The Sweet Home Ranger District, Willamette National Forest and South Santiam Services will host its third annual Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) alumni picnic on Aug. 26 at Trout Creek Campground.
The public is invited to attend. The events will begin at 1 p.m. and will end after a potluck lunch and reminiscing. Transportation from the Ranger District is available to those who wish to carpool.
From 1933 to 1942, the CCCs, a national relief program, gave jobless young men work. Fifty 200-man camps were built in Oregon. The U.S. Army provided housing, food, clothing, medical care, pay and education programs while the USDA Forest Service provided work, supervision and training in tending and improving forest lands.
Company 2907 built Trout Creek Campground in the mid-1930s. Company 2907, formerly Company 1314, was organized in 1933 and moved to Camp Cascadia on the South Santiam River 22 miles from Sweet Home on June 20, 1934.
While on the Willamette National Forest, Company 2907 built 35 miles of forest road and 80 miles of trails; installed 17 miles of telephone; built six fire lookouts and eight bridges; landscaped four acres of grounds near Cascadia Ranger Station; constructed two large dwellings, one office and one gas and oil station; and constructed House Rock, Fernview and Trout Creek campgrounds. In addition, the men spent more than 7,000 man-days fighting wild fires.
Trout Creek Campground is approximately 18 miles east of Sweet Home on Highway 20. For more information about the picnic on Aug. 26 or to arrange carpool, persons may call Joanne West, Sweet Home Ranger District, at 367-9206 or Jan Wellhouser, South Santiam Services, (541) 466-5511.