It was 1935, the
height of the Great Depression, Jane
Hobson’s father, Fred Hobson, was an education advisor, stationed at the
Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) camp at Fort Macon. He was courting her
mother, who was back home in Leaksville, NC. His letters home and the material
he saved provide a look into life on Bogue Banks at that time. We thank our
neighbor Jane Hobson for sharing this material with the Pine Knoll Shores
History Committee. The letters, together with related photos and papers,
started a research effort to learn more about the CCC on Bogue Banks.
Company 432, Civilian
Conservation Corps, Camp SP-1, Fort Macon, Bogue Banks, NC
The impact of the Great Depression was
severe nationally, but it was even more so in North Carolina. In 1933, gross
farm income was only 46 percent of its 1929 level. Consequently, the banking
community, which was closely linked to the farming community, also grew weaker
and more desperate, and the absence of credit for farmers and industry
compounded an already miserable situation. Manufacturing activity declined by a
third from its peak in 1929. Mass unemployment had become increasingly
widespread across the state and nation. By 1933, in North Carolina, 27 out of
every 100 persons were on relief; mountain and coastal regions were hardest
hit. Even those who had jobs experienced a 25% decrease in income.
Franklin Roosevelt was elected
President in 1932 on a platform that included many new programs to relieve the
stress of the Depression. Few states were willing to accept wholeheartedly the
liberalism of the New Deal's revolutionary programs, and North Carolina was no
exception. The legislature, dominated by farmers and conservative businessmen,
were determined to both resist Roosevelt's advanced social agenda and maintain
a balanced state budget. Nevertheless, several New Deal initiatives had wide
influence in North Carolina.[i]
One prime example is the Civilian
Conservation Corps (C.C.C.) which began in 1933 and ended 1942. A program
created to give young men a chance for an income and productive work when jobs
were scarce. It eventually enrolled
over three million. Participants
enlisted for six-month intervals and were able to serve up to two years. At the
camps, the young men, in some cases WW I veterans, were provided three meals a day,
uniforms and a place to sleep. Management staff of army officers and
educational advisers ran the camp. The pay rate was $30 a month, with $25 of
that sent home to families and dependents of the enlisted men.[ii]
The first two months of an enlistee’s life
was served at an Army base for initial training, conditioning and discipline.
An initial 48-man detachment came to Fort Macon in 1934 and lived in a tent
camp. As barracks and other support buildings were erected, the camp eventually
housed 234 corpsmen, officers and instructors. The camp also hired 22 local
skilled employees at its peak.
Class Picture, CCC Co 432, 1935,
Complements Paul Branch & NC State Archives
Fred Hobson, 3rd
row, white shirt, pith helmet on right
North Carolina had 66 CCC camps during the
program’s existence. [iii] As a
company’s tasks were completed, the company along with its facilities and equipment
were moved to a new location. To facilitate this movement, the barracks and
other buildings were “de-mountable”; they could be dis-assembled and re-erected
in a new location. Corpsmen moved them from place to place.
The barracks camp at Fort Macon was set up south of the current Coast
Guard Station and the park ranger maintenance area, near the ocean, on land
that no longer exists, reclaimed by the sea.
Photo
by Fred Hobson, 1935
In a letter home postmarked March 12, 1935,
Fred Hobson having just arrived in camp, gives his first impressions:
Well, I hardly
know where to begin to describe this place. It is something what I thought a
South Sea Island might be ‘cept there aren’t any Palms. . .The camp is located
near the site of old Fort Macon which is on the point of the island and the
fort once stood guard over the inlet leading into Beaufort & Morehead City.
. .There is a sort of romantic air floating about — My room is just about 20
yards from the surf which seems to produce some kind of a symphonic
arrangement. The sand is deep and continually shifting from one place to
another. If you’ll send your Kodak I’ll get some pictures.
