Utahns still benefit from 1930s work corps

But more than money was given to the state. The corps' work curbed flooding and erosion in the mountains, improved rangelands for ranchers, killed crickets for farmers, built more than 4,000 miles of new roads and provided hiking trails, campgrounds and other recreational facilities for Utah residents. Almost as important, the camps, equipment and staff of the corps created an infrastructure for the war effort, making it easy to mobilize combat-ready troops soon after the attack on Pearl Harbor.

In 1989, Myron Gale of St. George wrote to the Deseret News that he was headed for a life of crime before he learned of the CCC. In 1933 his father was jobless and did whatever work he could to feed his seven children. Gale said he couldn't find any way to help his family or pay for any of the things teenagers care about like new shoes or taking girls on dates. Nearing a point of desperation, Gale began pondering ways of getting money unlawfully. Working for the CCC provided him with $5 a month plus $25 that went home to his family.

Eldon Schoonover's family all worked in coal mines in Ohio before the Depression. During the 1930s the mines could only afford to be open one day a week. Desperate for a better life for himself, Schoonover joined the corps and moved to Pleasant Grove where he learned rock masonry and carpentry — skills that allowed him to find gainful employment. He also met his wife of 62 years during his weekend trips to Pleasant Grove's drug store. The jobs he got after the CCC eventually helped him find work at Geneva Steel, where he worked for 33 years.

Historian Beth Olsen, also from Pleasant Grove, said the $25 a month received from each of her two brothers in the corps allowed her family to have a good Christmas one year. She and her brother received roller skates, the biggest gift either had ever recieved.

Most Utahns live near or drive past CCC accomplishments daily whether they know it or not.

High above Davis and Utah counties, the men dug terraces into the mountainside to stop erosion and mudslides that resulted from overgrazing and general misuse of the mountains. From the earliest settling of the West until 1933, more than 700 million acres of forest had been destroyed nationally and 300 million acres of farmland lay wasted due to overuse and poor management. Many rangelands had been overgrazed or were also suffering the effects of erosion or pests. Until the CCC, Olsen wrote in a 1994 article about the corps, there had never been an organized group large enough to tackle the overwhelming task of setting back nature's time clock.

Nationally the corps replanted millions of trees, earning the nickname "Roosevelt's Tree Army." In Utah alone, almost 3.3 million trees were replanted. Re-seeding and re-vegetation projects improved more than 214,000 acres of rangeland, and 423 small dams were built to improve the collection of water for human use including the beginnings of Deer Creek Dam. By 1939 crews had built 700 miles of mountain terraces along the Wasatch Front.