Burns Sites

From 1934 to 1942, CCC Camp Gap Ranch operated in Harney County under the direction of the US Grazing Service, the precursor to the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). Enrollees at this 200-person Civilian Conservation Corps provided labor on projects designed to manage range land. As noted in a BLM brochure, this included building range improvements such as fences and reservoirs, drilling wells, building roads, and cutting large quantities of juniper posts for fencing projects. CCC Camp Gap Ranch (DG-5) was one of seven Civilian Conservation Corps camps established in Oregon to work with the US Grazing Service in the implementation...

In the  winter of 1935, members of Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) #1629 began construction of camp administrative and barracks buildings near Squaw Butte to facilitate CCC work related to the 16,000 acre Squaw Butte Federal Experimental Range Station. Today some of those building survive to support work at the North Great Basin Experimental Range Station and continued research on the ecology and  management of rangelands. CCC Company #2504 arrived in October 1936 to further the work associated with the Squaw Butte Experiment Station and its efforts to improve grazing conditions in this very dry, sagebrush area of Harney County, Oregon. The...

This structure was constructed with WPA help, but did not receive sought-for PWA funding: "Forty years later, the November 4, 1938 Burns Times-Herald called the courthouse “antiquated poorly arranged.” Voters were deciding whether the county should construct a new $100,000 courthouse, with 45 percent of the cost to be paid by the federal Public Works Administration (PWA). With such largess, the issue passed, and the county judge immediately traveled to Portland to present a request to the PWA official. But the PWA refused the request; later newspaper accounts blamed either incomplete plans or that the county’s part of the funding...

Originally installed in the Burns post office, this mural was one of the Treasury Section's 48-State Post Office Competition murals. "New Deal mural entitled "Cattle Round-Up" painted by Jack Wilkinson in 1941. When a new post office was built in the early 90's, the mural was moved to the 2nd floor court room in the Harney County Courthouse." (flickr)

The federal Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) worked to develop southeast Oregon's Malheur National Wildlife Refuge during the 1930s. "The Refuge was expanded on February 21st, 1935 to incorporate the 164,503 acre Blitzen Valley. The Blitzen Valley was purchased using funds made available under provisions of the Act for the Relief of Unemployment through the Performance of Useful Public Works and the National Industrial Act as established under Executive Order 7106 signed by Franklin D. Roosevelt, July 19th, 1935. Between April and July, 1935 three CCC camps were established on Malheur refuge to fulfill that purpose." (www.fws.gov) The CCC built refuge buildings as well...

As noted on the sign for the Northern Great Basin Experimental Range today, the research station was "established in 1936, (and) dedicated to research on the ecology and management of rangelands." At its inception, the research facility was known as the Squaw Butte Federal Range Experiment Station. The project was a joint effort of the Grazing Service of the Department of Interior and researchers from Oregon State University to address issues of range and livestock management. The federal Taylor Grazing Act of 1934 had brought Western public domain lands together in an effort to stabilize the livestock industry and improve range...