Month: March 2011

03/14/11

Christmass in NY during Great Depression

Photographer: Russell Lee. Unemployed workers in front of a shack with Christmas tree, East 12th Street, New York City. December 1937.
Alternative take of Migrant Mother by D. Lange taken in March 1936, Nipomo, California

The pictures were taken in very different parts of the US, one in New York City, another in California, the two business centers of the two coasts. Both photos from the both coasts convey the same great deal of hopelessness and insecurity. The scenery is similar: temporary shelters made of various scrap materials in the middle of a field with debris and garbage spread around, and in the middle people, all look haggard, exhausted and depressed. The Christmas Three by the shelter looks very dramatic, as the picture was taken in December. The similarities in the two photos show that Great Depression did not spare either part of the US, including large cities like NYC.

03/14/11

Whose fault is it!

blame game by Nate Collier (ca. 1931 – 1932)

Many say it all started with the stock market crash of 1929, but there were so many other factor that contributed to the Greatest Depression the world has seen.  Was it the bank, lack of international trade, was it capitalism.  Something was definitely unbalanced, and led to extreme poverty.

Dorothea Lange‘s Migrant Mother depicts destitute pea pickers in California, centering on Florence Owens Thompson, age 32, a mother of seven children, in Nipomo, California, March 1936.

When ever I think about the depression, and even during my research of photographs, the picture above seems to carry the greatest effect on me. This woman is carrying her two small children, and a look of pure sadness and lost that one just can’t fake.  She looks poor, and while doing some research found that she had 7 children traveling and looking for work. That’s a lot of mouths to feed.  I can’t imagine how hard that was.  At least now, there are government supports and aids for some of the poor.

I close these two photographs to show how on the large scale of things, that many things may have been responsible for the Great depression, but at the end of the day, many families suffered for it.  The hardship was real even if the real reason isn’t quite clear.

03/14/11

Worse Way to End the 1920’s

People are waiting on line for food. Ironically, they stand under a poster glorifying the American standard of living.

People lined up in London to protest about the Great Depression

The Great Depression not only hit the United States but effected the global economy. In the first picture there are people waiting on a line to get food. During this period, most people couldn’t afford anything and even the wealthy became poor in one day. Ironically, the pictures shows a poster saying how great the standard of living the United States is. It goes to show that it doesn’t matter where they are and how prosperous the country was, the Great Depression was affected globally.  The second picture shows another line of people in London where they protested about the lack of food and to get relief from this disaster. In both pictures, it shows that both countries had obstacles in fighting the Great Depression.

03/14/11

Poverty during The Depression

Both of these pictures convey the tough living conditions poor children had to endure during the time of the depression.  One of the pictures shows homeless children sitting on the street as their father’s were probably out looking for a source of food in order to survive.  The other picture shows a family who had to eat there christmas dinner around a small wooden table with probably just enough food to get by.  The children did not even have chairs to sit on as the poverty level was that bad.  Both of these images show how not only were adults left without jobs, but kids also had to suffer and live in ghetto’s for most of their childhoods as the depression went all the way to 1941.

03/14/11

The Rich Man’s Choice becomes “Poor”

The Great Depression scared all, including the rich. The Stock Market crash and other economic struggles forced Americans to stop purchasing! This in result led to much less production of goods and directly decreased the amount of human labor needed. People continued to loose their jobs and used places like “The POOR MAN’S STORE” as their last resort for trading, buying and selling what goods they did or did not need. On the contrary the first picture on the left, represents a normal environment inside of a store before all economic hell breaks out. Once people begin to refrain from buying because of a shortage of jobs and income, even those people who bought items on installment plans are unable to pay their dues and stores are forced to stock up on inventory: thus putting store owners to a loss.

