Jim Bradshaw: Idaho workers built a St. Martin Park

On a bright, warm Oct. 20, 1933, a special train pulled into the depot at St. Martinville. It carried 75 enrollees of the Civilian Conservation Corps. All of the men were from Idaho and none of them had heard of St. Martinville or its heroine, Evangeline, until very recently. But they had come to the Teche country to build a park named for her and the man who had made her an Acadian legend.
The CCC was a relief program begun in 1932 as part of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal to pull us out of the Great Depression. It provided manual labor for men 18 to 25 years old on rural lands owned by federal, state, or local governments. A handful of Army officers came with the young enrollees as supervisors.
The men had come to build the Longfellow-Evangeline park that had been created by the legislature in 1930 but that had languished as nothing but words on paper since then. Public Service Commissioner Wade O. Martin Sr. had been working almost since the establishment of the CCC to get men to his native St. Martin Parish to turn the park into a reality.
St. Martinville’s Weekly Messenger of Oct. 7 gave the first report that he had succeeded in doing just that. It reported on rumors that a CCC camp was to be established on the land and that the men would then begin work on building the park itself. It said local lumbermen and hardware dealers would be invited to bid on the construction materials.
C.T. Bienvenu, a member of the state park commission, said $18,500 had been set aside to build several permanent buildings, to bring a water supply to the park, and to create a system of walking and riding trails.
The CCC gangs got right to work, and before a month was out showed real progress on the construction — so much progress, in fact, that townspeople started thinking about what else they could do.
After another 113 workers arrived, these from New Jersey, by a special train during the first week in November, a group of citizens put together a petition for the federal Interior Department asking also for a football field, baseball diamond, four tennis courts, and a boat landing on the Teche. They sent a copy of the petition to Martin and he said he would see what he could do.
It turned out that he couldn’t do very much. The dreams were turned down, but the work continued on the originally planned improvements and the CCCers and officers apparently became involved in the community life.
On Thanksgiving 1933 local citizens were the guests at a turkey dinner prepared by the workers and in December the CCC basketball team played St. Martinville High. The CCC team featured two former college players and whipped the local Tigers 38 to 12.
In February 1934, Martin was made Mardi Gras king and the Messenger reported that CCC personnel took part in the local festivities.
(What do you think guys from Idaho wrote home about a Louisiana Mardi Gras?)
Work continued into the fall, but then, suddenly and unexpectedly it stopped. Nobody knew exactly why, but the Messenger reported on Oct. 27, 1934, that CCC Company 277 was leaving St. Martinville to go to work on a park near Winnfield. The fact that Winnfield native Huey P. Long was then at the height of his power in the U.S. Senate may or may not have had something to do with the abrupt change.
But the CCC had accomplished a good deal. An Acadian house at the park had been restored, a new lodge was built, along with picnic shelters, trails and bridges. It was a good start.
A collection of Jim Bradshaw’s columns, "Cajuns and Other Characters," is now available from Pelican Publishing. You can contact him at jimbradshaw4321@gmail.com or P.O. Box 1121, Washington LA 70589.