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29 M innesota’s ccc enrollees were much like those in other states. Juniors , or “boys,” made up the largest category. Enrollment guidelines stated that each had to be among the “needy unemployed,” unmarried , between the ages of eighteen and twenty-five, a citizen of the United States, and physically fit for manual labor.1 As the program got up and running, some administrative changes were made. On April 22, 1933, less than a month after its organization, the ccc expanded to employ Local Experienced Men (lems). These were the local foremen and the artisans, stonemasons, and craftsmen who helped oversee specialized work programs. Hired to work in the camps, they were allowed to live at home and did not have the same age or marital restrictions as enrollees. They also earned more money. On May 23, Roosevelt issued an executive order allowing needy World War I veterans to enroll in the ccc; he set a limit of 25,000 men and noted that veterans also would not be held to the age or marriage restrictions of junior enrollees. If it were possible to construct a typical Minnesota enrollee, his story would sound something like this:“Jack Smith” was nineteen years old in the late summer of 1934,the oldest of seven children.His father was a blacksmith and subsistence farmer who had been out of work for two years. His mother took in washing when it was available. Without the little food they raised 3: WHO JOINED MINNESOTA’S CCC? themselves, Jack and his family already would have been forced to leave their home. As it was, they were wondering how they were going to make it through the coming winter. When Jack heard about the ccc from the county relief officer, he thought it sounded like a chance to help his family.He signed up and was accepted for a standard six-month enrollment period.In October,having been assigned to work at a state forest camp in northern Minnesota, he received his first monthly paycheck—thirty dollars. Of that, twenty-five dollars was sent to his family and he kept five dollars. His mother wrote him several weeks later to say that the money had helped buy groceries as well as shoes for several of the younger children and that, with money coming in every month, the family hoped to be able to stay on the farm through the winter. “Jack Smith”is not a real person,but his story is based on information collected during oral history interviews. The typical ccc junior enrollee was between seventeen and nineteen years old. He had completed eight years of schooling, was about ten pounds underweight, and was five feet eight inches tall. He was one of six children, typically of white parents, and either had never worked or had been without work of any kind for six months. He stayed in the ccc up to twelve months, ate fifty cents’ worth of food a day, gained ten pounds, and grew half an inch.Alfred “Irv” Nelson described the average enrollee as a “pretty scared” kid. Most, he said, were a lot like him:“I was probably seventeen years old. I had never really been away from home before for any time at all.”2 New enrollees were accepted into the program four times a year: in January ,April,July,and October.Enrollments lasted six months.At first,enrollees could rejoin for just one more period, for a total of twelve months in the ccc. In 1934, during severe drought conditions, the national enrollment goal was raised to 350,000 men; in 1935 it was again enlarged to 600,000 men. In order to meet these larger goals, the upper age limit for junior enrollees was increased from twenty-five to twenty-eight years and enrollees were allowed to remain in the program for three six-month enrollment periods,or one and one-half years,rather than just two enrollment periods.The high point of ccc enrollment was reached in the summer of 1935,when over half a million men were signed on nationally.3 By 1937, as the economy began to improve, eligibility requirements were changed once more. Enrollees no longer were required to be in need of relief or welfare but simply “unemployed and in need of employment.” Age limits were changed again, and enrollees were allowed to reenlist for four full enrollment periods, or up to two years. Using the language of the military, enrollees enlisted...

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