How the CCC’s Work Lives On in National Parks

It’s been called the greatest federal conservation program in U.S. history — the Civilian Conservation Corps was a workforce initiative that employed 3 million young men in projects across the country and improved state and national parks, as well as national forests and other public lands, during the nation’s recovery from the Great Depression.

The CCC, as it was called, operated from 1933 to 1942 under command of the U.S. Army before folding as the U.S. entered World War II. Its enrollees planted nearly 3 billion trees to protect 20 million acres from soil erosion and worked on infrastructure in 800 parks.

For the National Park System, they built roads, trails, campgrounds and facilities — much of it by hand without the use of heavy machinery. If you’ve explored a national park, you’ve likely encountered the corps’ workmanship, much of which remains today.

U.S. Secretary of Labor Frances Perkins pioneered creation of the CCC in 1933 as a relief program as part of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal, working with Congress to pass the necessary legislation and setting up the program. It became Roosevelt’s most popular Depression-era program.

Workers signed up for six-month terms and could enroll for up to two years. They received a $30-per-month stipend, most of which was sent home to their families, and learned skills they could later take back to their communities.

The legislation that authorized the CCC included an amendment by Oscar DePriest of Illinois, the only Black member of Congress at the time, barring discrimination within the CCC based on race, color or creed. Despite the good intentions, racial segregation did take place. Additionally, the only women employed in the CCC were secretaries or medical assistants — so First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt and Perkins developed summer sessions, nicknamed the “She-She-She” camps, for about 8,500 unemployed women who could take courses, work on projects and get vocational counseling. That program ran from 1933 to 1937.

Here are 10 examples of how CCC labor endures at national parks.

Shenandoah National Park

Shenandoah was the first national park to have a CCC camp. More than 6,500 young men worked on the Virginia park’s infrastructure, including the construction and landscaping of Skyline Drive, a scenic roadway running along the crest of the Blue Ridge Mountains. They also constructed the road’s overlooks and picnic grounds.

The CCC put in 101 miles of trails, installed 4,001 signs and markers, seeded 361 acres of land and planted 147,595 trees and shrubs. The Big Meadows recreational area served as one of the six CCC camps at Shenandoah, housing 200 men.

Chesapeake & Ohio Canal National Historical Park

The C&O Canal along the Potomac River operated for nearly a century as an engineering marvel for transporting coal, lumber and agricultural products by waterway from Cumberland, Maryland, to Washington, D.C. Then, major floods in 1924 and 1936 led to its demise. It would not be a recreational space today if not for CCC companies of African American men, who restored the first 22 miles of the damaged canal after the federal government purchased the property in 1938. The crews cleared overgrowth from the towpath and resurfaced it and fixed lift locks back into working order. The Chesapeake and Ohio Canal Recreational Waterway opened in July 1941 and became a national historical park 30 years later.

Grand Canyon National Park

Seven CCC companies worked at Grand Canyon National Park in Arizona on the North and South rims and inner canyon. They constructed trails, stone walls and shelters, and other infrastructure still in use today. They also installed electric lines and a trans-canyon telephone line. Bright Angel Campground sits on the site of the CCC camp at Phantom Ranch. Visitors can take a 1.5-mile walking tour in the Historic District of Grand Canyon Village to see nine examples of CCC craftsmanship.

Petrified Forest National Park

The popular Painted Desert Inn in Arizona, which opened on July 4, 1940, owes its salvation to the CCC. It originally opened in the early 1900s as the Stone Tree House, a tourist attraction built from petrified wood and native stone. It was in disrepair when the Petrified Forest National Monument purchased it in 1936.

CCC crews built new roof beams and constructed a 12-mile pipeline for running water. Under direction of National Park Service architect Lyle Bennett, the CCC redesigned the inn in Pueblo Revival Style with wooden tables and chairs crafted in Native designs and light fixtures with hand-made punched tin. They hand-painted the inn’s skylight panels in designs of prehistoric pottery and painted concrete floors with Navajo blanket designs.

Mammoth Cave National Park

If you’ve walked inside this Kentucky cave system, you’ve benefitted from work of the CCC. Its crews created and improved 24 miles of trails through the cave passageways and constructed the Frozen Niagara entrance and its rock landscaping. The park recently rehabilitated a section of the trail system for visitor safety, tour experience and resource protection with funding from the Great American Outdoors Act.

Above ground, CCC workers crafted the stonework at Three Springs pump house, in the amphitheater and along the banks of the Green River Ferry crossing. Crews planted 1 million trees and built Park Service employee housing and administration structures still used today.

Platt Historic District, Chickasaw National Recreation Area

The present-day Platt Historic District within Chickasaw National Recreation Area was its own national park until the 1970s. This Oklahoma site owes much of its infrastructure to the CCC: mineral spring pavilions, campgrounds, picnic areas, stone bridges, dams and waterfalls, all linked by a network of roads and trails. CCC workers planted more than a half a million trees, shrubs and wildflowers in less than one thousand acres.

Cuyahoga Valley National Park

By the 1930s, essentially all mature American chestnut trees in Ohio had been killed by the infamous fungal blight. The task of CCC workers at Cuyahoga Valley National Park included removing hundreds of the dead trees and then using the wood to build the Kendall Lake, Octagon and Ledges shelters and Happy Days Lodge. These structures are still used today. The CCC also reforested the area and built Kendall Lake, which includes a beach and swimming area.

Zion National Park

Among projects at Zion in Utah, CCC workers built the park’s entrance signs, stabilized erosion on the Angels Landing Trail, created much of the water management infrastructure along the Virgin River, sloped banks, and constructed switchbacks and retaining walls below the Zion-Mount Carmel Tunnel.

When summer temperatures got too hot, the CCC workers moved to nearby Bryce Canyon National Park to grade roads and to Cedar Breaks National Monument, where they built the rustic log-cabin style visitor center and ranger cabin still used today, among other projects.

Appomattox Court House National Historical Park

This Virginia landmark, where the Civil War effectively ended, was officially designated in April 1940. Work in the park began that same year, as an all-African American CCC company stabilized structures, cleared vegetation, quarried stone and graded roadways. Many of the men were World War I veterans and older than the average CCC worker.

Haleakalā National Park

On the Hawaiian island of Maui, CCC workers built a 26.5-mile trail system in the center of Haleakalā National Park that creates an intimate experience of the natural features that characterize the area. They removed invasive plants and feral pigs and goats, and they built some of the structures used by park employees today. Mules carried in all the CCC materials and supplies, a practice still used to minimize noise at this park.