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CCC Properties listed in the National Register of Historic Places

Twelve African American CCC enrollees sit around tables studying. — The young men of Company 2314-C, Kane, Pennsylvania, study radio code, which enabled them to run the camp's radio station.
Photograph courtesy of the National Archives.

The Wall Street Stock Market Crash of 1929 was the main catalyst that ushered the United States of America into the Great Depression. At the height of the Depression, approximately 24.9% (12,830,000) of Americans were unemployed. Franklin D. Roosevelt won the presidency in 1932 and took office the following year. In 1933, Roosevelt’s administration enacted banking reform laws, emergency relief programs, work relief programs, and agricultural programs. These laws and programs would form the New Deal.

One of the earliest work relief New Deal programs was the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC). The main purpose of the CCC was to alleviate unemployment by providing national conservation work mainly for young unmarried men. Projects ranged from planting trees to building parks, flood barriers, and handling forest fires. At its peak, the CCC had 500,000 men employed at once and provided work for a total of more than 3 million men throughout its nine-year run (1933 – 1942).

Pay rates for the employed men, was left to the president’s discretion and was set at $30 a month, $25 of which went to the enrollee's family. Despite President Roosevelt having control over much of the program, such as with pay, “an amendment outlawing racial discrimination was virtually the only congressional limitation on his authority.” ^[1] During the 1930s, segregation was continued to be deemed appropriate due to the Plessy v. Ferguson ruling of “Separate but Equal” in 1896. Therefore, separate “Colored" CCC camps were set up for young African Americans. By the time the program concluded, there has been approximately 150 camps for the over 200,000 African Americans that had been employed by the CCC.

Native Americans were barred from joining the CCC during the start of the program, but this restriction was lifted within a few weeks of the program’s conception due to the terrible conditions on the majority of reservations. The Office of Indian Affairs within the Department of the Interior handled the Indigenous enrollees and applying the CCC program on reservations. By the end of the CCC program, more than 80,000 Native Americans had participated.

President Franklin Roosevelt is seated at a long table next to other prominent figures. Four men sit to his left and two to his right. Behind the seated men are dozens of CCC enrollees. — President Franklin Roosevelt visited with CCC enrollees at Big Meadows, Skyline Drive, Virginia on August 12, 1933. Seated from left are Maj. Gen. Paul B. Malone, Louis M. Howe, Harold L. Ickes, Robert Fechner, FDR, Henry A. Wallace, and Rexford Tugwell.
Photograph courtesy of the National Archives Catalog.

In 1933, less than three months after the first CCC enrollees were settled at Camp Roosevelt, located in Virginia, 300,000 men from across the country had been enrolled, moved, and settled in about 1,500 camps throughout the U.S. Each camp had a typical capacity of 200 men.

By the end of the program’s fifth year, in 1937, the CCC has established itself as a successful project, garnering enormous public support. At the time of its fifth year, more than halfway through the program’s active years, there were more than 3,500 camps operating. However, the number of camps began to decline in 1938 with 1,500 camps remaining in operation by April 1939. The future of the CCC was determined by the outbreak of World War II and the unemployment crisis easing. In September 1940, the United States began providing military supplies to their allies, which led to a consensus that the CCC’s work should shift toward national defense.

Despite the efforts to modify the CCC to adapt to the shift to supporting national defense, the program was being slowly phased out. As young men left the CCC for better job opportunities, it became harder to recruit replacements. On April 1, 1941, CCC camps were reduced from 1,500 to 1,100. On June 30, 1942, after America’s entry into WWII, Congress voted to liquidate the CCC.

While the CCC program did not last forever, it accomplished so much during its nine years. By the time the CCC program ended, more than 3 million men had served in more than 4,500 camps across the country. The men had planted over 3 billion trees, combated soil erosion and forest fires, occasionally dealt with natural disasters, helped establish hundreds of parks and recreation areas, and was the inspiration for a new program, the American Climate Corps. The American Climate Corps initiative starting in 2023 with a mission to place young people in the clean energy, conservation and climate resilience sectors. In June 2024, the first class of American Climate Corps enrollees were inducted into the program where they will be working in a variety of paid positions through federal, state, and local partnerships. The significance of the CCC’s work has not gone unnoticed, with camps and other properties worked on by the CCC listed on the National Register of Historic Places. This project highlights a few of these sites.

