By Rob Bates

There is a small cloth patch in the collection of the Sharlot Hall Museum in Prescott. It is circular in shape; pine trees grace the edges and mountains fill the center. The letters CCC sweep across the top.

CCC stands for the Civilian Conservation Corps. This was a government agency that was very active nationwide; it left its mark here in central Arizona during its nine years of existence from 1933 to the beginning of World War II. It was part of President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal, originally known as the ECW, Emergency Conservation Work, in the early 1930s.

This small patch tells the story of where the CCC did most of its work – in the mountains, within the green places of the United States, - and did so in cooperation with the U.S. Forest Service. One of these places to fit this description was, of course, the surrounding area of Prescott.

Prescott came under the Phoenix district of the 8^th Corps area of the Arizona-New Mexico district at Fort Bliss near El Paso, Texas. In 1933, Fort Bliss was the quartermaster’s head office. Officers were also at Tucson and Silver City, N.M. The CCC was set up much like a military establishment. Upon recruitment the men would undergo five days of basic training and orientation conducted by the military.

Often the men (average age about 20) would come up from the large cities into the CCC in an impoverished condition. The CCC would not only house and feed them, but also offered classes in reading, writing and arithmetic. “On the job” training included forestry, auto mechanics, engineering, adobe making, carpentry and machine operation.

The CCC was involved in projects such as building roads, bridges, campgrounds, bath houses, cabins, latrines, fences, wells, cattle guards and sidewalks. In cooperation with the U.S. Forest Service they built storage facilities for equipment and fire-fighting apparatus.

Spending time in camp, activities were arranged for the men to keep them occupied. These included baseball, boxing, ping-pong, music and various hobbies. Once in a while there was a trip to town to the local movie theater, and of course to greet the local ladies.

Nicknames given to the CCC were “Roosevelt’s tree army” and the “Colossal Collage of Calluses.” From 1933 to 1942, CCC workers planted 2.5 billion trees, built 13,100 miles of trails, laid out 52,000 acres of campgrounds, started 800 state parks and rejuvenated 4,000 historic buildings. All told, 3,463,766 men had served nationwide. Some of Arizona’s projects included the Walnut Canyon restoration project and Hualapai Mountain Park.

Pay went with job title, and it averaged between $22 and $45 per month. A certain amount of that was automatically sent home to the worker’s family. An enlistment would last six months, and could be renewed three times for a total service limit of two years.

The CCC spent $44 million in the nine years it operated here. It also recruited Native Americans, African Americans and Hispanics. By the time World War II had arrived, the military had received many men with necessary skills acquired when in the CCC.

Evidence of the camps are mostly gone now, but if one looks at the parks and campgrounds around the country, you will see a legacy of a time that was not as congenial to the economy as seen in recent years. The men are gone and have melted into society, many went on to the war, many never returned, some returned to the mean streets of the city, and many went on to prosperity.

Some of the local work sites are in the campgrounds that still surround the area today. The Yavapai campground near Granite Basin Lake and the Granite Basin Wilderness area is one that was originally a CCC project. Although little of the original work is visible today, it served as a background for the 1941 movie “Pride of the Bowery” with the East Side Kids, starring Leo Gorcey.

The movie is about some boys who were recruited from New York City, and their trials and tribulations in 1934. It is a rather poor quality film, but it does show Granite Basin Lake in the background and a few short scenes of downtown Prescott. One identifiable building is the Hassayampa Hotel on Gurley Street. One can also identify “the base camp” that is now the old Yavapai County Fairgrounds, and a work area at Thumb Butte.

Other regional campgrounds that were part of the CCC in the area (but not in the movie) include Powell Springs Camp on Cherry Road. This was the base camp for doing work along the old road to Camp Verde, and it is reported that there is some sort of chain in the ground that was laid by the CCC, but the purpose is unknown. Another camp became Lower Wolf Creek campground in the pines and live oaks off Senator Highway on Indian Creek Road. Some CCC stonework is used in retaining walls and picnic tables.

The CCC built the Indian Creek campground off Highway 89 and down Ponderosa Park Road in 1934. Today, visitors will find a stone water spigot there that was built in the Depression era. A little farther away is Hazlett Hollow, about eight miles out of Crown King down a one-lane dirt road. It is in the Horsethief Basin recreation area. Some of the stonework is evident as the remaining work of the CCC. Horesthief Lake is nearby.

The CCC was abolished in 1942 as World War II began in full swing, but there are many today who are still familiar with the tales and times of the “tree army” of 60 years ago. If you were a member of the CCC or any work project in Yavapai County, and you have photos or stories of that time, stop by the Museum Archives (noon to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Friday and 10 a.m. to 2 on Saturdays) and show us what you have.

(Rob Bates is a curatorial assistant at the Sharlot Hall Museum).