Civilian Conservation Corps Camp - LaCreek

The camp's men built the pools; the swans came later. Company 4723 worked here from May 1937 to the fall of 1939, building levees and planting cover on a refuge established in August 1935 from a marsh and several ranches. The trumpeter swans the 1991 bronze counts arrived after them, in 1960, when the Fish and Wildlife Service moved twenty cygnets here from Red Rock Lakes in Montana, then the species' last major breeding ground. Two pairs nested in 1963, and some 250 swans now winter here.

What the plaque says

Civilian Conservation Corps Camp Camp BF-3: located 1 mile E, 4 miles S, 1 mile W & 5 miles S Company: 4723 May 1937-Fall 1939 The Civilian Conservation Corps was a federal relief program during 1933-1942 that gave jobless men work renovating abused lands. The Army built 48 200-man camps in South Dakota and provided food, clothing, medical care, pay and programs of education, recreation and religion for 23,709 enrollees (single men aged 17-25 who sent $25 of their $30 wage to their families) and war veterans. Camps and work projects were supervised by another 2834 men. The Office of Indian Affairs operated smaller units for 4554 American Indians. Camp LaCreek was part of a national CCC program to develop waterfowl refuges. Supervised by the Bureau of Biological Survey the CCC and WPA developed 9302 acres of LaCreek National Wild- life Refuge from a natural marsh and several ranches. They built levees, roads, boundary fence and an observation tower and planted shrubs, trees, marsh plants and small grains creating 11 pools with water, food and cover for wildlife. Today the 16,410 acres provide habitat for 250 species of birds and 50 other animals. LaCreek is home for thousands of waterfowl, pelicans and, in winter, to 250 trumpeter swans. Twice a year large flocks of migrating birds rest there. White tailed and mule deer, ringnecked pheasants, sharp- tailed grouse and many species of furbearing animals also live and reproduce there. Erected in 1991 by CCC Alumni, the South Dakota Historical Society, the South Dakota Department of Transportation and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

Where it stands