cCc Camps Archives | New Deal Stories

New Deal Era Dead Records Slated for the Salt Mines

The National Archives’ massive collection of New Deal era records, including the cherished Civilian Conservation Corps (RG35) documents, is embarking on a historic move.

color image of shelves metal with boxes of archived records, left side of image shows the rough carved out limestone walls in Federal Reserve Center salt mines NARA Lexana KS — New Deal Era Dead Records Slated for the NARA Salt Mines similar to the Federal Records Center in Lexana, Kansas. NARA

Ever wonder about those old New Deal era records that were turned over to the National Archives by various government agencies for a Preliminary Inventory (PI) when their programs ended in 1942?

One of those vintage collections is Record Group (RG) RG35 containing agency Records of the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC). The CCC was initially named Emergency Conservation Work (ECW); the program was commonly and later (1937) officially known as the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), the name under which they are cataloged.

The files in RG35 may be over nine decades old but they remain a fascinating and insightful collection of Great Depression documents, letters, appeals, CCC camp inspections, investigations, visuals and dispatches from the first, longest-lasting, and most popular of the 60 New Deal agencies, the CCC. They may be vintage, but they are far from forgotten by history enthusiasts, genealogists, and researchers alike.

New Deal Records Unavailable

In early November 2024, a research request was sent to the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) in College Park, Maryland, for Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) camp Inspection Reports found in Record Group RG 35. The reply was unexpected – the RG 35 stack is closed and slated to be moved to the NARA Federal Records Center in Kansas City, Missouri. Unfortunately, the records will be unavailable until 2025.

Disappointing? Yes. But there’s more to this story and the New Deal era collections.

What can be established is that thousands of New Deal era textual records, deemed inactive, will be stored offsite deep beneath the Kansas and Missouri prairies in one of NARA’s underground man-made limestone caves, much like the subterranean storage facility in Lenexa, Kansas pictured above. The caves are within driving distance of the Kansas City NARA and, good news for researchers, parking is free.

A complete listing of the RGs moving to the salt mines is listed on the NARA website titled “What’s New For Researchers” for October 2024.

composite image of items found in RG 35 CCC Inspections Reports — A composite image of documents found in RG 35 NARA, Entry 115, the CCC Inspection Reports. Many folders contain more than just the standard reports. Inspectors would often include news reports, photos, announcements, brochures inviting community involvement and a sampling of items that would enhance and compliment their CCC camp inspection reports. ©2024KathleenDuxbury

The Custodial Why, How, and Where of New Deal Era Records

This news was confirmed in conversations with the acknowledged go-to source and expert for all things New Deal at the College Park NARA, Eugene Morris. What follows is the gist of our correspondence, beginning with:

“Gene, what’s happening?” Say it ain’t so. What Record Groups are moving in 2025? Is there a list?.. . Also, WPA, the work projects and art programs (microfilm, photographs & textural). Are the New Deal records being moved?

Gene answered …

It mostly has to do with the fact that the New Deal era records are mature, dead records (nothing new coming in). They don’t require a lot of additional work. They don’t have PII or restricted information.

Stack 530* is being taken over by the Presidential Libraries unit, so everything in there has to move out, either elsewhere in the building or to KC. The New Deal cluster of records, RG 35 (CCC), RG 69 (WPA), RG 114, (NYA) and RG 135 (PWA) are all slated to move to KC. This will probably happen in the March to May of next year.
*Stack 530 is a very large room with 50+ rows of movable shelving in it. It’s being taken over by the Presidential Libraries unit to house records and items from the Trump and Biden administrations until their respective libraries/museums are up and running. Then it will continue to provide that service to subsequent administrations.

CCC records in other RG’s will still be here, like RG 79 (Park Service), RG 95 (Forest Service)… RG 407 and the little bit in RG 121.

…the special media, the records in Still Pictures, Motion Pictures and Cartographics, will remain here in College Park.

The records should only be closed for 6 to 8 weeks. The year I mentioned is the time it will take to get a staffer familiar enough with the records to do good reference work.

Some material in Stack 530 is not being moved to KC and is being moved to other stacks here. Because we’re so strapped for space, that means some records in those other stacks* will move to KC to make room for the records from Stack 530.

