Mr. Judd
Name________________
Ch. 11&12 The Great Depression and New Deal Study Guide
A "chicken in every pot"
In 1928, on the campaign promise of continuing
prosperity and a "chicken in every pot,"
Hoover tried to remain true to his word even after
the stock market crashed on Black Tuesday in
October 1929. He promised that the recession
resulting from the Crash of 1929 would be brief
and that prosperity was just around the corner.
Rather than offer a helping hand, however,
Hoover and congressional Republicans passed
the even higher Smoot-Hawley Tariff in 1930,
driving the average tariff rate up to almost 60
percent.
The Depression Begins
The American economy quickly slipped into
recession and then plummeted headlong into the
greatest depression the nation had ever
experienced. The Great Depression in the
United States had a widespread ripple effect
throughout the world, soon leading to economic
stagnation and widespread unemployment in
virtually every industrialized nation. Millions of
Americans lost their jobs and their homes, and shantytowns dubbed “Hoovervilles”
(after the president whom many blamed for the depression) began to spring up
throughout the country.
Despite the worsening economic plight, Hoover still refused to provide any direct federal
assistance to relieve the suffering. He even authorized the army to use force to remove
20,000 members of the “Bonus Army,” a group of World War I veterans and their
families who marched on the U.S. Capitol demanding economic relief. By 1932,
Americans, fed up with Hoover’s lack of economic assistance, voted him and his
Republican counterparts out of office. The optimistic Democrat Franklin Delano
Roosevelt of New York—a distant cousin of previous president Theodore Roosevelt—
took office.
Roosevelt’s New Deal: Relief, Recovery, and Reform
Roosevelt rallied the panicked Democratic majority in Congress and pushed for the
passage of a bundle of sweeping laws known collectively as the New Deal. Taking a
calculated risk, Roosevelt structured the New Deal policies around the untested theories
of British economist John Maynard Keynes, who believed that planned deficit
spending by the federal government could “prime the economic pump” and jump-start
the economy again.
Vocabulary Terms
Depression
stock market
buying on margin
speculation
Black Tuesday
stock share
foreclosed
tariff
mortgages
deficit spending
Trickle Down
dictator
New Deal
court packing
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
1. What was the cause of the stock market crash?
2. Discuss the causes and consequences of the Great Depression.
3. What were the Bonus Army and its effect on President Hoover’s
public support?
4. Explain what the Fireside Chats were and its significance.
5. What did it mean to “Ride the Rails”?
6. What was the Dust Bowl and name one solution made by the
government?
Broke but
Not Broken
Ann Marie Low Remembers the Dust Bowl
“The air is just full of dirt coming, literally, for hundreds of miles. It sifts into everything.
After we wash the dishes and put them away, so much dusts sifts into the cupboards we must
wash them again before the next meal.”
- Ann Marie Low
Before Viewing
What is the most dramatic effect that a weather condition or natural disaster has had on
your life? Explain what happened, how you responded, and whether any government
agency assisted you.
After Viewing
1. What part of the U.S. was most affected by the dust storms?
2. What conditions caused the Dust Bowl?
3. How did drought and dust storms affect daily life on Low’s farm?
4. In what ways did President’s Hoover and Roosevelt try to solve the farm crisis?
5. What was the reaction of Low’s father when a federal agent offered to buy the
farm?
Presidential Terms
DIRECTIONS: Complete the following chart with philosophies and actions
of each president during the depression. There may be more than one example in each
section of the chart.
President Hoover
Personal philosophies in
regard to dealing with the
economic crisis.
Actions taken to provide
relief , recovery, or reform
ie. laws, acts, programs,
etc.
President Roosevelt
Alphabet Soup Programs
Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal programs (also known as the “Alphabet Soup” programs because of the
acronyms) were designed to alleviate the problems of the Great Depression. The New Deal focused on
three goals: relief for the needy, economic recovery, and financial reform.,Identify and discuss a New
Deal program established to help each of the following groups of people.
Group
Program Purpose
farmers, migrant
workers, others living
in rural areas
teachers, writers,
artists, and other
professionals
generally
unemployed workers
homeowners
retired workers, the
disabled, dependent
mothers and children
labor union members
and employers
consumers of food,
prescription drugs,
and cosmetics
stock market
investors
bank depositors
victims of flooding
in southern states
A “New” New Deal Poster Assignment
Assignment: The year is 2011 and people of the United States are experiencing:
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


high unemployment
expensive healthcare
high gas prices
small business
failures
depleted natural
resources and other
environmental issues





rising home- heating costs
home foreclosures
deteriorating infrastructure
expensive childcare
increasing drop-out rates in
high school and other
education issues
President Obama has convened an elite group of advisors,
including yourself, to create a “new” New Deal Program.
Your task is to:
Review the goals (relief, recovery, reform) of President
Roosevelt’s New Deal programs (1932-38) on Page 2.
1. Choose one of the problems from above (or choose
one of your own) and invent a New Deal-like
program to address your goal of relief, recovery or reform.
We’ll Give You More
Gas Than A…..
Bean Burrito
United States Gas Credit
2. Now, using construction paper, old magazines, the computer, cut-out letter stencils,
and/or traditional art supplies, you will design a poster that reflects the purpose of your
program. Your poster must include:
A. the name (or acronym) of your program
B. an image
C. a slogan
D.
3. In conclusion, students will include a written explanation (one paragraph) of their
program including information on who is your program designed to help, how will it
help, why did you choose this problem, is it relief, recovery or reform, etc.
Song of the South
Chorus:
Song, song of the south
Sweet potato pie and I shut my mouth
Gone, gone with the wind
There ain't nobody looking back again
Cotton on the roadside, cotton in the ditch
We all picked the cotton but we never got rich
Daddy was a veteran, a southern democrat
They oughta get a rich man to vote like that
Sing it...
Chorus
Well somebody told us Wall Street fell
But we were so poor that we couldn't tell
Cotton was short and the weeds were tall
But Mr. Roosevelt's a gonna save us all
Well momma got sick and daddy got down
The county got the farm and they moved to town
Pappa got a job with the TBA
He bought a washing machine and then a Chevrolet
Sing it...
Discussion Questions
1.
“Gone, gone with the wind” is a throwback to Margaret Mitchell’s famous novel “Gone with the
Wind” What was the novel about? Why do you think southerners do not want to “look back
again”?
2.
What effect did the Great Depression have on southern cotton farmers? Many people in the
south turned to sharecropping after the Civil War. How did sharecropping prevent farmers from
“ever getting rich”?
3.
Daddy was probably a veteran of what war?
4.
What did it mean to be a southern democrat (or Populist) in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s?
5.
“Wall street fell” is a reference to what event in 1929? What effect did this event have on most
southerners?
6.
Who is “Mr. Roosevelt”? What plan did he have to “save us all”?
7.
In addition to the economic crisis of the 1920’s and 1930’s, the plight of the farmer was
exacerbated (made worse) by what natural condition?
8.
Why did the “county get the farm”?
9.
What is the TVA? How did the TVA help many southerners?
10.
What southern edible specialty does the singer reminisce about?
Political Cartoons
1. Who are the three people depicted in this cartoon? How do you know
who they are?
2. What do some of the abbreviations stand for? Name two.
3. What is ironic about the “New Deal Remedies” bag?
4. How is Roosevelt depicted by the illustrator?
5. Do you think this cartoon is optimistic or pessimistic of the “New Deal”
Programs?