Roosevelt’s ‘Tree Army’ Helped Build Preserves

By Marni Pyke Daily Herald Staff Writer

Among the many programs of the New Deal, the Civilian Conservation Corps was one of those closest to President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s heart.

“It is my belief what is being accomplished will conserve our national resources, create future national wealth and prove of moral and spiritual value,” he wrote in the introduction to a Civilian Conservation Corps handbook.

Roosevelt’s “Tree Army” ended up employing more than 500,000 young men, who worked in camps across the nation for about $30 a month. They developed parks, planted trees and undertook irrigation and reservoir projects.

They also played a significant role in the growth of DuPage County’s forest preserves.

Three Civilian Conservation Corps camps sprung up in DuPage at McDowell Grove and Fullersburg Woods forest preserves and in Elmhurst. A fourth in the suburbs was in St. Charles.

At McDowell Grove in Naperville, workers built bridges over the West Branch of the DuPage River, picnic shelters and a limestone dam, according to district records.

The extra manpower transformed Fullersburg Woods in Oak Brook. Corps members built the visitors center and several shelters. They also contributed to the adjoining Graue Mill site, constructing a concrete dam and rebuilding the millrace, the waterway that operates the mill.

Other projects included dams, tree planting and dredging a lake at Herrick Lake Forest Preserve.

mpyke@@dailyherald.com

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