.
One of the most popular items on the menu was the beef commercial, which was a
delicious roast beef sandwich on white bread, cut in half diagonally and separated, a
scoop of whipped potatoes between the two halves, and then covered entirely with gravy.
The total price was 80 cents.
Doris Nehring: Growing Up During the Great Depression
Minnesota‘s Greatest Generation Website
DEPRESSION HEAT
Several times you may recall me mention 'depression heat' or 'depression wind' or
'depression toys etc. I became acquainted with it around 1929. As young as I was I didn't
really know anything different until years later when I could compare. The creamy fine
sand would be blown up by a tiny wisp of wind. It would crunch in your teeth. Very often
you would have to clean out your eyes and ears and dust your hair. When the two of us
girls were outside, we'd see small whirlwinds coming across the yard. By jumping in the
middle of them we could stop the whirling – just another toy of depression times. Every
window sill had a streak across it similar to a small snow drift. Women brushed off the
sand daily. (Take note of older women that wipe off the table BEFORE setting it. Then
you‘ll guess she lived in those depression times.)
We tried to grow gardens but to no avail without carrying pails of water. When the talk
turned to wells going dry we cut way back on the water for the garden. We saved every
itty-bitty vegetable, but a tiny vegetable is better than none. Why not buy some you ask?
What would we buy it with? There was NO money, NO rain, and NO crops to yield food.
Many farmers lost everything they had with no grain to sell.
There is no way you younger generation can begin to understand or comprehend the kind
of poverty hundreds of families lived through. NO running to the government for a hand
out. NO borrowing from the banks - they were going broke too. NO money for a gallon
of gas so we stayed home. NO money for a trip to a beauty shop. They were all closed
too. NO money for a new dress or shirt. NO money for heating fuel. NO money for a
movie. What's a movie? They closed up too. There was no such thing as a TV or
electricity.
Wood was the only way to heat our house and during the winters everyone usually closed
doors so we'd only have one room to heat. And yes, we'd all sleep in that one room. If
someone, men, women or children wore holes in the sole of their shoes a piece of paper
or cardboard or whatever they could find was put inside their shoes.
My family was extremely fortunate as the goats provided us with meat, milk and leather
for our shoes. Even those shoes wore out. I can remember Mama sewing a new piece of
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leather on our shoes to cover up the hole. How many of you today are wearing 'patched
shoes'?
All the girls and some of the boys in country schools wore long heavy brown stockings
held up with garter belts. I must admit they were warm when walking to school. As holes
appeared through much mending in the feet of the stockings, mom cut those feet off and
sewed anklets on. That would save a few cents as the anklets were cheaper than a new
pair of stockings. Even so I sure hated that sewed on anklet. Everyone wore four buckle
overshoes. They were warm until the snow got in the top and melted.
One summer was the worst ever for Dad to stay home from work. He had varicose veins
so bad the doctor ordered him to stay off his feet. That really stopped the income, and the
depression became depressing! If he could have worked our poverty wouldn't have been
quite so bad but there was no choice. We always had to take our circumstances the way
they were given to us. And still do. Accept it and go on. Trust in God to help you through
it all.
Very slowly the rains returned, the crops grew a little and finally things like gardens,
pastures and farm crops were back to normal. However, keep in mind, 'normal' took
many years. Thus our depression problems eased.
OUR FIRST A/C
In the early '30's temperatures were high and the wind had a lot of power. The land at
Vawter was all blow sand or sugar sand and almost as white. If you were outside and
forgot to keep your mouth closed your teeth were so gritty it felt like you were grinding
glass. Those intense south winds burnt into your flesh.
I'm sure it is hard to realize the intense heat unless you have lived through days and days
and days of over 100 degrees with very little to no relief at nights. We slept on the
linoleum floors which felt slightly cool.
My parents decided to invent the first air conditioning. This humongous wash tub was
brought in and I was instructed to pump water. Filling small pans my sister Lois, carried
them to the washtub one after another until the tub was 4/5 full. The tub had been placed
inside the south front door. Mom brought out an old quilt and sunk it in the water. Then
she and Dad each took a corner and raised it to the top casing of the door. Two large nails
held it there. Then we brought our straight chairs around so two of us were on each side
where the wind came in, bounced off the wet quilt and cooled before it hit us.
Ahhhhhhhh. That air conditioner and the cool linoleum gave us the first good night‘s
sleep we'd had in several weeks.
DEPRESSION LIFE
Many years ago when the winters were blizzards (no big road clearing machinery) and
the summers were baking ovens (no air conditioning) life was rough. At least it was
rough for my parents. We had all the food we wanted. That half acre garden provided all
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the vegetables and fruit and pickles the entire family needed. All was canned because the
"home freezer" was non-existent then. So was electricity.
I really wanted to go barefoot but Mom turned thumbs down with all the sandbur carpet
we lived on. Sandburs grow profusely on white sugar sand or blow sand. However with
plenty of water this sand had rich nutrients that produced produce in abundance.
So the goats and the garden kept the family supplied. The folks were very frugal, every
penny had to be pinched and stretched. The beauty in this family was the love we all
shared. We two kids didn't realize we weren't rich. We thought we were. With clothing,
food, shelter and love what more could we ask for?
Have you noticed I have stressed Mom in some stories? To explain: Mom was home with
us two girls during the week. Daddy came home Friday nights and left early Monday
mornings. His work was about 14 miles away and the Hupmobile didn't care to trudge
that far very often.
So Daddy used sheets of plywood, many hinges and small screen door hooks. The floor,
the walls, and the roof were made the same way. Inside was a stove, table (that tipped
down from the wall).a cupboard, chair and a cot. This was Daddy‘s home during the
week. He set it up in spring close to his work in the gravel pit and dismantled it to bring it
home in the fall.
I was Daddy‘s girl so you can imagine how thrilled I was when he was home to stay. Lois
was Moms girl, liked to cook, clean and read. So when I wanted to learn cooking etc. I
must have gotten in their way because Mom would send me outside to play. When Daddy
was home she'd tell him to take "that kid" out with him "cause she's just a nuisance in
here." Daddy would hold up one finger of his left hand to me and say "Come on, my little
nuisance lets go out."
