The first Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) camp in Florida was established in Eastport near Jacksonville on this date in 1933. The CCC was a federal worker-relief program designed to get young men working on construction and conservation projects throughout the United States, as part of the New Deal. Over the course of the program (1933–1942) over 3 million young men worked for the CCC. In Florida the work done by the CCC established a number of state parks, including Suwannee River State Park, Myakka River State Park, and Highlands Hammock State Park. The CCC workers built picnic facilities, operations buildings, fences, roads, and other forms of infrastructure in order to make the parks more available and accessible to the public.
~Florida Historical Society