Fortunately for us, the future Mrs. Hobson
(Miriam Tuttle) sent the Kodak two weeks later, on March 24, and Fred was able
to provide photos (See photos above.) as well as more detailed discussions of
the goings-on at camp:
 |
| Camp Education Advisoer patch |
"My program: I
like most of it. Of course there is a lot that I don’t know and cannot do,
i.e., the technical part. . . I’m not expected to do all of the teaching .... See,
it is a funny and peculiar system, odd, too. I have to convince others to do
the instructional services without pay. Sometimes it is an officer, or an
enrollee (CCC boy), or an expert who is stationed here as a foreman or
consulting engineer on the project."
In the March 24th letter, Fred
also rendered a map to help Miriam visualize the camp and surrounding area.
Rendering
by Fred Hobson, 1935, complements of Jane Hobson
Accompanying the letters home and the Kodak
moments, Fred included copies of the camp newspaper.[iv]
In addition to construction skills, the CCC provided opportunities for the
enrollees to gain experience in other areas. Many CCC camps had a periodical
written and published by the corpsmen, documenting camp activity from their
perspectives. Some were simple one-page newsletters, and others were more
professional looking printed newspapers. The Fort Macon Company 432 publication
was of the latter type. The Sand Dune
Echo was published semi-monthly and contained news on the projects, social activities
and sporting events and personnel changes as well as jokes, poems and stories
by campers, and advertising from local businesses. Some issues included a list
of the fellows’ nicknames.
Complements of Jane Hobson
An article in the September 11, 1934, issue,
described camp activities: “Co. 432 is building a camp
site, working on a road, reconstructing a fort, anchoring sand dunes, draining
old roads and fighting mosquitoes at night and sand fleas all day.”
Following is an editorial written by a corpsman
reporter in the same issue:
“On Going to Town”
It is
a fact that . . . some of the fellows go to town and allow themselves to be
influenced too much by the use of intoxicating dopes. This does not mean that
every one participates in such but it must be said that a few do allow
themselves to become in an unpleasant and degrading condition by the use of
strong drinks. This is not a part of the program of the Civilian Conservation
Corps!
The September 11, 1934, issue contained a
story about a visit home:
ROBERSON COUNTY BOYS ENJOY TRIP HOME
The long looked for day had
arrived at last. The boys from Roberson County were going home. About 3:30 on
the afternoon of Aug. 31, we left Fort Macon. After a long unexciting ride we
arrived at Lumberton at 9:30 p. m. of the same day. The CCC boys were overjoyed
at being home once more. The boys had been away for six long weeks and
home was welcomed.
After spending Saturday and
Sunday at home we began to think about camp once more. We wanted to get back
but hated to leave home again.
On Monday p. m. about six
o'clock we left Lumberton bound for Morehead City. On the way back the main
topic of conversation was the activities and doings while we were at home.
Girls, parties and parents were the most discussed topics.
After we got to Warsaw we
got on the wrong road and had to turn around and come back to Warsaw. This was
galling to us because by this time we were becoming tired of riding. Soon we
came to Jacksonville and here we stopped and bought hot dogs, candy, ice cream
and drinks. We rested here quite a while.
After leaving Jacksonville
we came to a dirt road which impeded our progress. "Cotton Top" furnished
amusement along here. He seemed to be happy and every one entered into the
spirit of the occasion.
When we got to Swansboro we
began looking for the lights of Morehead City. It seemed to us that we would
never reach Fort Macon again.
About 12:30 o'clock Tuesday
a.m. we arrived at the Atlantic Beach Casino. We had gone hardly 100 yards down
the beach before the truck mired down, Mr. Merle, the driver, decided that he
could not make it to Fort Macon. We dived out and walked the four miles to Fort
Macon and arrived here at 2 o'clock a. m. Tired and sleepy we went to bed and
dream of home.
The CCC camp at Fort Macon in the mid 1930s
was a “big deal” for Bogue Banks and the surrounding communities. In 1935, when
Fred Hobson was stationed at CCC, Fort Macon, the camp, was the major
population center on Bogue Banks. The full-time population of Atlantic Beach
was no more than a handful. Day visitors and short-term renters enjoyed the pavilions,
bathhouses, dance halls and refreshment stands, but when the summer ended, few
permanent residents remained.