ELECTRICITY
Our lights were kerosene lamps with glass chimneys. It was my job to wash those
chimneys every day. Wasn't I lucky??? NO!
The way everyone used this lamp at night was to put it in the middle of our round table
and we'd all sit around the table to read or study or sew or to write letters. It wasn't very
bright either and if we turned the wick higher for more light it smoked so bad the
chimneys got black – More washing.
Our modernization turned to gas lamps. The 'bulb' part was a small sack of silk we tied
on but once it was lit it became ashes. It could be reusable if it wasn't touched or the wind
left it alone. The base was filled with a fluid that ignited the sack after 'pumping' up the
base. That was pretty good lighting until the wind shattered the ashes. Pronto we were in
total darkness.
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We got up in society when we got a 'Delco Plant'. If I remember correctly there were 32
glass containers about the size of a battery, lined up on four shelves, each one holding
water. Dad gave me the responsibility of keeping the water at a certain level in every
battery. I was so proud that Daddy asked ME I think I checked them every hour the first
day.
That really gave us light. Now we could really see! No more little silk bags to break. No
more chimneys to wash. We were really ritzy!!
VAWTER
A memory place in my heart and mind – 15 years of memories. A very special place
where a little girl grew up. Me! I got there when I was two and a half. My brother had
died and Daddy found a different job.
At that time Vawter was a small town and getting smaller. The 'old timers' tell me that at
one time there were two elevators. Back in 1930 there was a dance hall building with
living quarters in the back, church, depot, ice house, and five houses. 3/4 mile west was a
school house. Many tall trees clustered along the service road and in the heart of the
town. A tornado flattened most of them years later. The Soo line tracks passed Vawter on
the north side. The depot was NW of the town. We had many, many 'bums' knock at our
door for a bite to eat and water. Mom always gave them a sandwich with homemade
bread and meat. Also there was a cookie or piece of cake and plenty of coffee or water. I
remember one older man whose pants were too big for him and he was so thirsty. At the
well he pumped a dipper full and drank so fast the water ran out both sides and straight
down inside of his trousers. Bet that was cool.
Several 'basket socials' were held in that little church to raise upkeep money. Each
girl/woman would make a good meal, pack it in a basket and decorate it. All the
boys/men would bid on the one they thought prettiest when auctioned off and then he got
to sit with the baskets owner and they'd eat together. One of the neighbor boys, Pete, told
his Mother that when my basket came up for bids she was to put her hand on top of her
head so he'd know which one it was. Before you get funny ideas, Pete didn't care a hoot
about me. He knew my Mom was a good cook! One year his Mom made a mistake. Pete
said "One bite was enough but I had to sit by her and eat more. I kept looking at Doris
Jean‘s basket to see what I was missing."
A GARDEN IN THE SAND
At Vawter we owned three acres of land and I think Mom had a third of it into garden.
That sand could really produce crops if it got enough water. Oh, how we carried water!
We raised a bounty of peanuts in the sand. Daddy and I ate them raw but Mom and Lois
liked theirs roasted. Mom made her own peanut butter but please don't ask me how. I
know there were hours of grinding cause I had to turn the handle. Some of these jars went
with Dad when he worked at the pit.
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In the spring we planted at least 100 tomato plants. These small plants had been started
from seed and then transplanted into a cold frame before setting them out in the garden.
Most of the tomatoes were canned, some whole, some juiced.
Mom loved a challenge so we had many varieties of vegetables. Wasn't it strange when I
was a nuisance in the house, but when there was gardening to do, I was the one that got
called? Lois hated outside work and I loved it.
SEWING TALENTS/RISKS
What a comforting way to begin life. From the very first clothing I ever wore they were
home sewn. My mother made three year outfits. The first year they were big. The second
year they fit just right. The third year they got pretty tight. I never knew very many
sewers that would use Montgomery Ward catalogs for their kids to pick out a picture of a
dress they liked. The fabric had already been ordered and received. "Here, Mom, this
dress is pretty, make mine like this." Then sheets from the Royalton Banner weekly
newspaper came out, held up against us kids and cut out right there. By the next day the
dress was ready to be fitted. Also included were slips and undies (Bloomers) when we
were little. They were made very big with elastic around the waist and legs. Many years
passed before I knew all mothers didn‘t sew like this. I did not have a boughten dress
until I was through High School. Many of my sister‘s clothes were passed down to me.
Oh, how proud I was when wearing Lois' clothes.
Mom‘s talents included shoes from the goat skin Daddy had tanned. My first boughten
pair was when in 5th grade I went to Paynesville School. Those goat skin shoes were the
most comfortable I ever wore.
Eleanore Eichers: Flour Sacks – As Valuable as the Flour Itself
Minnesota‘s Greatest Generation Website
My mother, Eleanore Johannes Eichers, lived on a farm near Rockville, MN beginning in
1931. She remembers that empty flour sacks were used extensively in making textile
items and were recycled continuously until they were worn out and discarded. The 100
lb. bags were the most important because of their standard size – roughly equal to one
square yard of cloth.
Most flour mills had their own unique designs printed on them. These empty sacks could
be transformed into a variety of practical items, including everyday dresses, children‘s
clothing, and towels. Another common use for bags was to turn them into tablecloths or
blankets. This was done by sewing 4 sacks together in a 2 x 2 configuration, or sewing 6
together in a 3 x 2 configuration, resulting in a table cloth that could cover virtually any
size table or a covering that could be stitched onto muslin cloth for a blanket.
In the 1940's, she made maternity dresses for herself out of empty sacks. Her brother also
remembers having to go to the feed mill and search the inventory of bagged flour for a
certain pattern because it was needed for completing a sewing project. She also recalls
that feed mills often sold empty sacks as well. On occasion, her family purchased flour
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and then emptied it into a barrel so that the sack could be quickly turned into a clothing
item.
Sacks with printing imperfections were utilized as well. These mostly became hand
towels. Once the fabric became thin and unsuitable for practical clothing, it was cut into
2-inch strips and braided into rugs or quilts. Thus, no part of the sack was wasted and the
importance of the sack actually equaled that of the flour itself.
