"The reason they selected [me], I had put down that I played baseball.  And every camp had a baseball team, so soon as they saw 'baseball player' they grabbed me and took me to Murfreesboro then.  So I didn't know that.  I didn't know that till about three or four years ago that that's the reason that I went to Murfreesboro.  But, at one time, earlier, I would not have qualified because of my age; I was seventeen.  And also I didn't qualify for 'dire need' like some of them did earlier because as I say, we never were, were hungry or never did without anything that could be traded for or purchased cheaply, we always had plenty to eat.  But as the war approached a great many of the boys began to go into the service, even early, even before Pearl Harbor.  And then they began to need people to come into the CCC.  Earlier, it was very selective; they could be very selective.  But then they began to they began to need people to come in to fill the ranks in the CCC and so they, they took more of us that would not have been eligible otherwise."