historical timeline financial crash banks & factories close; farming collapses 1929 1931 1933...
TRANSCRIPT
Historical Timeline
Financial crash
Banks & factories close; farming
collapses
19291931 1933
Franklin D. Roosevelt
becomes president
1936
The “New Deal”: Support for
unemployment
1937
Of Mice and Men is
published
The 1930s
Depression: an economy with high unemployment, falling income, failing business, decline in production and sales.
The Great Depression: a depression that took place during the 1930s in America
On Black Tuesday, October 29, 1929, the stock market crashed, triggering the Great Depression, the worst economic collapse in the history of the modern industrial world.
It spread from the United States to the rest of the world, lasting from the end of 1929 until the early 1940s. With banks failing and businesses closing, more than 15 million Americans (one-quarter of the workforce)became unemployed.
Our current economic depression has been compared by some to the Great Depression.
The Great Depression
Heavy real estate losses Mass consumption or living above means Uneven distribution of wealth Uninsured banks Stock Market crash
Leading Causes of Great Depression
Causes:Cheap landOver production on wheatThe Dust Bowl
The depression led to a dropin the market price of farm crops,which meant that farmers wereforced to produce more goods in order to earn the same amount of money.
Farming Depression (1920-1935)
A 97-million-acre piece of high, level land in the southern portion of the Great PlainsFound in the states of Colorado, New Mexico, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas.
The Dust Bowl
The increase in farming activity across the Great Plains states caused the precious soil to erode.
This erosion, coupled with a seven-year drought that began in 1931, turned once fertile grasslands into a ‘desert-like’ region.
The Dust Bowl
From 1932-1936 the annual rainfall didn’t exceed 12 inchesLow wheat prices and yields drove farmers from their landsDust clouds lifted and settled over millions of acresFarmers and farmhands moved into California as migrant workersSeventy severe dust storms recorded in 1933
“The Drouth”
Atlantic Monthly article from 1930s:“Dust in the beds and in the flour bin, on dishes and walls and windows, in hair, eyes, teeth, and throats…”
Ceilings collapsed under the weight of the accumulated dust mounds People remember hanging wet blankets across their windows and laying wet cloths over their faces when they went to sleep because of the dust
Dust Was Everywhere
Map of the Dust Bowl
Migration: movement of people from place to place for permanent settlementDrought in the plains forced owners off farmsThe Grapes of Wrath (another Steinbeck novel) depicts this lifestyle
Migrant Workers
Migrant farm workersHomeless/farmless due to drought and “Dust Bowl”Hundreds of thousands of farmers packed up their families and few belongings, and headed for California, which seemed like a promised land.The state’s mild climate promised a longer growing season and, with soil favorable to a widerrange of crops, it offered more opportunities to harvest.
“Oakies”
These poor mid-western farmers were despised and abused in California
Very few found it to be the land of opportunity and plenty of which they dreamed.
“Oakies”
Factories and mills closedManufacturing cut in halfUnemployment rose from 3.2 % to 24.9%Banks ran out of moneyMortgages foreclosed Homelessness and poverty“Riches to Rags”
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Effects of the Great Depression
Malnutrition Doubt and fear Most severe for men (women’s jobs actually rose) Children had to be more self-reliant Whites took over jobs held by minorities
Living Conditions
President Hoover: Tried to stress self-relianceand to restore confidence but grew unpopular as conditions worsenedPresident Roosevelt:elected in 1932
“The only thing we have to fear is fear itself”Fireside chats (radio show) helped boost moraleBegan The New Deal – programs run by government to aid people affected by the Great Depression
The Government Responds
1939: unemployment still at 15%Outbreak of WWII caused expansion of national defense
This stimulated jobs and growth
Federal Government expanded its role in social and economic areas (through The New Deal)
The End of the Depression
Look up the following words in the dictionary and write their definition on your own piece of paper:
ItinerantJuncturesDebrisMoroselyBrusquely
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