Mary Jo Breton: Surviving the Great Depression – Our Plunge Into Poverty
Minnesota‘s Greatest Generation Website
"I'm bid 900 dollars, now do I hear 950? Will ya give me 50? Nine-fifty, nine fifty? I hear
950, now 975, will ya give me 975, now 975?"
On the scorching August day our house at 3701 24th Avenue South in Minneapolis was
sold at auction. I huddled half way up the stairs of our two-story bungalow waiting for a
glimpse of the bird that lived in the cuckoo clock hanging on the wall above the landing.
Part of my father's nightly routine, after emptying the drip-pan under the ice box, was
winding the cuckoo clock by raising with pull chains the pine-cone-shaped weights up to
the cuckoo's house.
As I watched and fantasized about the cuckoo bird - I liked to pretend it was alive - and
listened to the auctioneer's chant to the crowd on the front lawn, I could sense a huge
change about to take place in my life. I didn't know what was going to happen to us. The
uncertainty scared me. Clutching my skirt to my face, I swabbed away the sweat and
tears and masked my nose against the stench of cigar smoke. I was eight years old. It was
1932.
The stairway stood open now - it was summertime - and I could peek through the
balustrade. But as I listened to the auctioneer's chant, I recalled how in the winter my
mother hung brown velveteen curtains in the stairwell and across the landing to confine
the heat from our coal-fired furnace to the downstairs. The second-floor bedrooms
remained cold. On special occasions my three brothers and I used the landing as a stage
for entertaining our parents and other adult relatives and guests. My oldest brother, Bill,
who always managed the show, had rigged a system of pull cords by which, from a spot
up a few steps, he could open and close the curtains like a real stage. Another brother,
Sandy, played the violin or his harmonica, while I danced free-form style in a costume
made of scissor-blade-curled pink crepe-paper petals sewn to a muslin base. My mother
had created the outfit for me to wear for a kindergarten performance of the "Wedding of
the Painted Doll" at Miles Standish School. I played a bridesmaid and did a between-act
dance to a phonograph accompaniment of "Tiptoe through the Tulips."
Three of us four children had been born in the upstairs front bedroom of this house that
my parents had bought in 1921. From that room on national holidays my father could step
through the window and edge himself along the gable of the front porch roof to slip our
flagpole into its holder. He never missed a holiday.
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During the early 1930s the iceman and the milkman still made home deliveries while the
ragman in his horse-drawn wagon and the umbrella repairman shouted out their
hardscrabble occupations as they made their way through the neighborhoods. Repair
services and recycling businesses were among the few growth industries during the Great
Depression.
Mornings in the Minnesota winters found the cardboard lids on the glass bottles of milk
left on our back stoop perched atop a column of frozen cream an inch above the bottle.
We sometimes mixed a bit of vanilla and sugar into the frozen cream for an "ice cream"
treat. A quart of milk and an ice cream cone each cost five cents at that time.
My father, William James Dean - only five feet tall but with a deep, resonant voice - had
been deprived in England of an education beyond the fifth grade because he was
tubercular and not expected to live to maturity. He had emigrated from Cornwall to the
United States at 21 and practiced a trade - paperhanging and painting. He remained a
bachelor until, at forty, he married my mother, Mary Mercy Armstrong, fifteen years his
junior. Their four children arrived between 1920 and 1926 - just in time to be clobbered
by the Great Depression. Soon after the October 29, 1929 stock market crash, my father
lost his steady job at the Andrews Hotel in Minneapolis. Redecorating had become an
expendable luxury. So now, having exhausted our savings and unable to make the
mortgage and tax payments on our home, unable even to find a buyer, we were forced to
auction not only our house but all our furniture as well. ―SOLD for $1,000!‖ the
auctioneer roared.
I loved every room in that house. Over the next few years I would recall fondly, for
example, the fun we had had in the steamy warm bathroom when my father gave us our
baths before story time. Often he would make us giggle by knocking on the side of the
claw-footed tub as though knocking on the door of a house, then carry on an animated
and comical conversation with a mysterious ―Mr. Smith‖ who lived somewhere in the
drainpipes. Mr. Smith originated as a tiny doll that had fallen off the handle of toddler
Johnny's new toothbrush and had been washed down the tub drain.
With the loss of our home and with scarcely any money, my parents had to decide what
to do, where to go. While they were figuring out a plan, they rented a sparsely furnished
house for the winter on Vincent Avenue in what was then a rinky-dink outlying
community called Bloomington.
Early the following spring, 1933, my parents bought one acre for $450 from dairy farmer
Willard Anderson in rural Eden Prairie Township, then just an isolated sleepy settlement,
population only 1,000. Our acre was on Highway 169 across the road from a huge
Sherwin Williams billboard picturing paint flowing over and enveloping the Earth.
Our one-acre plot in Eden Prairie had already been planted with oats. My mother
surveyed the scene. ―We'll grow our food right here.‖ But it looked impossible to me.
And I wondered where we would live. Even so, the prospects of a challenging new life
experience somehow energized me and lifted my spirits.
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In the spring of 1933 my parents bought, for $450, a treeless acre already planted with
oats, in rural Eden Prairie Township, Minnesota, population then only 1,000. With no
family income and having had to auction our home and furniture in Minneapolis, we had
no choice but to relocate to the countryside and live off the land.
A generous friend, Mr. Lathrop, who owned a lumber yard in Minneapolis let us have
enough lumber on credit to build a crude one-room, shoe-box shelter. But we had to pay
cash to the contractor to construct it, as well as to the well driller. During construction we
slept in a rented house in Bloomington where we had spent the winter of 1932-33. By day
we worked on clearing the weeds and oats from our acre in preparation for planting
vegetables. Even after plowing and harrowing the ground and pulling out the oats, the
grain kept coming back up. The task seemed overwhelming to my brothers and me, and
we wanted to give up and try again the next spring. But raising vegetables meant food for
the coming winter. So all of us had to pitch in and continue working. The soil was sticky
clay, though, and difficult to cultivate. Worse yet, we were inexperienced gardeners. Of
the two thousand strawberry plants my mother set out, only five hundred survived the dry
spring. Until the well was dug, we had to haul water in milk cans from a neighbor to
water what we had planted.
