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Civilian Conservation Corps museum exhibit oral histories, 1990.
Amount:
.50 cubic ft.
Medium Included:
videotapes
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Biographical/Historical:
The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) began in 1933 as a part of President Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal relief program. A federal program, the CCC worked in connection with the U.S. Army, Depts. of the Interior, Agriculture, and Labor, and the National Park Service to provide work relief for single, unemployed men between the ages of 18 and 25. Later, World War I veterans were also allowed to join the CCC. Paid $30 a month, with $25 of the pay sent home to their families, the enrollees were housed in army-style camps and worked on forestry, soil reclamation, park construction, and fire suppression projects. Enrollees generally signed up for six-month stints. The CCC remained in operation until 1942, when World War II diverted energies and money away from federal relief programs. Florida maintained an annual average of twenty-five CCC camps throughout the program's existence. In 1990 the Florida Park Service (FPS), one of the by-products of the CCC, set out to create a State Civilian Conservation Corps Museum at Highlands Hammock State Park in Sebring. The FPS interviewed on videotape several CCC veterans during a 1990 reunion held at the state park, for eventual use in the musuem's exhibits. However, when the FPS budget was slashed in 1991, many of the museum's plans were abandoned, and the videotaped interviews were never used.
The Florida Park Service began in 1935 with its first park, Highlands Hammock State Park, and was managed by the Board of Forestry. Over the next seven years, the CCC constructed all eight of the FPS's original parks. After a hiatus during WWII, the FPS became an independent agency, and grew rapidly throughout the 1950s and 1960s. By 1990, the FPS was managed within the Dept. of Environmental Protection's Division of Recreation and Parks, and boasted well over one hundred parks.
Summary:
This series consists of five thirty-minute videos of oral histories by former Civilian Conservation Corps enrollees that were conducted by the Florida Park Service in 1990 for a museum exhibit at Highlands Hammock State Park. Discussing events during the years 1933-1942, the enrollees -- including men from camps in Olustee, Niceville, Miami, Biscayne Bay, and Highlands Hammock and Gold Head state parks -- talked about life during the depression, their decisions to join the CCC, food and work in the camps, and conditions in the surrounding towns. Also interviewed were enrollees from other states, as well as Floridians sent to camps across the country. The interviews run an average of five to eight minutes.
Finding Aids:
Folder listing available. 0 A brief index to the videos, with interviewee names, camp locations, and running times, is also included. #
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Associated Materials:
For related information on the CCC, see series 1270, Florida State Park project files, 1933-1942, 1988-1989; series 1352, Florida Park Service project files, 1936-1948; and series 1831, Florida Forest Service program and project photographs, 1931-1941.
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Subject Access Fields:
Florida Park Service. Civilian Conservation Corps (U.S.)
Parks Florida New Deal, 1933-1939. Oral biography. Reforestation. Public welfare Administration Florida
Video recordings. aat Oral histories. aat
Highlands Hammock State Park (Fla.)
for detailed listing.