The Ozark Natural & Cultural Resource Center is hosting a new exhibit through at least the end of June documenting the positive impact and honoring the continuing legacy of the Civilian Conservation Corps in south-central Missouri. During the Great Depression, the New Deal program put 18- to 25-year-olds to work replanting forests, preventing soil erosion and building recreational areas. In fact, several of the public lands still welcoming visitors in this area were originally built or significantly improved by CCC workers.
“Just like how people don't know where their groceries come from, they don't know where their state parks or their national parks come from,” said Jason Stotler, a member of the Dent County Historical Society, who helped create the exhibit. “The CCC was very instrumental in that, from FDR and the New Deal, the CCC boys went in and started building 800 state and national parks that are still enjoyed today.”
The CCC existed from 1933 to 1942, during which it employed more than three million people nationwide for at least six-month terms or up to two years. Locally, Dent County had three CCC camps at Boss, Montauk and Indian Trail. A fourth in Reynolds County was just over the border outside Bunker. Workers from these sites helped develop Indian Trail Conservation Area, Montauk State Park and several sites in today’s Ozark National Scenic Riverways. The Blooming Rose camp in Phelps County also built the George O. White State Forest Nursery outside Licking as well as the historic headquarters for Mark Twain National Forest (which is today home to the Rolla Area Chamber of Commerce).
“It worked hand in hand to get the people who were suffering to work and get their families fed, and in turn, rebuild our country,” Stotler said. “We had the deforestation of timber, soil erosion and a lot of things happening on the landscape that needed fixed. People also needed hope. Through the New Deal, the CCC put men to work, they got paid $30 a month, and they sent $25 home to their families.”
Stotler, who works at Indian Trail for the Missouri Department of Conservation, said he’s met many local people with personal roots in the CCC while leading tours at the exhibit.
“It was, I believe, a little bumpy in the beginning, because there were city people coming to the country life, but I think they kind of grew on each other,” Stotler said. “I'm sure there were marriages that resulted in kids and all which came from the camps. I had a classmate actually, that came in this morning and found her two uncles pictured on a panorama we have from the Bunker camp. … The last group in here we counted, and of the nine of them three had a direct connection to the CCC, so there is definitely a lot of family connections. With over three million people being in the CCC, there's got to be connections out there, and nowadays, people probably don't even know they do because they haven't asked the questions.”
In addition to healing the landscape, Stotler said another enduring legacy of the CCC was improving the lives of its workers. Many took the skills and lessons from the CCC with them when they fought in World War II and afterwards raised families.
“They would go work all day, come back and then they'd have night classes,” Stotler said. “They'd get their high school educations, learn welding or even get mechanical degrees. They had recreation sports like baseball games and boxing matches. They got healthy, ate decent meals, had a roof over their heads and could help their families back home. In turn, they helped our country with our natural resources and built stuff that is still enjoyed today and will be for hundreds of years if it's maintained.”
Stotler said these days there are very few CCC workers to share their stories, and many museums dedicated to the CCC have closed. However, a group called CCC Legacy has been founded to help preserve the history of the CCC and maintain places originally built by CCC workers.
“I hope that they're able to gather the information to create a database so you can search and find an ancestor that was in the CCC, where they served, and what happened to them afterwards,” Stotler said. “I think it's such a small handful of people that are possibly still alive that were in it, because it ended in 1942, so if someone enrolled at 18 years old, I believe they'd be like 102 years old now. There are very few people alive that actually went to the camps, but the history is still there.”
Stotler said the ONCRC exhibit represents three months of research talking to local people, reading historic newspapers and working with museums near and far. He says he plans to continue the research in anticipation of a larger celebration for the CCC’s 100th anniversary in 2033.
“It's just got to be gathered, digitized and shared,” Stotler said of the history. “I think to come to something like this would birth something to where the next generation will continue to gather the information. I always told my kids you don't know where you're going if you can't remember where you been, and we've already been here, so let's not forget it.”
The Ozark Natural & Cultural Resource Center is open 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday to Friday and located at 200 South Main Street in Salem. Stotler said to check social media announcements for the ONCRC because he will also be hosting guided tours on select Saturdays while the exhibit is on display.
