JOE BRADISH INTERVIEW - ARRIVING IN IDAHO

(Joe Bradish was living in Southern Illinois when he enrolled in the CCC program. Bradish was excited when he found out he was going to Idaho. "We had studied Idaho – Idaho with it’s tall timber. They kept it a good secret from the Easterners that the southern part of Idaho was all desert." After three days on the train, he was let off in a field in Southern Idaho.)

We started off on this country road, gavel road, mostly gravel. And every once in awhile, we'd yell to this gentleman that was leading us to the camp. "How much farther?" "Oh, just a short way. It’s a short ways up, so keep walking." And so we walked and walked. Finally, after asking him several times, finally he says, "Well, you're here." We looked around. "Here" was nothing. It was desert. The term desert didn't mean too much to me until then. And I saw, looking out in the field off the road there a huge pile of something. And the closer we got to it, we’d be able to identify it as the tents, canvas tents. He said, "Well, you're here. That's your home."