My mother and I created a bed of annual flowers - mostly zinnias - in one area. I squatted
beside her as she dropped seeds into the soil channel we had hoed. "We'll sell fresh cut
flowers along the highway. They will be our cash crop." Kind neighbors who had started
a nursery business gave us poplar tree seedlings and a few small shrubs including roses my father's favorite flower. His father had been a gardener on a "gentleman's estate" in
his native Cornwall, England. On Sundays, when my father dressed up for church, he
liked to wear a red rose in his lapel. (One of those heirloom rose bushes - after being
transplanted numerous times from the garden of one descendant to that of another thrives today on an arched trellis in my daughter Jeannine's front yard garden near Long
Lake, Minnesota.)
We worked to enrich and aerate the clay soil on our Eden Prairie acre by adding manure
given to us by neighboring farmers. We also hauled peat from the bog in an adjacent
valley. We buried our organic kitchen garbage between our vegetable crop rows and
maintained a compost pile. During the summers when my mother had to work in the
garden, much of the housework and cooking fell to me, the only girl. We cooked on a
three-burner kerosene stove using a portable metal oven over one burner when we wished
to bake.
During harvest time in the late summer, an oblong copper boiler covering two burners of
the kerosene stove bubbled away 24 hours a day while my mother - often staying up all
night - canned the tomatoes, corn, beans and other vegetables we had raised along with
apples and peaches contributed by generous neighbors. We stored potatoes, squash,
carrots and cabbages in our earthen cellar under the house. One onion farmer gave us all
we could harvest ourselves. Another sold us all the asparagus we could cut for fifty cents
a bushel. We bought and carried home raw milk in gallon buckets straight from the
119
Holstein cows on a neighboring dairy farm. Cream rose to the top in a leathery sheet. We
skimmed it off to use on cereal and for whipping.
During harvest time in the late summer, an oblong copper boiler covering two burners of
the kerosene stove bubbled away 24 hours a day while my mother - often staying up all
night - canned the tomatoes, corn, beans and other vegetables we had raised along with
apples and peaches contributed by generous neighbors. We stored potatoes, squash,
carrots and cabbages in our earthen cellar under the house. One onion farmer gave us all
we could harvest ourselves. Another sold us all the asparagus we could cut for fifty cents
a bushel. We bought and carried home raw milk in gallon buckets straight from the
Holstein cows on a neighboring dairy farm. Cream rose to the top in a leathery sheet. We
skimmed it off to use on cereal and for whipping.
During our first winter in the unfinished one-room dwelling, nothing but tarpaper and
thin insulation bats between the two-by-four studs sheltered us from the Minnesota cold.
Sometimes snow blew in through the wall cracks onto our beds. Several of us slept on
Army cots lined up along the walls. But there weren't enough cots for everyone. A large
blanket chest served as one additional bed, and my younger brother, John, slept in a
contraption we christened "The Chariot" comprised of an old upholstered chair and a
footstool bridged by a board. We curled up in our beds under olive drab woolen Army
blankets given to us by a relative, my great uncle, Colonel Sanford Parker, who had been
in the Spanish-American War.
We had one closet for the six of us, no electricity or running water, no indoor toilet. If it
was too cold to go out to the privy at night, we used a "slop jar." My father had the
unpleasant chore of emptying the slop jar each morning. A pot-bellied, wood-burning
stove provided our only heat. Even when the stove looked red hot as we hovered around
it, our backs were freezing. I used my nightgown as a tent under which I tried to dress
and undress in a bit of privacy, shivering all the while.
During the winter the outdoor water pump froze up every night and had to be primed
each morning. The hard well water came out a cloudy orange from the iron that settled to
the bottom of the water pail after standing. Combined with soap (no detergents then), it
produced a curd that left a ring of scum on the dishpan or throughout our hair. To obtain
soft water for hair washing, we melted snow in the winter and used rain-barrel water in
the summer. We washed our laundry by hand in a washtub with a scrub board, using a
hand-crank wringer. In the winter the laundry froze dry on the clotheslines.
Compared to the cute bungalow of my early years, I felt this dwelling was unbearably
ugly. I hated it. But it sheltered us and we were exceedingly grateful for that. We had
heard about many people much less fortunate than us being totally homeless and having
to sleep on park benches or in jail cells at police stations. According to historians, the
years 1933-34 were the worst years of the Great Depression, causing a devastating
epidemic of poverty, hunger and homelessness.
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Living off the land on our one-acre plot in Eden Prairie proved difficult. We never did
succeed that first summer of 1933 in raising enough vegetables to carry us through the
winter. When our food supply approached exhaustion in November, potatoes became the
mainstay of our diet. Often I was still hungry after a meal, but none of us dared ask for
seconds. Had it not been for Aunt Rachel, we could have come near starvation that first
winter.
Once a week, Aunt Rachel, my mother's plump, younger sister - a spinster, who worked
at the First National Bank in Minneapolis - gave us a box of groceries. And frequently
she invited us to her apartment at 2519 Hennepin Avenue in Minneapolis for a chicken or
roast beef dinner on Sundays after church. She was the only member of our extended
family with a steady job. My mother had been a teller at that bank and had been
instrumental in Rachel's being hired. My mother quit her job when my oldest brother,
William Webster Dean, was born in 1920. But Aunt Rachel remained at her job with the
Bank until she retired in her early sixties.
Aunt Rachel had a tendency to be bossy. One of her favorite expressions was: "Oh, you
don't want to do that," or, for example, if I showed a preference for a particular choice of
shoes, "You don't want those." I guess she thought her charity gave her this license. But
when I visited her, she occasionally took me to see Shirley Temple movies at the Uptown
Theater near her apartment on Hennepin Avenue and that redeemed her for me.
"When does the movie begin?" Aunt Rachel took her feet off the Singer Sewing machine
treadle for a moment. "It doesn't matter. We'll just go when we're ready." So patching
together the action of the last part of the stories with the beginning often left me
confused.
Bill, then thirteen years old, helped put food on our table by hunting rabbits and
pheasants. He wasn't always successful, however. My mother stretched food with bread,
cracker and rice fillers: scalloped tomatoes, scalloped canned salmon, scalloped potatoes,
scalloped anything. Sometimes our meal consisted of bread and gravy. My mother baked
our bread. Recalling the aroma of fresh-baked bread on arriving home from school
inspired me to make bread every week during the growing-up years of my own three
children.
