He just turned 90, but Tucker had no problem demonstrating part of the exercise routine he followed while working for the CCC in the late 1930s.

"I've kept those exercises up for 90 years and it's been a real help to me," said Tucker, one of several former CCC workers who attended the dedication of an interpretive kiosk near what is now the YMCA's Camp Roger east of Kamas. The ceremony marked the 75th anniversary of the founding of the CCC.

While only a handful of the 22,000 Utahns who served as members of the corps survive today, their legacy lives on in campgrounds, erosion- and flood-control projects, roads, wildlife refuge dikes and trails.

Tucker, a native of Clawson in Emery County, who still plays basketball in the Utah Senior Games, joined the CCC in May 1936 after graduating from high school. He helped build a road over Boulder Mountain and then went to Duck Creek near Cedar Breaks National Monument to build campgrounds. He described the experience as a "good time."

James Carroll, of Heber City, helped build the Balsam Campground and guard station in Hobble Creek Canyon east of Springville before moving to Pineview Reservoir in 1941.

"It was a good organization," said Carroll. "Kids learned a trade like carpentry, driving heavy equipment, blacksmithing or welding. I learned to be a carpenter and worked in Salt Lake."

Bruce Wallace, of North Ogden, now 92, had a different experience. He was sent to Mount Wilson in California to work but when supervisors discovered he could play the bugle, he was put into a band that traveled the state entertaining CCC workers. He ended up getting a music degree at what was then Weber College, singing at more than 3,000 funerals and working in Utah State Library bookmobile program.

Brad Shafer, a special assistant to Sen. Robert Bennett, said CCC members devoted 4.2 million hours to fighting fires, built 3,470 fire towers and 97,000 miles of road for firebreaks, planted more than 3 billion trees in national forests and performed erosion control on more than 20 million acres of land.

Richard West, chief operating officer for the Salt Lake YMCA, said his agency acquired the abandoned CCC camp in the Soapstone Basin in 1948. Three original buildings remain from that era.

"The purpose of the CCC was to get young men, who did not have work, working, build self-esteem and get them back on their feet," he said. "That's what the YMCA is all about, too."

wharton@sltrib.com

What is the CCC?

* The CCC was organized in March and April 1933 when Congress, at the request of President Franklin Roosevelt, passed the Emergency Conservation Work Program.

* The idea behind the CCC was to put young men to work, teaching them skills in a military-like, male-only camp environment.

* CCC workers helped create campgrounds, helped build Ogden Bay waterfowl management area's original dikes, and completed erosion control projects on foothills.

Source: Museumofthesoldier.com The CCC in '35

505,782

Men were enrolled

22,000

Utahns were enrolled

116

CCC camps in Utah