Step Back in Time

Virtual Exhibit

Step Back in Time and Experience Life at CCC Camp Needmore!

In 2020-2021, staff at the Carter County Museum digitized the CCC Camp Needmore Archive and it was recently accepted for inclusion on the Montana History Portal. More than 25,600 men from Montana enlisted in the Civilian Conservation Corps; over 48,800 worked in the state’s 24 camps. CCC projects in western Montana were involved in forestry where Glacier National Park saw much work. Combating soil erosion received more emphasis in eastern Montana. In South Dakota, projects included fire prevention, reforestation, and developing recreational facilities. In the summer of 1935, a federal program funded the construction of a CCC camp south of Ekalaka, that housed nearly 200 young men, working at fencing, forest thinning, building forest trails, spring development, and other projects to improve the value of the Ekalaka division of the Custer National Forest.

It was a CCC Camp from 1935-1936 and 1940. On October 11, 1940, it was returned to the Forest Service and taken over by American Legion Post #60 in 1946. Carter County assumed management of the lease in the 1970s and completed many necessary repairs in 1975. Since then it has hosted 4H camps, family reunions, football camps, visitors and hunters.