Building new buildings is expensive. Digging out a chunk of an old salt mine in suburban Kansas City and framing rooms inside is much cheaper. We have had “caves” in Lenexa and Lee’s Summit, Missouri for 25+ years. Both sites are roughly 30 minutes to an hour’s drive from our KC branch.
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New Deal records research will become more challenging. Perhaps, the National Archives’ ongoing digitization initiatives will prioritize these popular RG35 New Deal era records slated for the salt mines. As technology becomes available perhaps scans of these records will be considered for inclusion in their online catalog given its historical significance.

It stands to reason demand will grow for digital access to these and other archival New Deal records once the highly anticipated release of the digitized Civilian Conservation Corps Individual Records of Employment, Form No. 1 are freely uploaded and made available to the National Archives Catalog before the end of 2024.

The research and New Deal stories continue.

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NOTES:
Image: Lexana, Ks Federal Records Center, The National Archives Goes Underground, Spring 2016, Vol. 48, No. 1 | The Historian’s Notebook
By Jessie Kratz

Presidents Birthday Ball – Eradicating Polio

“No single agency, whether it be the doctor, the hospital or the research laboratory, can cope individually with this great problem; we can do it only by joining our efforts.” FDR 1936

On January 30, 1934, a majestic full moon illuminated the winter sky from Campobello Island to Hawaii and Alaska to the Virgin Islands. A stimulating setting for the young and old, the rich and poor, all those who came out, en masse, in formal and informal attire to attend the first of the Presidents Birthday Balls.

During one of the cruelest periods of the Great Depression, the social elite and the average citizen would gather, nation-wide, from coast to coast and border to border for a noble purpose. One that honored the new president, but also created an endowment through which the Georgia Warms Springs Foundation could battle a decades old scourge, polio.

In the White House that evening President Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR), who was in the first year of his administration as the 32nd US President, was surrounded by an intimate group of friends and family. Together they celebrated his fifty-second birthday, but this birthday and how it would be honored in the years to come, would be different.

In 1934, the mineral-charged waters of Warm Springs, Georgia worked a magic spell over those who suffered from the disease. The hope then was buoyed by the idea that celebrating the presidents birthday, in a fund raising way, might create a permanent legacy to treat as many patients as the natural thermal springs could accommodate and hopefully find a cure.

What began as parties to benefit the Georgia Warm Springs Foundation would, decades later, result in the creation of an effective inoculation, one that could eliminate the disease of poliomyelitis, thereby benefiting millions all over the world.

Radio Introduction Interrupted

Having fundraising “birthday balls” came at the suggestion of Col. Henry L. Doherty, business magnate and political ally of FDR’s. Doherty made a $25,000 donation to launch the National Committee for Birthday Balls and became its first chairman. Doherty would also recommend that the president make a live radio address with a personal message of thanks; a broadcast that would be heard in the auditoriums, ballrooms, halls and Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) camps hosting the celebrations. As the national committee chairman, Doherty, would have the distinct honor of introducing the president over the airwaves. This radio announcement would not be without some pre-broadcast drama.

Shortly before stepping up to the microphone Doherty was unexpectedly interrupted, a “process server” strode forward and served him with legal papers, a summons regarding a lawsuit filed the previous July. This intrusion appears to have had no adverse effect on the mission to introduce the president, and Doherty, who was no stranger to lawsuits, would continue as the National Committee for Birthday Balls chairmen.

Radio Brought the President to the Party

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CCC Art – Solving the Mysteries

Solving the mystery of CCC Art and its origins sometimes happens when you least expect it.

It is an exciting research day when one of the mysteries surrounding CCC Art can be solved, especially if you weren’t looking for it.

A component of the first federal government sponsored fine art programs, the Public Works of Art Project (PWAP) included depictions of the government work programs, the most popular being the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC). Artists, who were considered roving artists, were briefly sent into camps to make a pictorial record of the life and work.

Leland Roger Gustavson (1899-1966) was one of these roving and prolific PWAP artists. Gustavson was sent to several CCC camps during the harsh winter months of January and February 1934.

In its March 24, 1934 edition, HAPPY DAYS the unofficial national newspaper of the CCC included a front page report and photograph on the PWAP CCC art projects.

Until recently the identity of the CCC boy and the camps where Gustavson’s CCC art was created was long ago lost to history.

Continue reading “CCC Art – Solving the Mysteries”