Photo of the Day

In the 1930s, the federal government was the answer to prayers for poor, unemployed young men.

Those between the ages of 17 and 28 could enlist in the Civilian Conservation Corps where they could work, learn new, marketable skills…

…and earn $30 per month, with most of that going to their families.

And they would travel and receive food, clothing, medical care and undergo physical conditioning.

They’d live outdoors in large work camps with people from different parts of the country.

Planting trees on Little Round Top, Gettysburg.

It was a promise of adventure and new possibilities.

Their work was mostly heavy manual labor on rural government property, where they planted trees and built infrastructure.

And after work in some camps, these guys could attend classes.

Art class at a California camp.

Tens of thousands of young men learned how to read and write in these camps.

Black men lived and worked in separate camps. The men in this picture are learning Morse code.

The Army Reserve ran these camps, so these young men got their first taste of the military.

And when the draft began in 1940, camp alumni were inducted, not as privates, but as corporals and sergeants.

FDR with campers in Virginia, 1933.

Three million young men, working in almost three thousand camps scattered across the country, benefited from this government program.

It was a powerful force for good.

And it changed millions of lives for the better.

I’ll see you tomorrow.

— Brenda