Robert "Griff" Griffiths

Robert Lansing Griffiths the son of William and Julia Lansing Griffiths was born in New York Mills, New York, on the 23rd day of December 1916. He spent his early years living in, and attending elementry and high school there.

He often talked of his first jobs in Utica, New York as a teenager, the delivering of telegraphs by bicycle for the Western Union. If you can imagine New York, rain or shine, sleet or snow -- and on a bicycle.

At the age of 19 he joined the Civilian Conservation Corps and was stationed in Oxford NY from January 1935 to March 1938. He received the fantastic pay of $30.00 a month, of which $25.00 was sent back home to assist his parents, and later, his family. The programs and projects carried out by the CCC were enormous. Billions of trees were planted. Many of the national and state parks and forests we wnjoy today were built or improved by the CCC. There were all kinds of programs and projects relating to soil erosion, water conservation, the building of fire towers and other fire protection facilities, flood control dams, and many more. Being involved and seeing the results of the many CCC projects left an indelable mark on young Robert. As you may recall, the CCC was the brainchild of President Franklin D. Roosevelt and he became Robert's mentor who he looked up to and admired. Roosevelt referred to the CCC as his "Tree Army".

In 1937 Robert married Barbara Jane Wood and they had two daughters, Marlo in 1938 and Nola in 1947. Over the subsequent years, they gave him, 7 grand children, 12 great grand children, and 1 great great grand child, who he loved dearly.

Shortly after being discharged from the Army in 1945 he obtained a civil service job and over the years, worked in Florida, West Point and Griffiss Air Force Base in Rome New York. He spent 30 years as a federal civil service executive. At the time of his civil service retirement in 1966 he worked himself up to the position of Deputy Commander of the Griffiss Air Force Base Installation.

After his retirement, he toyed around by getting his fingers into politics. General Nichols, the previous commander at Griffiss, ran for the office of mayor for the town of Hamilton, New York. The general asked Bob to become manager for his campaign. Bob worked hard on the campaign but the general did not win the office, however it was a learning experience for Bob as to what it was like becoming involved in politics.

Bob was still fairly young at this phase of his life and there were so many many things to see in this country which he had never seen. So Bob purchased a 32 foot trailer and he went off to see the country. His daughter Marlo and family were living in Sacramento at the time and there were many sights to see within the 3000 miles from coast to coast. He and Barbara spent many weeks predominantly visiting the federal and state parks along the way. How could he not remember the influence that the CCC had in building many of those parks.

After traveling around the country for many months, he and Barbara decided to "put up camp" in Sacramento, so to speak. This placed them closer to Marlo and her family. He had also taken the action to move his younger daughter, Nola from memphis, Tennessee to Sacramento thus having the whole family closer.

After traveling many a mile in that trailer, and seeing the many sights across the country, he was ready to settle down. He needed a project to keep him busy. One of his favorite programs, the CCC "Roseville Tree Army" kept entering his mind. Bob figured that nearly a million CCC'ers were still living around the country and well into their senior american status. He had encountered a few of these oldsters in his regular beer drinking sessions. So one day he proposed to his friends -- what better thing can we do than form a national organization of these "boys" and call the organization the National Association Civilian Conservation Corps Alumni (NACCCA). In August 1987, he co-founded the organization as Chapter 1 in Sacramento and obtained non-profit status from the state of California. Subsequent to organizing Chapter 1, Bob was instrumental in expanding the association to every state including Alask and Hawaii. The Alumni was dedicated to (1) preserving the history, heritage and accomplishments of all CCC programs that have functioned -- past, present and future. (2) promote the CCC concept, and (3) contribute to the protection and improvement of our environment. At the peak of the organization, in the early 80s, Bob boast 8000 documented members in 100 chapters.

As time passed, and membership declined due to the advanced age of the members, it was propsed that memorial statues depicting a CCC "Boy" be obtained and be placed at approperiate locations within the states to remind the younger generation as to what the CCC in the past represented. When Bob first became aware of the statue program, he immediatly put his efforts to work. He sent out multitudes of letters to every one he knew, and to radio stations, newspapers, magazines and TV stations, as well as celebrities, requesting solicitations. In a very short period of time, he had enough funds to purchase the first unit. That statue is now located at the California Conservation Corps headquarters in downtown Sacramento. It is a symbol and a reminder to the younger generation that this wonderful American program took millions of young unemployed Americans off the streets, gave them hope, made them self supporting, built their self respect and confidence and taught them to be good citizens and to love their country.

Whenever a need was apparent to enhance the CCC's, Bob was always there to be first in line to support it.