03/14/11

Assignment due 3/21

Post an image of a political cartoon published between 1932 and 1941 on topic of the New Deal, which has not yet been posted to the blog. Include a caption that indicates the publicaton date and source of the cartoon as far as you can determine.  Write 1-2 paragraphs discussing the political argument behind the cartoon.  What do you think the artist was thinking?  What message was he/she trying to communicate?  What historical events were going on at the time the cartoon was published that explain the meaning of the cartoon (be as specific as possible).

03/14/11

Assignment due 3/16

A reminder that class will be held Wednesday, March 16.

The following assignment is due by class time on Wednesday:

Reading: Foner, Chapter 21.

Written: Write 2-3 comments in response to this post.  Each comment should be at least 2-3 sentences long.  At least one comment should discuss the cause of the Great Depression.  At least one additional comment should discuss the experiences of those living in America during the Great Depression.  I encourage you to build off of the comments already left by your classmates.  You can agree, disagree, or clarify their points.  Every comment should include at least one specific example (of a specific person, place, or event) from the reading that has not yet been mentioned in the conversation.
03/14/11

Hard life during the Great Depression

Picture above: Free food was distributed  in some urban centers to large numbers of the unemployed.

Picture on the left: Number of people who were unemployed and looking for a job.

During the Great Depression,the unemployment rate reached a extremely high point. Ten of thousand of people lost their jobs and they were just kept looking for a job. However, it was impossible to satisfy everyone. The amount of unemployed people were so great meanwhile the job opportunity was so less. When the people lost their job, they could not provide food to their families, not even themselves. Therefore, the government provided free meals to those people. The Great Depression made a terrible effect on everyone and it took a more than ten years to recover the society.

03/14/11

Life During the Great Depression

 

The Great Depression was one of the hardest times in the United States history for farmers as well. With the stock market crash in 1929 and American economy crushed, the farmers couldn’t make money on their crops, so they also lost $1.50 per acre of land they planted. Having no mercy on the farmers, the elements took their toll. As giant dust storms destroyed fields, it left farmers broke with no way to repair the damage, forcing many to leave their homes in search of different work.

03/14/11

Enemies of the Law… Heroes of the People!

During the Great Depression while the country’s money was decling and the unemployment rate was at its peak, Bonnie and Clyde became famous for their notorious battles against the law. Although Clyde expressed interests to lead a non-criminal life after his experience in the notoriously brutal Eastham Prison Farm, the start of the Great Depression left him jobless forcing him to rob again soon after. At the time many felt that big businesses and government officials were abusing the capitalistic system, so the news about Bonnie and Clyde made them instantly famous for their”opposition” of the system by robbing banks.

Bonnie and Clyde. (This image is available from the United States Library of Congress's Prints and Photographs division under the digital ID cph.3c34474)
Bonnie Parker smoking a cigar while holding a gun moll. This image was found by the police. (http://foia.fbi.gov/bonclyd/bonclyd1a)

The image above on the right is a snapshot of Bonnie smoking a cigar while holding a gun moll. The police found this photo in one of their abandoned hideouts. These photos were soon released to the the press and was published nationwide. This began Bonnie’s notorious reputation as a cigar-smoking gull moll.

03/13/11

Having no choices

A jobseeker adopts the same strategy in New York during the Great Depression

A shanty town within Central Park, New York. The huts were designed with the idea that they'd been built out of everyday objects

After the stock market crash of October 1929 in New York, million people lost their jobs. Jobseekers started to stand on street with a cardboard which depicts the basic information of them. However, the unemployment rate was increasing and those jobseekers could not still afford their renting and housing. As a result, they used some trash to build huts and settled the huts to form a town, called “Hooverville” because they believed President Hoover’s policies lead the nation into depression.

03/13/11

The Crash That started the depression.

One of the major catalysts of the Great Depression was the stock market crash in October of 1929. The market lost $40 billion dollars in value in two months, which is at that time over 40% of the Gross Domestic Product of US in 1929. The crash led to widespread panic selling which fueled further declines in the market. Business conditions became bleak, leading to high unemployment rate. Black Tuesday was one the days when the market crashed and lost 12%, marking the beginning of the great depression. The market bottomed in 1932, after losing 89% of its value from its peak three years earlier.

