Final paper

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Running Head: CIVILIAN CONSERVATION CORPS

The Civilian Conservation Corps

Ashley Ford

History 206: American History since 1877

Ashford University

January 1, 2015

Title Page

 Title of paper

 Name of student

 Course name and number

 Ashford University

 Date

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CIVILIAN CONSERVATION CORPS

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The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) was an important New Deal program that had a

significant impact on many Americans. In 1933 when the CCC was created, the United States

was experiencing the widespread economic hardship that came with the Great Depression, with

unemployment at 25% throughout the country (Kennedy, 1991, p. 163). The CCC was created

specifically to address unemployment and before it ended in 1942, the program put more than

three million young men to work at hard physical labor in the nation’s national forests and parks

(Kennedy, 1991, p. 144). While the CCC was only one of many New Deal Programs created to

deal with the causes and fallout of the Great Depression, it had many positive impacts on the

individuals who participated in it and for American society.

Certainly, the CCC aided many men and their families who had fallen victim to lack of

income resulting from the greatest economic disaster of the 20th century. Many of the young

men who joined the CCC had experienced hunger and deprivations as a result of the Great

Depression and were undernourished, prone to illness and physically weak. The Army’s Office

of the Surgeon General estimated that 75% of the men who joined the CCC during the 1930s

were underweight and many thousands of them were suffering from illnesses like Tuberculosis

and hook worm (Maher, 2002, p. 441). In fact, enrollment in the program was restricted to

single, unemployed men between eighteen and twenty-five years old whose families were on

relief. The men were required to agree to send the majority of their monthly pay, approximately

three quarters of it, to their families (Maher, 2002, p. 437). Although the CCC enrolled only a

relatively small proportion of the American population, it drew its enrollees from a section of the

Thesis Statement

A one to two sentence

summary of the main point

of your paper.

Citations

Paraphrased and summarized

information is cited according to APA

style.

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nation that was both in need of relief and young enough to do very physical work, even if it was

questionable whether or not they were healthy enough.

In addition to offering the enrolled men an income, the CCC also met other needs. The

CCC men were housed in camps across the nation, where they received food, clothing and

medical and dental care (Watkins, 2000, p. 160). In addition, educational activities were offered

at many CCC camps and approximately 52% of the enrollees took advantage of them (Watkins,

2000, p. 165). A 1937 Army study of CCC enrollees who had been in the program for several

months showed that the percentage of underweight enrollees decreased by around 35% and the

instance of Tuberculosis was approximately 20% lower in the CCC men than in the

corresponding population in the general public (Maher, 2002, p. 444). Clearly, the men who

participated in the CCC experienced significant physical improvements.

While CCC enrollment was restricted to only men, it was not restricted to only white

men. Racial and ethnic minorities were eligible for the program and many enrolled. During a

period when racial discrimination was endemic, the inclusion of non-whites, especially African

Americans, represented a notable achievement of the Roosevelt Administration (Kennedy, 1991,

p. 378). However, African American men made up only around 7% of total CCC enrollees and

CCC recruiters in the South regularly rejected African American applicants. In addition, the

majority of the CCC camps were segregated, with strictly white or non-white camps. All but two

of the African Americans camps were led by white officers and had many fewer doctors,

teachers and chaplains than did the white camps (Watkins, 2000, p. 167-168). As in the larger

society, “separate but equal” proved to be separate but unequal. Despite the racial segregation

and unequal treatment, non-whites still benefitted from the CCC.

P.I.E

Structure

Point: The

topic sentence

that tells the

reader what

the paragraph

will be about.

Information:

Provides

evidence to

support the

point. Use

examples,

statistics or

other specific

information

here

Explanation:

The author’s

analysis or

conclusion.

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The deployment of millions of men to work in the national parks and forests had a

significant impact on the nation’s physical landscape. As historian T. H. Watkins wrote,

…there is no denying the utilitarian value of a small army of generally

young and healthy men, most of whom were willing to do as told and grateful to

do it, and the Departments of Interior and Agriculture found plenty for them to do

(2000, p. 163).

In the years that CCC was active, 1933 to 1942, the enrollees participated in a huge variety of

projects, like reseeding forests, combatting erosion, and restocking fish. They built picnic tables

and portable toilets as well as museums and amphitheaters (Watkins, 2000, p. 164). So, while

the CCC helped the individual men who participated in the CCC, the nation also benefitted

through material improvements to public lands.

At the same time that the CCC men were participating in conservation and construction

projects, they received substantial on-the-job training, with effects that lasted long after the

program ended. Enrollment in university forestry programs saw a significant increase, fueled

largely by former-CCC enrollees. Many of the CCC enrollees went on to find careers in fields

related to the work they had done in the program, often in federal agencies but also in

conservation organizations that they founded (Maher, 2002, p. 452-3). Historian Neil M. Maher

argues that, “…the Corps’ on-the-job training made numerous converts to the conservationist

cause” (2002, p. 451). These new converts then went on to form an important part of the

conservation movement that emerged in the years after World War II (Maher, 2002, p. 453). The

CCC had significant long-term effects on the men themselves but also on American politics.

Quoted material

 Must be enclosed in quotation marks

 Source of quote must be cited

 Citation must contain page or paragraph number

Block Quote

Quotes of 40 or more

words should be in

block quote format.

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Although only a relatively small percent of Americans directly participated in the Civil

Conservation Corps, the positive effects of the program were substantial on both an individual

and societal level. The CCC enrollees benefitted economically, physically, and professionally,

often translating their experience into careers or lifelong involvement in conservation efforts.

The nation benefitted from the material results of the Corps’ projects. And, the political

landscape was changed by the number of former-CCC participants who embraced the

conservationist ethos. So, while the CCC originally developed to address the problem of

unemployment during the Great Depression, its effects rippled far beyond that and can still be

seen today.

Concluding Paragraph

 Rephrase thesis statement

 Summarize major points

 Do not introduce new information not mentioned earlier

Remember!

You can find tutorials, templates and assistance at the Ashford

University Library and Ashford Writing Center.

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Reference list

Kennedy, D. M. (1999). Freedom from fear [electronic resource] : the American people in

depression and war, 1929-1945 / David M. Kennedy. New York : Oxford University

Press, 1999, Ashford University Library Ebook Collection, EBSCOhost (accessed

December 11, 2014).

Maher, N. M. (2002). A New Deal Body Politic: Landscape, Labor, and the Civilian

Conservation Corps. Environmental History, (3). 435, Available from: JSTOR Journals,

Ipswich, MA. Accessed December 11, 2014.

Watkins, T. (2000). The hungry years: A narrative history of the Great Depression in America.

New York: Henry Holt Publishing.

Reference List

 All sources of information used in the paper are listed here, according to

APA style.

 Any source cited in the paper must be listed here

 Only sources cited in the paper should be listed here.