PROSPERITY,
DEPRESSION, & THE
NEW DEAL
American History II - Unit 4
Ms. Brown
Review
• What were the 4 long-term causes of the Great Depression?
• Decline of key industries, farming crisis, overuse of credit, unequal distribution
of wealth
• Why was Hoover (a man who had never held an elected office)
overwhelmingly elected as the 31st POTUS in 1928?
• Part of the prosperous Republican administration of the post-WWI 1920s
• Some southern democrats voted Republican due to dislike of Smith’s
Catholicism
• What were some problems with investing the stock market in the
1920s?
• Speculation, buying on margin, little gov’t restrictions on unrestrained
buying/selling of stocks, stocks didn’t reflect companies’ actual wealth
• What series of events caused banks to collapse after Black Tuesday?
• Americans tried to withdraw money from banks, banks ran out of money, banks
couldn’t pay loans for stocks bought  banks collapsed
• What was the goal of the Hawley-Smoot Tariff? What did it actually
do?
• Goal – protect American industries to spur economic growth
• Actual effect – European countries passed similar tariffs and didn’t buy US
goods, increased US unemployment
4.6 – LIFE DURING THE
GREAT DEPRESSION
Depression in the Cities
• Evicted from housing 
increased homelessness
• Shantytowns – little towns
consisting of shacks
• Soup kitchens and bread
lines– social organizations
offered free or low cost food
• Early 1930s, no system of
direct relief – cash
payments or food provided
by the gov’t to the poor
Depression in the Cities
• Minorities were hit
especially hard during the
depression
• Higher unemployment rates,
lower wages
• Racial violence from
unemployed whites
competing for the same jobs
• By 1933 – 24 known black
lynching deaths
• Demand for Latino (mostly
Mexicans and MexicanAmerican) exportation
Depression in Rural Areas
• Falling crop prices and rising debt  many farmers lost
their farms
• 1929-1933: 400,000 farms foreclosed on (mortgage holder takes
back property if an occupant has not made payments)
• Many farmers turned to tenant farming
Dust Bowl
Severe
drought in
early 1930s
Plowing
removed
thick
protective
layer of
prairie
grasses
Overproduction
of crops
DUST BOWL
The region in Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Colorado, and New Mexico,
that was made worthless for farming by drought and dust storms
during the 1930s.
Wind storms could carry dust/soil as far as the east coast
Families moved west  “Okies” – negative term for all migrants
Effects on the American Family
• Fear that hard times
would lead to immoral
actions and the
destruction families 
emphasis of maintaining
the family unit
• Ex: board games for
entertainment – Monopoly
(1933); radio
• Relocation of families
meant leaving friends
and communities
behind… family was all
they had.
Hoboes
• In search of employment,
some workers left the cities
and wandered/hitchhiked
the countryside for odd
jobs, farmhand work, etc. 
“hoboes”, mainly men who
left their families
Mad Men – The Hobo Code
-25 min
-36:30 min
-44:10 min
Women and the Depression
• Canned food, sewed clothes, managed
budget, childcare
• Faced employment discrimination from
males competing for jobs
• Head of household if husband left family
“I’ve lived in cities for many months,
broke, without help, too timid to get in
bread lines. I’ve known many women to
live like this until they simply faint in the
street… A woman will shut herself up in
a room until it is taken away from her,
and eat a cracker a day and be as quiet
as a mouse… She will go for weeks
verging on starvation… going through
the streets ashamed, sitting in the
libraries, parks, going for days without
speaking to a living soul, shut up in the
terror of her own misery.” – Meridel Le
Seur
Children and the Depression
• Poor diets, lack of nutrition,
inadequate/no healthcare (rickets
were common)
• Falling tax revenues  shorten
school year or completely close
schools  children looked for
employment
• “Wild Boys” – teenage boys left home
in search of work, adventure, and an
escape from poverty; hopped trains;
faced danger, turned to criminal
activity
“If I leave my mother, it will mean one
less mouth to feed.”
– Eugene Williams, 13
Social and Psychological Effects of the
Depression
• 1928-1932: suicide rate rose 30%, 3x as many people
entered mental hospitals
• Lost dreams… college, marriage, having children,
• New habits… increased kindness towards community
members and strangers, saving practices, thriftiness
Diary Entry
• Dust, Drought, and Depression
• Read Ann Marie Low’s diary entry about life during the
Dust Bowl.
• Answer the 3 questions at the bottom on a separate
sheet of paper.