03/13/11

 

This picture depicts the great amount of homeless men who had to wait on line for free dinner at a lodging house in New York.

 

Not only adults, but also children suffered during the Great Depression.

When the Great Depression struck the nation, it affected everybody. Unemployment was at an ultimate high  and most people did not have enough money to afford the basic necessities. In the first picture of homeless men lining up for a free meal in New York, we can see the extent of the economy’s failure. Hundreds of men are lining up for a free meal. It seems as if everyone felt the pain and setbacks of the Great Depression. In the second pictures, children are holding up signs on the lack of jobs available for their parents. Both of these pictures depict how the Great Depression had a strong impact on everyone’s daily lives.

03/13/11

Bread Lines During The Great Depression

"Breadline" sculpture by George Segal in the FDR Memorial in Washington, DC.
Bread line during the Great Depression

During the Great Depression thousands of unemployed residents who could not pay their rent or mortgages were evicted into the world of public assistance and bread lines. Unable to find work and seeing that each job they applied for had hundreds of seekers, these shabby, disillusioned men wandered aimlessly without funds, begging, picking over refuse in city dumps, and finally getting up the courage to stand and be seen publicly – in a bread line for free food. To accommodate them, charities, missions, and churches began programs to feed them. Men who experienced the waiting in line recall the personal shame of asking for a handout, unable to care for oneself or to provide for others. On the first picture, you can see  the “Breadline” sculpture by George Segal in the FDR Memorial in Washington, DC. The sorrowful faces of the life-size statues are a powerful expression of the times, showing the inactivity and troubles of everyday citizens during the Great Depression. On the 2nd picture, you can see a real bread line in NYC during the Great Depression.

03/13/11

Give Me Bread or Give Me Death!

Unemployed men waiting on line for food.

The Great Depression had a pervasive and profound impact on American life. When the stock market crashed, everything began to crumble and fall. Millions were without jobs, therefore, resulting in people relying on bread and soup lines to bring food to the table. In the two photographs, it depicts different groups of people waiting on line for food. In the first photograph, it is a picture of a group of men, most if not all white, on a line for free coffee and doughnuts. This line is targeted to the unemployed individuals. In the second picture, it shows African Americans on a soup line. These two pictures show how the depression negatively affected diverse segments of the population and that starvation was a widespread problem. In addition, the second picture has an ironic poster advocating the American life in the background. American dream? It did not exist anymore.

People waiting on the soup line.
03/13/11

Look What Great Depression has Caused

The image of waiting on line were the people who looked for food that was provided by the government and the image that has people sleeping in the public were the homeless who had no money to pay their rent or mortgage.  These two images are showing the immediate result of the Great Depression that started on Black Friday when the stock market crashed. People were jobless and they were not able to support their family because they have no money. They had to rely on government aid which was so little that they barely had any basic food for living. People who were homeless did not have a safe and warm place to live in. They have to face the cold winter outisde in the cold or on the street, and government up to that point still didn’t do much to help those poor or unemployed people. Great Depression caused more people to be jobless and homeless.

03/13/11

The times are hard…

A "Hooverville" home, located in a shanty town during the late 20s early 30's.
A bread line during the Great Depression.

The first photo shows a house made of salvaged boards and planks that poor Americans who lost everything during the Depression lived in.  Many families lost all of their money in the stock market and were left homeless, so they moved into parks, under bridges and into the woods where they formed little communities.  These towns became known as Hooverville’s, because many people blamed the President (Herbert Hoover) for the economic collapse.  These communities began popping up all over the nation as more and more of its citizens fell upon desperate times.  The second photo shows a bread line in a major city.  In an attempt to provide some relief, the government provided food to the most needy of its citizens.  Bread, stew, soup and water were the most common commodities handed out to starving men women and children.  It was not uncommon to see thousands of people waiting on one of these lines hoping to get a few scraps of food to get them through the day, because they did not know when their next meal might be.

