Saturday, March 1, 2014

Some Administrative Housekeeping


© Michael I. Smith, 2014

BACKGROUND

This is the first post at Forest Army for 2014 and it seems that perhaps it is time to undertake some administrative housekeeping.  Frequent visitors here will know that I maintain a separate – more active – Civilian Conservation Corps blog at the Civilian Conservation Corps Resource Page.  Eventually, I may phase out posts here at Forest Army and hopefully migrate content that is currently here, over to the CCC Resource Page but in the meantime, visitors can jump between the two blogs by clicking the image under the phrase “Please visit my other CCC blog” which appears along the left hand side of the blog page here.  I hope that visitors will find ample reason to jump between the two in search of new, interesting CCC material but my hope is that you won’t find the jumping between blogs to be too bothersome.

BUYER BEWARE!

Recently, while doing a Google search for material related to the Civilian Conservation Corps, an image from this blog appeared with the related Google images.  Problem was, when I checked the source of the image, the link took me to a different blog with a very similar name.  More shocking still, that blog is an exact copy of the Forest Army blog you are viewing here, except the posts are listed as having been posted by a  “Walters Louann”.  Fortunately, the copyright line I put at the end of my articles does appear on the mirror site but it’s disconcerting to see your work posted verbatim on another blog.  I sent an email to the Google Blogger folks but, perhaps not surprisingly, there was no response.  I suspect the site that is mirroring my blog is coming from overseas; perhaps Asia.

I’m not relaying this bit of information because I think you should go over and view the blog that is basically an exact copy of my Forest Army blog, not even out of basic curiosity.  On the contrary, I think you should avoid going to that blog because I don’t have any idea what sort of spam or malware might be attached to the links they are using.  Going forward, you will likely see my copyright information more prominently posted here at Forest Army and at the CCC Resource Page.  I research and write about the CCC in order to share information and I’m pleased when visitors comment that my site is helpful or interesting and I generally agree to any requests to use information or link to my page, but obviously, finding a pirate blog that purports to be Forest Army is frustrating and I will do what I can to make certain that my own research and writing is recognized, for better or worse.

DROP ME A NOTE

Please enter a comment or question if you have one either here or at the CCC Resource Page.  Feedback, any feedback, is often the spark that motivates people to continue researching and writing and the effort becomes somewhat meaningless if the worker never hears back from the folks using the product of his or her labor.

© Michael I. Smith, 2014

6 comments:

Gary said...

Michael, I've recently been researching CCC history in Rhode Island and found your blog. Local libraries and archives have provided some good information, but it's only a small fraction of what I hope to find. Would you know of any information about RI camps?

Michael said...

Hi Gary! I'm grateful that you visited the Forest Army blog. I'm working on a state by state account of CCC work over at the CCC Resource Blog but unfortunately, I'm just now working on Maine, so Rhode Island is somewhere in the future.

I have some information on Rhode Island; mostly statistics from the 1937, 1939 and 1942 FY Annual Reports. I would be happy to scan the Rhode Island pages and email them to you if you'll leave another "comment" and provide your email address. I won't publish that comment, so your email address won't go out to the masses. I can also pull any Rhode Island CCC fatalities that may have been reported in Happy Days. Your other option would be to watch the CCC Resource Page blog for the Rhode Island state by state article, but I think it may be some time before I get that far. Drop me a note and I'll send you whatever I have!

Unknown said...

Hi, Michael -

My late-father served with the C.C.C. in Claremont, NH on a dam-building project. That's about all I know, and I'm trying to find out more about that. I've downloaded the form to acquire his record, which I'll be submitting later this week. In the meantime, if you have any information in your archives about the C.C.C. in the Claremont, NH area, I would be most appreciative.

On a somewhat related matter, I have just composed a song entitled "The Boys Of The C.C.C.", and I'll be debuting it in a fundraising event for the CT CCC Worker Statue fund. The fundraiser will be held at the VFW Hall in Norwich, CT on June 1st.

I would be glad to send you an MP3 of it, if you would provide an E-Mail address that will accept such a file.

Michael said...

Hi TCinCT! I'll have to look through my stuff for anything on NH camps. Eventually I will do a New Hampshire entry for the State-By-State series but I'm working on Maine at the moment.

I'd definitely like to hear your CCC melody. I don't post my email here on the blogs - something I've considered but decided against. If you'll leave me a comment with your email address I'll drop you an email and I won't publish the comment that contains your email.

Anonymous said...

Hello Mr. Smith,

Would it be possible to use the Fort Knox Conditioning camp photo for an educational video for McLennan Community College? If you do not have rights to the photo, do you know where the photo originally came from?

Thank you,
Michaela McCown

Michael said...

Hi Michaela, leave another comment with your contact information (I won't publish it) so that I can contact you directly. The Ft. Knox photo is part of my collection but I need to pull it from storage in order to see where I originally obtained it so that I can provide some background.

Buffalo Crossing Camp, Eastern Arizona

Buffalo Crossing Camp, Eastern Arizona