On Thursday, April 20, 2023 from 7:00 to 8:30 p.m. Old Pueblo Archaeology Center’s Third Thursday Food for Thought presentation will feature “The Civilian Conservation Corps in Southern Arizona and the Creation of a Transformed Landscape” by archaeologist William B. Gillespie.

This free Zoom online program will be held from 7:00 to 8:30 p.m.

The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) is widely recognized as one of the most successful of President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal programs that helped bring the country out of the depths of the Great Depression of the 1930s.  Some 3.5 million unemployed young men enrolled to work outdoors to protect forests, alleviate erosion, and develop the infrastructure of thousands of parks. The CCC was particularly active in southeastern Arizona, with nearly 40 camps, each occupied by approximately 100-200 enrollees, in use at various times between 1933 and 1942.  Several agencies took advantage of CCC work crews to make improvements: The US Forest Service focused on fire prevention and constructing new roads, the National Park Service and Arizona’s Pima County emphasized developing infrastructure for recreation, the newly established federal Soil Conservation Service performed extensive erosion-control work, and the less well-documented Indian Division of the CCC employed many O’odham workers to develop new water sources for livestock. Throughout the parks, forests, and deserts of the region, the legacy of the CCC is still very much in evidence. Guest speaker Bill Gillespie is a retired Coronado National Forest archaeologist.

                To register for the Zoom webinar go to https://us06web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_thTCtZ4TTN2Ie7V-HF7spw. For more information contact Old Pueblo at info@oldpueblo.org or 520-798-1201.