McCayde Brown

Northwest College sophomore McCayde Brown has had a busy last couple weeks of school, preparing for various finals and graduation. But what’s occupied the Worland High School grad’s mind most this spring has been the large group of letters a Massachusetts man wrote home in the late 1930s from his Civilian Conservation Corps camp outside of Powell. 

Brown’s spring internship with the Homesteader Museum has focused on putting together an exhibit based on the letters of George Moran, a young CCC member who spent nearly a year working on the Willwood project, doing concrete work and even performing wilderness search and rescues. 

The focus on Moran stemmed from discussions with Brown’s history professor Amy McKinney and museum Curator Brandi Wright. 

He decided to investigate and learn more about the Civilian Conservation Corps related to the Shoshone Project and Park County. The CCC Camps in the area were located in Deaver, Willwood (Powell), Heart Mountain, Wapiti (Cody), and Yellowstone National Park where there were several.

Brown said while a lot of history in regard to these projects is fairly basic, such as what was accomplished, a group of letters caught his attention. 

“Having actual personal letters really made this exhibit happen,” Brown said. “Because then I could talk about things way more personal than just like, ‘oh, this is what the CCC was.’”

Homesteader Museum received the letters from Paul Douglass in Knoxville, Tennessee in 2016.

Paul wrote, “My uncle George Moran worked for the CCC Camp in Powell in the late 1930s. He wrote letters to my parents and sent some pictures. I would like to donate these letters and pictures to the museum. I hope you will be able to use this information in learning more about the CCC.”

Moran went on to join the U.S. Army Air Force and was killed on Dec. 7, 1941 at Pearl Harbor in the surprise attack by the Japanese Empire, but for much of the prior decade he worked with the CCC. 

Moran started working for the organization in 1934 and, in the summer of 1938, was sent to  Willwood to work mostly on the Shoshone Project mostly around the then recently completed Willwood Dam. 

He also worked with cement, took down weeds and was available for

Brown, who in addition to pursuing a history education degree is a wildland firefighter, said that aspect of the corps connected him to this group of people serving more than 80 years ago. 

“I picked the CCC specifically because it was something that, as a wildland firefighter, I could really relate to,” he said. 

One thing he couldn’t quite relate to: Moran’s use of cursive, something Brown said with a laugh he hasn’t used since elementary school aside from signing his name. Wright, who helped Brown design the exhibit and decipher some cursive handwriting, said she’s planning on projects to get kids to at least read cursive well, as it opens a window into so many old letters. 

Cursive issues aside, Brown was able, through an estimated 60 hours of work, to open a window into the life of Moran during nearly a year in the late 30s spent in the Powell Valley. 

He said Moran talked of the dry country and the “cowboy culture,” including everyone’s "funny talk" and wearing of 10-gallon hats. 

He and the rest of the corps members hurried to town from their Willwood camp to see the bank robbery and death of Earl Durand in 1939, a little over a month before Moran was slated to end his time in Powell. 

Moran said witnessing the robbery and subsequent shooting felt like he was in the wild west again. He snapped pictures of the scene, including Durand’s body and a picture of the young man who shot him still holding the rifle. 

“It's funny, I have actual finals … and this two credit internship has very quickly become the majority of my work, which I'm happy with,” Brown said, adding “As a student, I would much rather have this creative outlet be my final, rather than the traditional essay.”

And even though he’s leaving town after graduation — he’s headed to Black Hills State University this fall to pursue a bachelor’s in history education, his project will be available for people to check out until Sept. 30.