During the stressful winter of 1933-34, especially with six of us living in cramped
quarters, tempers could easily fly. We weren't used to sharing such a small living space. I
can recall one of my older brothers throwing a washbasin across the room. This made my
mother take to her bed. Nevertheless, we were surviving and all six of us remained
healthy.
Source of stories: Minnesota Historical Society Minnesota‘s Greatest Generation
http://www.mnhs.org/people/mngg/index.htm, accessed March 5, 2010.
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Appendix L. Popular Culture during the Great Depression Years
By the 1930s money was scarce because of the depression, so people did what they
could to make their lives happy. Movies were hot, parlor games and board games were
popular. People gathered around radios to listen to the Yankees. Young people danced
to the big bands. Franklin Roosevelt
influenced Americans with his Fireside Chats. The
FACTS about this decade.
golden age of the mystery novel continued as people
Population: 123,188,000 in 48
escaped into books, reading writers like Agatha
states
Christie, Dashielle Hammett, and Raymond Chandler.
Life Expectancy: Male, 58.1;
Female, 61.6
Average salary: $1,368
Popular Music of the Great Depression Years
Unemployment rises to 25%
"It Don't Mean a Thing (if it Ain't Got That Swing)".
Huey Long proposes a
The title of this Duke Ellington song sums up the "in"
guaranteed annual income of
music of the thirties. There were popular songs such
$2,500
as "Brother, Can You Spare a Dime" that spoke to the
Car Sales: 2,787,400
hardships of the time, but the young people flocked to
Food Prices: Milk, 14 cents a
hear and dance to the big bands of Benny Goodman,
qt.; Bread, 9 cents a loaf;
Duke Ellington, Glenn Miller, and Tommy Dorsey.
In this same era Broadway produced some of the most Round Steak, 42 cents a pound
Lynchings: 21
famous and lasting American musicals. George and
Ira Gershwin wrote the hits Strike Up the Band, Girl
Crazy, and Of Thee I Sing. Cole Porter produced such works as Anything Goes, Jubilee,
and Red Hot and Blue. Songwriters and lyricists like Irving Berlin, Johnny Mercer, and
Richard Rodgers composed melodies still being played and sung today
In 1931 Congress designated "The Star Spangled Banner" as the national anthem. In
1938 Kate Smith sang Irving Berlin's "God Bless America" and made the song her own.
Big bands were very popular from 1935-1947. While not considered jazz, the bands
often used jazz arrangements and their soloists played what was often called hot
arrangements. Glen Miller, Benny Goodman, Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey, Artie Shaw,
and others led the hit parade. Many singers (Doris Day, Peggy Lee, Rosemary Clooney)
got their start singing with the big bands. Young and old alike enjoyed an evening
dancing to the music of Artie Shaw and Guy Lombardo and others.
Some Favorite Songs of the Great Depression Years
―Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?
―Life is Just a Bowl of Cherries‖
―We‘re in the Money‖
―No Depression in Heaven‖
―It Don‘t Mean a Thing (If It Ain‘t Got That Swing)‖
―Happy Days Are Here Again‖
―I Surrender, Dear‖
―Whistle While You Work‖ (from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs)
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Radio during the Great Depression Years
Radio reached its zenith of popularity in this decade. By 1939 about 80% of the
population owned radio sets. Americans loved to laugh at the antics of such comedians
as Jack Benny, Fred Allen, George Burns and Gracie Allen, Amos and Andy, and Fibber
McGee and Molly. The soap opera dominated the daytime airwaves. Our Gal Sunday
began each episode with the question, "Can a girl from a little mining town in the west
find happiness as the wife of a wealthy and titled Englishman?' Many a woman's ear was
glued to her radio every day in hopes of learning the answer. The heroics of the Lone
Ranger, the Green Hornet, the Shadow, and Jack Armstrong, all-American boy, thrilled
listeners both young and old and sold countless boxes of cereal. News broadcasts by
commentators like H. V. Kaltenborn and Edward R. Murrow kept the public aware of the
increasing crisis in Europe. Franklin Roosevelt used the medium in his "Fireside Chats"
(listen)to influence public opinion. One of the most dramatic moments in radio history
occurred on May 6, 1937, when the German airship Hindenburg burst into flames as it
was about to land in Lakehurst, New Jersey. The horror of the incident was conveyed
live by the reporter Herb Morrison. His reaction to what was happening in front of him
still enthralls today. On October 30, 1938, 23-year-old Orson Welles broadcast on the
H.G. Wells story War of the Worlds on his Mercury Theater of the Air. Despite the
disclaimer at the end of the program, the tale of a Martian invasion of Earth panicked a
million listeners who mistook the play for a newscast. Such was the influence of radio in
this its golden age.
Popular Movies during the Great Depression
Hollywood turned out movie after movie to entertain its Depression audience and the
30's are often referred to as Hollywood's "Golden Age". Movie goers wanted mainly
escapist fare that let them forget their everyday troubles for a few hours. They swooned
over such matinee idols as Clark Gable, Bette Davis, Greta Garbo, and Errol Flynn.
They laughed at the likes of W. C. Fields, Bob Hope, and the Marx Brothers. America
fell in love with the little curly headed moppet Shirley Temple and flocked to see her tap
dance and sing to the song "The Good Ship Lollipop". Busby Berkeley's elaborate dance
numbers delighted many a fan. Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers tapping and ballroom
dancing across the screen enthralled the audience. Notable writers like William Faulkner
and F. Scott Fitzgerald penned screenplays. Not all movies were fantasy and lightness.
In 1940, the picture version of John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath brought to film the
story of the Joab family and its migration from the Dust Bowl of Oklahoma to the
agricultural fields of California. One of the top money makers of all time Gone With the
Wind debuted in Atlanta, Georgia in 1939. Walt Disney produced the first full-length
animated movie Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937.
Household Names during the Great Depression Years
Mary McLeod Bethune an influential African American woman educator and
friend of Eleanor Roosevelt who, as a board member of the National Youth
Administration, was able to extend benefits to African Americans.
