Camp Gap Ranch
Posted by: 
Volcanoguy
N 43° 32.138 W 119° 46.376
11T E 275951 N 4824034
These history signs are located just off U.S. Hwy. 20 about 13 miles east of Riley, Oregon.
Waymark Code: WMAW36
Location: Oregon, United States
Date Posted: 03/01/2011
Views: 3
There are two signs at this location. Both are titled Camp Gap Ranch and the text of both are include below..
Marker Name: Camp Gap Ranch
Marker Text #1: Through the eyes of out-of-work young men from eastern cities, the beautiful and rugged landscape of southeast Oregon was a scene of welcome opportunity providing income, camaraderie, and a new lease on life.
Heaty food, hefty work, and heavy sleep were the daily routine at Camp Gap Ranch. The camp was patterned after military installations run by the US Army, but these men carried hand tools, shovels, and saws rather than weaponds. Corps members labored to build fences and roads, drill wells, and cut juniper fence posts for the US Grazing Service.
Through hard physical labor and team work, the hallmarks of life at Camp Gap Ranch, these men made their mark on the landscape and in the history books.
Marker Text #2: The worn footpaths, rock buildings, and water tower before you are crunbling reminders of a difficult time in our nation’s history - the Great Depression. To address chronic unemployment, President Roosevelt created the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) in 1933 to provide jobs for young men, most from eastern cities. A year later Gap Ranch became a CCC Camp, a bustling home of 200 Corps members, supervisors, and officers.
Gap Ranch already had some buildings, the legacy of the one time cattle ranch owned by Bill Brown. Tents provided the first shelter for enrollees until prefabricated buildings were erected.
The CCC camp operated for eight years, until 1942, just after WWII began and national priorities shifted. Camp Gap Ranch closed. The wooden buildings were dismantaled and moved elsewhere to support the war effort. Men and buildings are gone, but the legacy of CCC remains.
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