Civilian Conservation Corps Camp – Lightning Creek

Camp F-14 Lightning Creek: located 0.7 miles NW on road 288 Companies: 1783V - - 10/17/33-Spring 34 791 - - 4/30/34-Fall 41 The Civilian Conservation Corps was a federal relief program during 1933-1942 that gave jobless men work renovating abused lands. The Army built 48 200-man camps in South Dakota and provided food, clothing, medical care, pay and programs of education, recreation and religion for 23,709 enrollees (single men aged 17-25 who sent $25 of their $30 wage to their families) and war veterans.

Camps and work projects were supervised by another 2834 men. The Office of Indian Affairs ran smaller units for 4554 American Indians. Camp F-14 was part of a national CCC program to renovate forests and build more recreation areas. Work projects, supervised by the USDA Forest Service, included tree thinning, pruning and planting; fire prevention and suppression; rodent, disease and insect control; grazing land improvement and recreational area development.

Veterans from North Dakota and Iowa in Company 1783V devoted most of their time to camp improvement and tree thinning. Enrollees in Company 791 operated sidecamps at Drew and Summit Peak ranger stations, Compton Spring, Billy Hay Pen and Freeland Wells. They built a ranger station, garage roads, several bridges, telephone lines and firetrails and quelled forest fires.

CCs dug wells, built cattle guards and drift fences and developed springs on grazing land, erected erosion control dams and spread grasshopper bait on thousands of acres. Erected in 1991 by CCC Alumni, the South Dakota State Historical Society, the South Dakota Department of Transportation and the Black Hills National Forest.