The Great Depression and the 1930s 1929-1939. Table of Contents The Stock Market Crash Causes of the Great Depression Impact on Americans Herbert Hoover

The Great Depression and the 1930s

1929-1939

Table of Contents

The Stock Market Crash Causes of the Great Depression Impact on Americans Herbert Hoover Franklin D. Roosevelt The New Deal FDR and the American People The Dust Bowl World War II begins

The Stock Market Crash

1929

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What event marked the beginning of the Great Depression? The stock market crashed, October 29, 1929

This day became known as “Black Tuesday”

This pictures shows the panic on Wall Street during the Stock Market crash of 1929

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What event marked the beginning of the Great Depression?

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Causes of the Great Depression

Over speculation of Stocks

Federal Reserve

High Tariffs

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What were the causes of the Great Depression? Over speculation of stocks

People wanted to get rich in the 1920s by investing in stocks

People often borrowed money from banks to buy stocks

When the stock prices dropped, people could not afford to pay back the banks!

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What were the causes of the Great Depression? The Federal Reserve

The Federal Reserve failed to prevent the collapse of the banking system

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Confused?

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What does all this mean? 1. The Federal Reserve supplies banks with

their money

2. The banks loaned all of their money to people who were buying stocks

3. Stock prices dropped

4. People lost money

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What does all this mean?

5. People could not afford to pay back the bank

6. The banks had no money!

7. When people went to get money out of the banks that they were saving, there was no money left!


What were the causes of the Great Depression? High Tariffs

High Tariffs of the 1920s strangled (stopped) international trade People could not get goods from another

country at a cheaper price to save money

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Impact on Americans

Employment

Farmers

Community Help

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Impact on Americans: Banks and Businesses

How were the lives of Americans affected by the Great Depression?1. Banks and Businesses Failed

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Impact on Americans: Banks and Businesses

How were the lives of Americans affected by the Great Depression? ¼ of all Americans did not have a job. They

tried to find work by riding the rails or migrant work.

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People with jobs People without jobs

Migrant workers of the Great Depression

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Why do you think the children are in these fields?


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How were times different in the 1930s than they were in the 1920s?


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Where do you think these peopleare heading?

Why do you think they do not have any tires on the car (left picture)?


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What part of the country do you think she’s in when this picture was taken?

What do you think she is thinking about?

How old do you think the lady in the picture is?

Dorthea Lange, Migrant Mother photograph In 1960, Lange gave this account of

the experience: I saw and approached the hungry

and desperate mother, as if drawn by a magnet. I do not remember how I explained my presence or my camera to her, but I do remember she asked me no questions. I made five exposures, working closer and closer from the same direction. I did not ask her name or her history. She told me her age, that she was thirty-two.

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Dorthea Lange, Migrant Mother photographShe said that they had been living on

frozen vegetables from the surrounding fields, and birds that the children killed. She had just sold the tires from her car to buy food. There she sat in that lean- to tent with her children huddled around her, and seemed to know that my pictures might help her, and so she helped me. There was a sort of equality about it. (From: Popular Photography, Feb. 1960).

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Impact on Americans: Hungry and Homeless

How were the lives of Americans affected by the Great Depression?3. Many Americans were hungry and homeless

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Hungry and Homeless during Depression

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“One vivid, gruesome moment of those dark days we shall never forget,” recalls one citizen from the Great Depression in 1931. “We saw a crowd of some fifty men fighting over a barrel of garbage which had been set outside the back door of a restaurant. American citizens fighting for scraps of food like animals!”

–Louise V. Armstrong, 1941


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“In an Appalachian Mountains school, a child who looked sick was told by her teacher to go home and get something to eat. ‘I can’t,’ the girl replied. ‘It’s my sister’s day to eat.’”

–Oates and Errico, Portrait of America


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Impact on Americans: Farmers

How were the lives of Americans affected by the Great Depression?4. Farmer’s incomes fell to low levels

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Farmers of the Great Depression

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Farmers of the Great Depression

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Impact on Americans: Community Help

How did the community try to help the homeless and the hungry?a. Soup Kitchens, breadlines

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Impact on Americans: Community Help

How did the community try to help the homeless and the hungry?a. Soup Kitchens, breadlines

b. Cut back on services (police; fire dept.; trash)

c. Closed schools or cut teachers salaries

d. Penny Auctions

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Impact on Americans: Penny Auctions

What is a penny auction? A lot of times during the Great Depression, farmers

could not afford to pay what they owed on their farm and would lose their farms to the bank.

