The War on Poverty-era Job Corps conservation centers of the National Park Service offer an important narrative about the contributions of young people of color and poor white people to conservation and the national parks. At a time when the agency is eager to diversify both its staff and visitors, this is an important history for the NPS to research and interpret for the public. The Job Corps and other federal youth conservation programs also offer important lessons for current and future job training and conservation programs. These lessons underscore the need to fully consider issues of race and class in federal programs that seek to address poverty and conservation, and to consider whether federal land agencies such as the National Park Service are equipped to handle this task.
Researching the Job Corps at Acadia National Park
Laura Miller is a public historian and historical consultant based in Western Massachusetts. She specializes in research, writing, and oral history projects for history organizations and other nonprofits. She has been a consultant since 2017 and has worked on several projects for the National Park Service. Her recent projects include a Historic Resource Study for Acadia National Park co-authored with Angela Sirna (2021), an administrative history of Adams National Historical Park (2020), and an administrative history of Eisenhower National Historic Site (2024). Miller holds a PhD in History and MA in Public History from the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
Angela Sirna leads the Park History Program for the legacy Intermountain Region of the National Park Service. She holds an MA in history from West Virginia University and a PhD in public history from Middle Tennessee State University. She has worked for two national parks in interpretation and cultural resources management. She wrote an administrative history for Stones River National Battlefield. She has been working as a historian in NPS regional offices for the past seven years, providing project management support to park history baseline documents. The views in this article do not represent the views of the National Park Service.
Laura A. Miller, Angela Sirna; Researching the Job Corps at Acadia National Park. The Public Historian 1 November 2024; 46 (4): 44–64. doi: https://doi.org/10.1525/tph.2024.46.4.44
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