Welcome to the Southern Region
- Introduction
& Overview - Map of the
Southern Region - Doing Business With
The Forest Service - Weeks Act
Centennial - Strategic
Framework
In 2008 the Southern Region celebrated the 75th Anniversary of the Civilian Conservation Corps.
From 1933 to 1942, the enrollees of the Civilian Conservation Corps worked on our National Forests planting millions trees, building thousands of miles of roads, constructing beautiful administrative and recreational facilities (many of which we still use and enjoy today), and fighting wildland fires.
In essence, the CCC “boys” (as they call themselves), constructed and/or planted the majority of our Forest Service infrastructure in the Southern Region. More than half of all National Forest lands in the Southern Region were purchased during the CCC era. It is doubtful that these mostly cut-over and burned-over lands would have been purchased for the Forest Service if it had not been for the available labor of the CCC enrollees. They were our region’s first wildland firefighters, and they spent countless hours educating local residents about the Forest Service’s vision of a beautiful forest in the “lands that nobody wanted”. We owe them a tremendous debt.
These former CCC enrollees are members of what has been recently called “the Greatest Generation”. In 1942 most of the enrollees went on to fight in WWII. Those that are still with us are in their late 80s and 90s, and this 75th anniversary will be the last major anniversary of the CCC that they will personally witness.
Nationally, from 1933 to 1942 these dedicated young men:
- planted over 3 billion trees;
- built 63,000 buildings, 47,000 bridges, 7600 dams, 8000 wells, 3470 fire towers, and 97,000 miles of road;
- expended more than 4,235,000 man-days on fighting fires.
In essence, they created more than $2 billion in infrastructure -- much of which we still use today. This video presentation is our attempt to honor these men whose legacy lives on.
You can also download the movie by right-clicking on this link and then choosing
"Save Target As..." from the context menu. The movie is in Windows Media format (.wmv) and its size is about 95 MB.