03/13/11

Hard Times Are Hoovering Over Us

This image has been taken from the Presidential Library & Museum of Herbert Hoover. Taken by Underwood and Underwood. This image depicts children insulting the president for letting nation slip into depression

Image taken in CA 1930, by Bettmann. Hundreds to thousands of people waiting on line for some free food to survive the great depression.

The great depression was very sad and difficult time in American history. After the New York stock market crashed in October 1929, thousands and thousands of people lost their jobs and their life savings. Thousands of people were forced to live on the street as they were unable to afford shelter. Many of these people took to living in small shanty towns, Hooverville, that grouped hundreds of homeless people. In the first image, a family insults the president Herbert Hoover by using his last name to describe a situation at the time. Plenty of blame has been placed on president Hoover as he was said to have let the nation slide into depression. Many other terms were coined during this time such as the hoover blanket (a newspaper), hoover flag (turned out pockets) and hoover wagon ( a automobile pulled by a horse). The second image, directly represented many people on the breadline that offered free food to the poor and homeless. Many individuals could not afford to buy their own food let alone afford shelter during the great depression.

03/12/11

Enough is Enough!

During the Great Depression, unemployment was high. Many employers tried to get as much work as possible from their employees for the lowest possible wage. Workers were upset with the speedup of assembly lines, working conditions and the lack of job security. Seeking strength in unity, they formed unions. Automobile workers organized the U.A.W. (United Automobile Workers of America) in 1935. General Motors would not recognize the U.A.W. as the workers’ bargaining representative. Hearing rumors that G.M. was moving work to factories where the union was not as strong, workers in Flint began a sit-down strike on December 30, 1936. The sit-down was an effective way to strike. When workers walked off the job and picketed a plant, management could bring in new workers to break the strike. If the workers stayed in the plant, management could not replace them with other workers. This photograph shows the broken windows at General Motors’ Flint Fisher Body Plant during the Flint sit-down strike of 1936-37.

World War I veterans block the steps of the Capital during the Bonus March, July 5, 1932 (Underwood and Underwood). In the summer of 1932, in the midst of the Great Depression, World War I veterans seeking early payment of a bonus scheduled for 1945 assembled in Washington to pressure Congress and the White House. Hoover resisted the demand for an early bonus. Veterans benefits took up 25% of the 1932 federal budget. Even so, as the Bonus Expeditionary Force swelled to 60,000 men, the president secretly ordered that its members be given tents, cots, army rations and medical care.

In July, the Senate rejected the bonus 62 to 18. Most of the protesters went home, aided by Hoover’s offer of free passage on the rails. Ten thousand remained behind, among them a hard core of Communists and other organizers. On the morning of July 28, forty protesters tried to reclaim an evacuated building in downtown Washington scheduled for demolition. The city’s police chief, Pellham Glassford, sympathetic to the marchers, was knocked down by a brick. Glassford’s assistant suffered a fractured skull. When rushed by a crowd, two other policemen opened fire. Two of the marchers were killed.

These two pictures are images that show that the people of the nation had tolerated enough. Not enough was being done to help the economy and the government wasn’t quick enough. In the first image, the workers are taking matter into their own hands by protesting the big factories that were treating them unfairly. The second picture depicts the same concept, but consisted of the war veterans who wanted to collect their bonus checks that were owed to them. In both sceneries, those in power took advantage of them.

03/12/11

Dead End Jobs!

The first photograph shows that men in the United States were unable to get aid from the businesses in their own town. The sign is an indication that the businesses themselves were unable to take care of their own employees so men who were looking for work had to try to look elsewhere. The second photograph shows young children holding signs asking why their fathers were unable to get a job. The two photographs are significant to showing the effects of the Great Depression because it shows the severity of the situation people were in. No one was able to help anyone out, even those who were supposed to help others find jobs could not help. There was a dead end road for everyone.