John Bryan State Park: CCC Trash Furnace

I went camping at John Bryan State Park last weekend, hoping to take some pictures in the Yellow Springs area of a few things, the covered bridge in the Glen Helen preserve being once of them.  None of that worked out, but I did stumble across something else from the past completely by accident.

According to the sign taped to the desk at the camp office, there was an old trash furnace in the woods just a short hike away. It mentioned the CCC camp that used to be located in John Bryan, so I was intrigued.

I like John Bryan State Park a lot. It's not over-developed to be some sort of mini-resort. It's actually pretty primitive--most sites are non-electric, there aren't too many of them. No shower house. After my last few trips to state parks that are designed to capture the RV market with all the bells and whistles, it was a nice change.  Here's a brief history on John Bryan State Park.

The workmanship is what really struck me. This thing was built before any of my grandparents were born--and it looks like you could fire it up and start burning trash with it by lunch. The only clear sign of damage, aside from missing hatch covers where you feed the fire (bottom photo), was a crack on the edge of the platform surrounding the port where trash was dumped (middle photo).

Of course, the powers of erosion aren't so easily held back--the retaining wall on either side of the furnace was starting to show signs of wear--but think about that, it's still pretty well intact despite the damage.  When's the last time we had a public works project that didn't need to be at least partially redone within 5 years? And this has been sitting mostly untended in the forest for 70+ years, still functioning as designed.

I found an interesting story on the CCC and Ohio State Parks/Forests, and based on that I think the current state of the furnace would please those men who planted trees, built trails, and otherwise did the work to keep parts of Ohio wild--yet accessible to those who could appreciate it.