Highlighted CCC Properties Listed in the National Register

Showing results 1-10 of 12

Coolidge State Park
- Type: Place
Coolidge State Park is located in Plymouth, Vermont. The park is named after the 30th president of the United States who was born and sworn into office in the village of Plymouth Notch. Constructed from 1933 through 1941, Coolidge State Park was the third of 21 state parks established by the CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps) in Vermont.
Yosemite National Park
Frog Creek Cabin
- Type: Place
Frog Creek Cabin is located in Tuolumne, California as a part of Yosemite National Park. The cabin was constructed in 1934 by the Civilian Conservation Corps to house seasonal workers for the fish propagation program within Yosemite. The Frog Creek Cabin remains as evidence of the fish egg-collecting operations that once existed on the shore of Lake Eleanor.
Gum Springs Recreation Area
- Type: Place
Gum Springs Recreation Area is located in Winnfield, Louisiana. Gum Springs Recreation Area is a U.S. Government owned public recreation site born originally out of a Great Depression era Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) development project which principally constructed an outdoor swimming pool and picnic area for operation by the United States Forest Service (USFS). The area is a part of the Kisatchie National Forest and cover about 10 acres.
Hard Labor Creek State Park
- Type: Place
Hard Labor Creek State Park is located in Rutledge, GA. The park is one of ten Civilian Conservation Corp (CCC)-built state parks in Georgia and contains the only extant CCC Camp, Camp SP-8, built for the workers. Two CCC camps were located at Hard Labor Creek, SP-8 and SP-11. Their projects included damming Hard Labor Creek and clearing land to create Lake Rutledge and Lake Brantley, building roads and bridges, reforesting land, constructing telephone lines, etc.
Hydaburg Totem Park
- Type: Place
The Hydaburg Totem Park is located in Hydaburg, Alaska. Established in 1939, the park preserves the totemic art of Pacific Northwest Coast Haida people. The park includes 21 totem poles, three carved before 1939 and moved to the site at that time, 16 carved between 1939 and 1942, two carved in 1971 to replace two that were carved before 1939, and one carved stone figure.
Mt. Britton Tower
- Type: Place
Mt. Britton Tower is located in Rio Grande, Puerto Rico. Named in honor of botanist Nathaniel Britton and his wife bryologist Elizabeth Britton, the observation tower was built by the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) in 1937 as the hiking goal for the Mt. Britton Trail. It is representative of the Craftsman/Rustic architectural style used by the CCC in the construction of forest reserves infrastructure during the first half of the program’s existence.
Parque Zaragoza
- Type: Place
Parque Zaragoza in Austin, Texas was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 2022. The property is significant as a gathering space for Austin's Mexican American community since 1931.
State, Tribal, and Local Plans and Grants Division
Red Rocks Park and Mount Morrison Civilian Conservation Corps Camp
- Type: Article
The Red Rocks Park and Mount Morrison Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) Camp is located in Morrison, Colorado. The Red Rocks Park and Mount Morrison CCC Camp is a stellar example of Federal and local government collaborative planning carried out with the manpower of the CCC. The CCC developed public landscapes and advanced outdoor recreation from the mid-1930s until the CCC program ended in 1942.
Sewanee Fire Lookout Tower
- Type: Place
The Sewanee Fire Lookout Tower is located in Sewanee, Tennessee. Built in 1934 by the Civilian Conservation Corps, the tower was constructed as part of the Tennessee Division of Forestry's (TDF) statewide efforts to protect forested land in the state through its fire control program. The CCC was responsible for the construction and operation of the majority of Tennessee's fire lookout towers built in the early twentieth century.
Stone Arch Bridge over McCormick's Creek
- Type: Place
The Stone Arch Bridge over McCormick’s Creek is located in Spencer, Indiana. It is a stone arch bridge that spans McCormick’s Creek above the falls and is a strong example of an arched bridge constructed by the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) in any Indiana State Park.