Richard E. Byrd a famous explorer of the Antarctic and Arctic whose 1933-35
expedition to Antartica conducted many scientific search projects.
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Father Charles E. Coughlin a Catholic priest who gathered a large following of
all denominations with his radio broadcasts; an early Roosevelt supporter, he later
came to vilify the President and oppose his programs.
Mildred Babe Didrikson considered by many to be the finest woman athlete of
all time, she won medals or distinction in such varied sports as baseball,
basketball, track and field, and golf.
Amelia Earhart an aviation pioneer who was the first woman and second person
to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean.
Karl Menninger an American psychiatrist whose book The Human Mind had a
great effect on public attitudes toward mental illness.
Jesse Owens an African American athlete who won four gold medals in trackand-field at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin and put to shame Hitler's Aryan
superiority message.
Frances Perkins the first woman cabinet member who advocated the eight-hour
work day, stricter factory safety laws, and laws for the protection of women and
children in the labor force.
Will Rogers a homespun philosopher who began his career as an Oklahoma
cowboy. Well loved and respected radio commentator, film actor, and author
Walter Winchell a gossip columnist and radio commentator whose controversial
stands and scoops on celebrities made him one of the most famous twentiethcentury American journalists.
Education during the Great Depression Years
The 1930's were a perilous time for public education. With cash money in short supply
parents were unable to provide their children with the necessary clothes, supplies, and
textbooks (which were not furnished in some states) to attend school. Taxes, especially in
rural areas, went unpaid. With the loss of revenue, school boards were forced to try
numerous strategies to keep their districts operating. School terms were shortened.
Teachers' salaries were cut. One new teacher was paid $40 a month for a five-month
school year - and was glad to have a job. When a rural county in Arkansas was forced to
charge tuition one year in order to keep the schools open, some children were forced to
drop out for that year. One farmer was able to barter wood to fuel the potbellied stoves in
the classrooms in exchange for his four children's tuition, thus enabling them to continue
their education.
The famous Dick and Jane books that taught millions of children to read were first
published in 1931. These primers introduced the students to reading with only one new
word per page and a limited vocabulary per book. All who learned to read with these
books still recall the "Look. See Dick. See Dick run."
Fads and Fashions of the Great Depression Years
With the reduction of spendable income, people had to look to inexpensive leisure
pursuits. President Roosevelt helped make stamp collecting a popular hobby.
Parlor games and board games became the rage. In 1935 Parker Brothers introduced the
game of Monopoly and twenty thousand sets were sold in one week. Gambling increased
as people sought any means to add to their income. Between 1930 and 1939 horse racing
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became legal in fifteen more states bringing the total to twenty-one. Interest in spectator
sports such as baseball grew. Stars like Lou Gehrig and Joe DiMaggio drew fans into the
stadium, and those who could not attend the games gathered around their radios to listen
to the play-by-play. The separate Negro League was in its golden years. The 1932 Winter
Olympics, held at Lake Placid, New York, renewed interest in winter sports. The
Civilian Conservation Corps, a New Deal work project for youths, built ski runs and
jumps on public land as well as recreational facilities in the national parks.
Paris fashions became too expensive for all but the very rich, and American designers
came into their own. Hollywood movie stars such as Bette Davis and Greta Garbo set
fashion trends in dresses designed by Adrian and Muriel King and hats designed by Lily
Dache. Clothes had to last a long time so styles did not change every season. The simple
print dress with a waist line and longer hem length replaced the flapper attire of the
1920's. The use of the zipper became wide spread for the first time because it was less
expensive than the buttons and closures previously used. Another innovation of the
1930s was different hem lengths for different times of the day - mid calf for day wear,
long for the evening. Men's pants were wide and high-waisted. Vest sweaters were an
alternative to the traditional matching vest of the three piece suit. Hats were mandatory
for the well dressed male.
Other Stories from the Great Depression Years
Gutzon Borglum finished carving the faces on Mount Rushmore using WPA
funds.
The Empire State Building, the Chrysler Building, and Rockefeller Center were
completed during the 1930s.
Amelia Earhart, woman aviator, disappeared in 1937 trying to be the first woman
to fly around the world.
Prohibition
Prohibition, the era during which the sale, manufacture, and transportation of
alcohol was banned in the United States, lasted from 1920-1933. Prohibition began when
the Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution was ratified on January 16, 1919, and
went into effect on January 16, 1920. Congress passed the National Prohibition Act, also
called the Volstead Act, over President Woodrow Wilson‘s veto. The law, however, had
few provisions for enforcement and bootlegging became rampant. On March 23, 1933,
President Franklin Roosevelt signed an amendment to the Volstead Act into law allowing
the manufacture and sale of specified alcoholic beverages. The Twenty-First Amendment
to the Constitution, ratified on December 5, 1933, repealed the Eighteenth Amendment,
ending Prohibition.
Crime of the Century
On May 20, 1927, Charles A. Lindbergh, from Minnesota, became the first person
to fly solo from the U.S. to Europe. He later married Anne Morrow and on March 1,
1932, their 20-month-old son, Charles A. Lindbergh, Jr., was kidnapped from their home.
The Lindberghs followed instructions in a series of notes and paid a ransom, but the
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child‘s body was found two months later near their home. The baby appeared to have
been murdered almost immediately after the kidnapping.
The kidnapping and murder were called the Crime of the Century. An illegal
immigrant from Germany, Bruno Richard Hauptman, was arrested after he was caught
spending some of the ransom money. After handwriting analysis seemed to indicate he
had written the ransom notes, he was convicted of kidnapping and murder and was
executed in 1936. Questions and theories about the kidnapping and murder, however,
continued to come up, keeping the story in the public‘s eye for many years.
The Hindenberg-International Air Disaster
On May 6, 1937, the Hindenberg (Deutsches Luftschiff Zeppelin), a German rigid
passenger airship that used hydrogen as its lifting gas, crashed and burned as it was
attempting to land (dock) in New Jersey after a transatlantic crossing. The airship burned
in thirty-seven seconds, killing thirty-five of the ninety-five people aboard and one
person on the ground. The crash ended the era of hydrogen-based rigid airships.
