The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1935-08-23
JUsTIFYING THE COST OF THE
C.C.C. CAMPS-PART III
BY H. G. Buckingham
District Forester

Director of Emergency Conservation
Work, covering the first three
periods, it is estimated that the
value of all the types of projects
completed by the 100000 enrollees
in the C.C.C. is approximately $780,
100000. The cost for this period is
approximately $4,000, 1000. The
average monthly cost to run a camp
is $14,285. Obviously, the value of
the area worked is not being increas-
ed in proportion to the expenditure.
The wisdom of the outlay of funds
for certain types of work cannot be
determined for many years as the
ultimate value is dependent upon flu
ture development. Other benefits
derived from the manipulating aspect
of this great relief measure have in
tangible values which must not be
under-estimated Yet, there are
some projects such as road building
and stand improvement work where
VALUES are ClGdS6uJ anu IhC
results can be established now.
During the fire seasons in the fall
of 1888 and the spring of 1884, the
C.C.C. men were directly responsible
for a reduction of at least so 20 in
the area burned The spring season,
especially the first week of May, was
very severe and it is hard to estimate
what the loss might have been had
these extra fire fighters not been
control has been done which will
tend to alleviate the future fire risk
in our mountainous section.
Fire breaks are constructed pri-
marily as lines of defense in case of
fire. They also serve as trails in
some instances, and will be used as
boundaries of b-compartments in
the managing of the forest. In the
camps in Western Maryland, a policy
was adopted whereby the forest was
subdivided into blocks of from thirty
to fifty acres each depending upon
the topography and existing roads
and trails. On May 1894, one of the
most critical fire days in recent years,
a series of fires were set along the
base of a rough timbered slope
These fires soon united on a common
front and spread with tremendous
rapidity.. No water for direct con-
troll was available, but with the rate
of spread it is doubtful if the blaze
could have been controlled by that
method. A crew of twelve men fell
back to a previously constructed fire
break, backfred, and controlled the
fire on a sixty acre block Had this
fire break not been constructed, il is
quite probable that the fire would
have spread over at least thousand
acres and the loss would have been
CORRESPONDENCE great. Fire break
construction must be carried on in
such manner that maintenance is
kept as low as possible, yet in an
emergency with minimum of work
it can be used to the greatest advant-
age.
According to "The Forestry News
wooded area increases the money
yield by two and half times. On
the majority of the forest land under
state administration there. is little
merchantable timber. Much of the
land was cut over previous to state
acquisition. Stand improvement con-
sists of cultural operations in which
green material is removed in order
to improve the composition, distribu-
ton, and form of the existing stand.
In the past, there have been many
cases where stand improvement work
should have been done. Inasmuch
as there were no funds available and
that the products removed would not
pay the operating costs, this valuable
work was not done
OIdHu improvements, WlCn disease
and insect control and reduction of
fire hazards, required six and a
quarter man days per acre. In this
work $1,308. worth of timber
products were removed and sold,
Costly, yes, but justified in planning
for the future, for the quality of the
next crop in about twenty years will
yield far greater returns than would
have been possible otherwise, and an
infection center for surrounding
healthy timber is eliminated. Ger
tainly on such an area it is not out of
reason to accept The News Digest's
estimate of the increase in value by
cultural operations wisely carried
out.
Undoubtedly, we are dealing with
a long time investment where results