Hopewell Furnace National Historic Site held an Civilian Conservation Corps encampment Saturday to kick off National Park Week.
The event at the Union Township site featured reenactors in period attire conducting programs and demonstrations highlighting the role the CCC played in restoring Hopewell Furnace and its impact nationwide during the Great Depression.
Activities included mock CCC enlistment procedures, woodcutting and branding demonstrations, guided ranger tours through the encampment along with activities related to National Junior Ranger Day.
The CCC, a work-relief program established by President Franklin Roosevelt in 1933, offered manual labor jobs to unemployed, single young men. Its work focused on conservation and development of government-owned rural land, including national parks. The program operated until 1942.
Hopewell Furnace, which preserves the late 18th- and early 19th-century setting of an ironmaking community, was establshed as a national historic site in 1938.
Source: Berkshire mont