Nationally-known American food brands of the Great Depression Years
Tootsie pops
Hershey Bars
Butterfingers
Milk Duds
Baby Ruth
Whitman samplers (box of candy)
Lifesavers
NECCOs (& conversation hearts)
Mounds
Milky Ways
Heath bars
Snickers
American food brands introduced in the 1930s
1930
Birds Eye Frosted Foods
Wonder Bread (sliced)
Hostess Twinkies
Mott's Apple Sauce
Snickers candy bars (Mars, Inc.)
French's Worcestershire Sauce
Chock Full o' Nuts chain restaurants (New York City)
Philadelphia Cheese Steak (Pat's)
1931
Beech-Nut Baby Foods
Bisquick (General Mills)
Ballard Biscuits (cardboard tube packed refrigerator dough)
Wyler's Bouillon Cubes
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Hotel Bar Butter
Tootsie Pops
1932
Frito Corn Chips
Skippy Peanut Butter
3 Musketeers (candy bar)
Heath bar (candy bar)
1933
Nestle Toll House Chocolate Chip Cookies
Campbell's Chicken Noodle and Cream of Mushroom soups
Kraft Miracle Whip
Tree-Sweet canned orange juice
E. & J. Gallo winery founded
1934
Pet Evaporated Milk
Wild Cherry flavor Life Savers
Royal Crown Cola
Carvel (ice cream restaurants)
Ritz Crackers [Nabisco]
1935
Adolph's Meat Tenderizer
Kit Kat bar
Five Flavors Life Savers
ReaLemon Lemon Juice
1936
Goya brand foods
Waring blender
Betty Crocker (General Mills)
Elsie the Cow (Borden)
Spry (Unilever)
Hungry Jack pancake mix (Pillsbury)
Chunky Chocolate bar
Mars Almond Bar
Fifth Avenue (candy bar)
Orangina (soft drink)
Howard Johnson's restaurant chain
1937
Pepperidge Farm Bread
Kix cereal (General Mills)
Spam (Hormel)
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Kraft Macaroni & Cheese Dinner
Ragu Spaghetti Sauce
Sky Bar (New England Confectionery Co.)
Rolo (candy)
Smarties (Rowntree candy)
1938
Lawry's Seasoned Salt
Mott's Apple Juice
Nescafe (instant coffee)
1939
Lay's Potato Chips
Cream of Wheat (5 minute)
Dairy Queen (ice cream stores)
What Things Cost
Clothing
Mens Shirt $2.50 Ohio 1932
Ladies Wool Flannel Robes $3.95 Nebraska 1934
Ladies Winter Coats $16.00 Indiana 1937
Mens Quality Overcoats $15.00 Indiana 1937
Ladies Oxfords Shoes $2.44 Indiana 1937
Mens Slacks $3.98 Indiana 1937
Womens silk hose 49 cents Ohio 1933
Boys overcoat wool 8.69-11.98/each From $ New Jersey
Boys pants and breeches, corduroy From $1.98 New Jersey
Boys school suit, From $7.94 New Jersey
Girls hose (tights), woolen, From $25 cents per pair New Jersey
Mens shirt, Arrow, From $1.45 New Jersey
Mens sport coat, /each From $19.98 New Jersey
Womens dress shoes, From $3.45 New Jersey
Womens suit, 2 pieces, From $6.98 New Jersey
Mens Sox 10 cents Ohio 1933
Ladies Sandals 98 cents Maryland 1939
Boys and Girls Underwear 49 cents Maryland 1935
Mens 2 Piece Suit Double breasted $19.75 New York 1935
Howard Deluxe Quality silk lined hat $2.85 New York 1935
Sheep-lined Moccasins 79 cents Ohio 1935
Fancy Broadcloth Pajamas $1.89 Indiana 1937
Mens Lined Gloves 98 cents Ohio 1935
Food
Shoulder of Ohio Spring lamb 17 cents per pound Ohio 1932
Sliced Baked Ham 39 cents per pound Ohio 1932
Dozen Eggs 18 Cents Ohio 1932
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Coconut Macaroons 27 cents per pound Ohio 1932
Bananas 19 cents for 4 Pounds Ohio 1932
Peanut Butter 23 cents QT Ohio 1932
Bran Flakes 10 cents Maryland 1939
Jumbo Sliced Loaf of Bread 5 cents Maryland 1939
Spinach 5 cents a pound Maryland 1939
Clifton Toilet Tissue 9 cents for 2 rolls Ohio 1932
Camay Soap 6 cents bar Ohio 1932
Cod Liver Oil 44 cents pint Wisconsin 1933
Toothpaste 27 cents Wisconsin 1933
Lux Laundry Soap 22 cents Indiana 1935
Suntan oil 25 cents Pennsylvania 1938
Talcum Powder 13 cents Maryland 1939
Noxzema Medicated Cream for Pimples 49 cents Texas 1935
Applesauce 20 cents for 3 cans New Jersey
Bacon, 38 cents per pound New Jersey
Bread, white, 8 cents per loaf New Jersey
Ham, 27 cents can New Jersey
Ketchup, 9 cents New Jersey
Lettuce, iceberg, 7 cents head New Jersey
Potatoes, 18 cents for 10 pounds New Jersey
Sugar, 49 cents for 10 pounds New Jersey
Soap, Lifebuoy, 17 cents for 3 bars New Jersey
Sugar $1.25 per 25LB Sack Ohio 1932
Pork and Beans 5 cents can Ohio 1932
Oranges 14 for 25 cents Ohio 1932
Chuck Roast 15 cents per pound Ohio 1932
White Potatoes 19 cents for 10LBs Ohio 1932
Heinz Beans 13 cents for 25oz can Ohio 1932
Spring Chickens 20 cents per pound Ohio 1932
Wieners 8 cents per pound Ohio 1932
Best Steak 22 cents per pound Ohio 1935
Pure lard 15 cents per pound Wisconsin 1935
Hot Cross Buns 16 Cents per dozen Texas 1939
Campbells Tomato Soup 4 cans for 25 cents Indiana 1937
Oranges 2 dozen 25 cents Indiana 1937
Kelloggs Corn Flakes 3 pkgs 25 cents Indiana 1937
Mixed Nuts 19 Cents per pound Indiana 1937
Pork Loin Roast 15 cents per pound Indiana 1937
Channel Catfish 28 cents per pound Missouri 1938
Fresh Peas 4 cents per pound Maryland 1939
Cabbage 3 cents per pound Maryland 1939
Sharp Wisconsin Cheese 23 cents per pound Maryland 1939
Common Household Appliances
Electric Toaster $9.95 New York 1932
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Electrolux gas Refrigerator $144.50 North Carolina 1939
Westinghouse Cleaner with attachment kit $39.95 North Carolina 1939
Westinghouse Wringer washing machine $59.95 North Carolina 1939
Tappan Gas Range $69.95 North Carolina 1939
Emmerson 5 tube bedroom radio $9.95 Ohio 1938
Philco Auto Radio $24.95 Ohio 1938
Electric Flat Iron $1.49 North Carolina 1935
Electric Movie Projector $3.95 North Carolina 1935
Slang
Slang
alligator
back burner
body and soul
boog
boondoogle
buttinski
cannon fodder
crabber
creep
cut a rug
dinger
dizzy
doodle-bug
doozy
Dust Bowl
G-man
grease
have kittens
high hat
Hoover blanket
jam session
jerk
Meaning
a fan of jive / swing music
to postpone
girl / boy friend
to dance
project wasting
nosey person
regular soldier
nagging critic
obnoxious person
dance
telephone
odd, strange
jalopy, buggy
wonderful person or thing
Great Plains States
FBI agent
a bribe
to get excited
arrogant, superior
newspaper used as a blanket
by a homeless person
musicians playing as a group
a fool, disliked person
Slang
lovebirds
Nervous Nellie
one and only
phooey
sad sack
screwball
scuttlebutt
session
Shangri La
smart Alec
smoke eater
snooty
spinach
threads
tops
twerp
unlax
up the wall
wacko!