Five miles west of Atlantic Beach, Alice
Hoffman had her home and the support staff she employed. By the mid 1930s, the
economy and her personal declining wealth had curtailed her business activities
significantly. A census would have found perhaps five people there. Six miles
beyond the Hoffman complex was the settlement of Salter Path with approximately
25 families—100 people. The path ended at the west side of the settlement. Beyond
was unpopulated wilderness. So, the 230 members of the CCC camp more then doubled
the Bogue Banks population.
In order to renovate the Fort, the CCC finished
and paved with compacted clay the road from the Atlantic Beach Circle to the
Fort.
 |
| 1935, looking east to Fort Macon, NC State Archives |
At the time, this was the only improved road
on Bogue Banks and probably contributed to the early real estate developments
west of the circle.
The camp brought new money to the community
during a bleak period in the form of funds spent locally by the fellows and
staff, supply and equipment purchases as well as the hiring of local
construction experts.
In October 1935, Company 432 completed its assigned activities and was moved
to Laurinburg, North Carolina for a new assignment. During their stay they
completed the road from Atlantic Beach, cleaned out the fort and cleared the
surrounding grounds, made repairs to stabilize the structure, restored the
interior of some of the casemates to civil war era style, and built some
rudimentary park facilities. Over the
years while the fort was not in use several feet of sand had filled the moat
and fort itself, removing all this by shovel and wheel barrel was a major task.
Once the moat was restored they also cleared the culvert and gate system that
extended north to the sound, thus allowing the moat to once again be flooded.[v]
The Civilian Conservation Corps work left Fort Macon as the first developed
State Park in North Carolina and to this day it remains the most visited park
in the system.
1935 was a notable year in
the Hobson family history. In discussions with Jane Hobson explains, “ My
parents were married on August 31, 1935. Dad had been at the CCC camp here for
about 6 months. From his letters, it is obvious he is anxious about where he and
mother would be after their marriage, and possible living arrangements, as I'm
sure she was as well. Many of his letters mentioned rumors of the camp
closing and moving to one of several locations, with various dates mentioned.
Some of them were thought to be pretty inhospitable, with no nearby towns
where he and mother could live. Only three days before he left camp to
drive to their wedding on August 31 did he find out. He wrote in his 8/27
letter to her: "News!!! General orders Co. 432 to move to Laurinburg N.C.
as soon as possible after Sept. 1 - The camp is already set up over there and
all we have to do is move in and start to work. I don't think that you
will get to live in Morehead at all - certainly not more than two or three
days." Since the letters stopped when the marriage began, I don't
know much of anything about the next four years of life with the CCC camps.
I do know they lived in Laurinburg, Monroe, Newton, and Washington (NC).”
Fred Hobson’s letters home
provide us a glimpse into life on Bogue Banks 80 years ago, and led Jane and
her husband, F.W.Boring, to select this “South Sea Island . . .without palms”
for their home.
The depression era activity was just the beginning of Federal influence on Bogue Banks, soon WW II was underway. see "WW II on Bogue Banks"
The depression era activity was just the beginning of Federal influence on Bogue Banks, soon WW II was underway. see "WW II on Bogue Banks"
Post Author: Walt Zaenker
To contact the author or the History Committee
The author thanks Paul Branch, Park Ranger, Historian of
Fort Macon State Park for lengthy discussions during which he shared his vast
knowledge of the background and history of the Park, the CCC, and Bogue Banks.
His publications include The Siege of Fort Macon (1982), Fort Macon: A history
(1999), Fort Macon – Images of America (2013)
[i]
Great Depression, by
Douglas Carl Abrams and Randall E. Parker, 2006, NCpedia
[ii] Library of Virginia, 800 East
Broad Street, Richmond, Virginia 23219-8000
http://catalog.crl.edu/search/Y?SEARCH=Sand+Dune+Echo&searchscope=1
[iii] Works Projects in North Carolina, 1933-1941. North Carolina State Archives, Raleigh, NC, USA.
[iv]
The Center for Research Libraries, Digital Delivery System, has some issues
on-line, https://dds.crl.edu/crldelivery/13727
[v] “Fort
Macon, a history”, by Paul Branch, The Nautical & Aviation Publishing Co,
1997