CCC ART - Reima Victor Ratti: Artists of the Civilian Conservation Corps

by Kathleen Duxbury

Overview

The Civilian Conservation Corps (1933 – 1942) was a labor force meant to help those hardest hit by the staggering unemployment caused by the Great Depression. The CCC was the first and most successful of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal work programs. With the President’s personal approval, a small group of artists were assigned to document the life and work in CCC. Reima Victor Ratti, like so many unemployed boys of his generation joined the CCC, but Reima did so with the eye of an artist. What transpired during his CCC days and beyond, was life changing, news worthy, and historic. Though he began as a CCC laborer, his creative talents were recognized and his status changed to artist. He found confidence and purpose in painting the rock crushing labor of the CCC boys along the Milwaukee River; and in sketching a “tree army” in the midst of battling fires on remote Isle Royale. As an embedded CCC artist, he was in his element as he created what he saw and felt. These experiences inspired him to sculpt a small figure symbolizing a CCC boy after a day of work. When this sculpture surfaced six decades later, CCC alumni recognized themselves in Ratti’s art. They used it as a model for a monument, the CCC Worker statue. Today, these larger-than-life statues can be found in state and national parks. They are monuments to remind all of the great the lasting good accomplished by the CCC.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780986003875
Publisher:	Duxbury Media, Inc.
Publication date:	12/25/2018
Series:	CCC ART Artists of the Civilian Conservation Corps , #2
Pages:	204
Sales rank:	985,551
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.55(d)

Table of Contents

Contents Chapter 1 - Defining the CCC, Architect of the CCC—Frances Perkins, President’s Suggestion—CCC Artistic Depictions; Employment of CCC Artists; Chapter 2 -Coming of Age in Green Town,;Chapter 3 -Educators Who Inspired; Chapter 4 -Come One, Come All; Chapter 5 -A New Dea;l Chapter 6 -A Sad Day In Green Town; Chapter 7 -Milwaukee Rock Pile; Chapter 8 -Welcome Rookies Chapter; 9 -President Comes To Town; Chapter 10 -Eight Days of Terror in Milwaukee; Chapter 11 -Changes In Camp; Chapter 12 -Enchanting Isle Royale; Chapter 13 -Memories of Isle Royale; Chapter 14 -Inspector Hannon’s Findings; Chapter 15 -Reima Ratti, CCC Artist CCC Art Titles; Chapter 16 -Found Himself 1937–1945; Chapter 17 -Another World War Chapter; 18 -Double Losses; Chapter 19 -Odd Pieces Exhibition; Chapter 20 -Reima “Ray” Ratti Art Collection at the Bess Bower Dunn Museum; Chapter 21 - Monumental Reminders; Chapter 22 - Epilogue; Acknowledgements; Bibliography; Glossary; About the Author; Illustrations; Endnotes; Index