whodunit
with bells on
woof
zombie
zoo suit
Meaning
sweethearts
anxious person
sweetheart
nonsense!
unpopular student
an odd person
rumor
a party
paradise
wise guy
a firefighter
snobbish
nonsense!
clothing
the best
disgusting
relax
crazy
great!
detective story
definitely
to chat
weird person
special type of man's
Popular Comic Strips
Blondie and Dagwood – began running in 1930
Dick Tracy – began running in 1931
Little Orphan Annie – began running in 1924
Jiggs – began running in 1913
Krazy Kat – began running in 1913
Superman – began running in 1932 (date also given as 1938)
Buck Rogers – began running in 1928
Popeye – began running in 1919
Gasoline Alley – began running in 1919
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Celebrities
Judy Garland (Wizard of Oz came out in 1939
Clark Gable (Gone With the Wind came out in 1939)
Walt Disney‘s Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs came out in 1937
Bing Crosby (singer)
Fred Astaire (dancer)
Frank Sinatra (singer)
Common Illnesses and Diseases of the Great Depression Years
Common illnesses and diseases during the Great Depression years were:
Cancer
Heart disease (caused CCC Director Robert Fechner‘s death in 1939)
Pneumonia
Influenza
Tuberculosis
Polio (came in epidemics in the 1940s and 1950s before development of vaccine)
Diphtheria
Typhoid
Whooping Cough
Measles and German Measles (Rubella)
Mumps
Strep Throat and Scarlet Fever
Chicken Pox
Some of these diseases were considered ―childhood illnesses‖ because children
often got them. In some cases (whooping cough, measles, rubella, mumps, and chicken
pox), a person developed lifelong immunity after having the illness. Some of the diseases
on this list, such as polio, could cause lifelong problems or be fatal. Antibiotics, including
penicillin, were unknown, leading to deaths from diseases, such pneumonia, which
would, in the decades following the 1930s, be curable. Although some vaccines were
developed as early as the 1700s, vaccines for common childhood illnesses would come
into more common use after the Great Depression. Development of the polio vaccine in
the early 1950s would be hailed as a great accomplishment. The most common control
for contagious diseases in the 1930s, however, was quarantine. In quarantine, a person
suspected of having an infectious disease was isolated until the infectious period was
over. Often this meant isolating an entire family or, for the CCC, an entire camp.
Sources for information about popular culture during the Great Depression years:
Beverly Bundy, The Century in Food: America's Fads and Favorites http://www.amazon.com/Century-Food-Americas-FadsFavorites/dp/1888054670, accessed March 5, 2010.
Lynn Kerrigan, More Than Bread Alone: Food in the Great Depression
http://www.globalgourmet.com/fiid/egg/egg0997/slth0997.html, accessed March 5, 2010.
Beth Kimmerle, Candy: The Sweet History http://www.amazon.com/Candy-Sweet-History-Beth-Kimmerle/dp/1888054832,
accessed March 5, 2010.
What They [Diseases] Are and How Your Child Can Avoid Them http://www.provmedgroup.com/infect.pdf, March 4, 2010.
The People‘s History http://www.thepeoplehistory.com, accessed March 3, 2010.
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Eleanor Roosevelt National Historic Site: The Great Depression http://www.nps.gov/archive/elro/glossary/great-depression.htm,
accessed March 2, 2010.
The Depression in the United States: An Overview http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/depression/overview.htm, accessed March
2, 2010.
The Library of Congress Learning Page: The Great Depression and World War II
http://memory.loc.gov/learn//features/timeline/depwwii/depwar.html, accessed March 2, 2010.
The Great Depression: An Overview http://www.todaysteacher.com/TheGreatDepressionWebQuest/BriefOverview.htm, accessed
March 2, 2010.
Great Depression http://www.tms.riverview.wednet.edu/lrc/great%20depression.htm accessed March 2, 2010.
American Cultural History http://kclibrary.lonestar.edu/decade30.html, accessed March 2, 2010.
http://www.plymouth.k12.in.us/~bwaymouth/US%20History%20Site/BIGLIST/1930's1.htm, accessed March 3, 2010.
http://www.paper-dragon.com/1939/slang.html, accessed March 3, 2010.
http://www.foodtimeline.org/fooddecades.html, accessed March 5, 2010.
See also: America in the 30s. http://xroads.virginia.edu/~1930s/front.html, accessed March 19, 2010. This site includes dress, radio
programs, comic strips, films, books, magazine articles, and etc.
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