The bank would then sell these ‘foreclosed’ properties at auctions

Farmers would go to the auctions and try to purchase the land for very low costs

Farmers got very upset when non-farmers came to the auctions and tried to put in high bids for the property

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Herbert Hoover

President at the beginning of the Great Depression

1929-1933

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Herbert Hoover

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President at the beginning of the Great Depression

Inaugural address, March 1929 (7 months before the Great Depression)

“We in America today are nearer to the final triumph over poverty than ever before in the history of any land. The poorhouse is vanishing from among us.

I have no fears for the future of our country. It is bright with hope.”

Herbert Hoover

Herbert Hoover was president at the beginning of the Great Depression. How did he deal with the problems in our

economy?

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Herbert Hoover

How did he deal with the problems in our economy? Many people blamed Hoover for the

Depression They felt like he did not help the American

people Hoover was like a ‘Cheerleader,’ telling

everyone it would be OK. Hoover believed that if the government helped

out too much, people would stop trying to help themselves

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Herbert Hoover

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“It is solely a question of the best method by which hunger and cold shall be prevented…I am willing to pledge myself that if the time should ever come that the voluntary agencies of the country, together with the local and state governments, are unable to find resources with which to prevent hunger and suffering in my country, I will ask the aid of every resource of the Federal Government…I have faith in the American people that such a day will not come.”

The Great Depression Begins

Franklin Delano Roosevelt

President, 1933-1944

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Franklin D. Roosevelt

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President during most of the Great Depression

“The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”

Franklin D. Roosevelt

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What is going on in this political cartoon?

Who is walking away?

What is F.D.R. carrying?

What do you think is symbolized in this cartoon?

The New Deal

Social Security ActFederal Works Programs

Environmental Improvement ProgramsFarm Assistance Programs Increased Rights for Labor

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Social Security Act

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Established a tax paid by bosses and employees

This tax is used to pay pensions (a retirement income) to older Americans (age 65 and older)

Social Security Act

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This also helps with survivors insurance (if your parent passes away and you need support)

Social Security Act

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What is the main group of Americans that benefited from the Social Security Act?

Social Security Act

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What is the main group of Americans that benefited from the Social Security Act?

The elderly, like the guy on the left.

Which president created the Social Security Act?

Federal Works Programs (WPA, PWA)

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Works Progress Administration Built roads, bridges, parks, and public

buildings like schools, and libraries.

Also, paid artists (such as Dorthea Lange) to record life during this time period.

Public Works Administration Also built roads and highways


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Works Progress Administration

This D.C. bridge was built by workers in the Works Progress Administration.

Why was confidence needed during this period?


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Works Progress Administration

What types of work did the people in the WPA do? Who benefited from the WPA?


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Public Works Administration, bridge

Federal Works Programs (CCC, TVA)

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Civilian Conservation Corps Built wildlife preserves, planted trees, built

lookout towers for fires, took care of forest roads and trails

What types of people worked in the CCC?

Federal Works Programs (CCC, TVA)

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Civilian Conservation Corps

Environmental Improvement Programs

(CCC, TVA)

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Tennessee Valley Authority Built dams in this area to control farming.

Brought electricity to farmers in this region.

Environmental Improvement Programs

(CCC, TVA)

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Tennessee Valley Authority

Farm Assistance Programs (Agricultural Adjustment Act)

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Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA) Helped farmers to get higher prices for

their crops Paid farmers to grow less crops

You get paid more money for less work!

How would this happen???

Increased Rights for Labor

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Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA): Established a minimum wage.

This made employers pay at least 25 cents/hour Set a work week of 44 hours It made it against the law for those under 16 to

work

National Industry Recovery Act (NRA): Helped labor unions by promising workers the

right to work with unions Unions would help to get better pay and work

conditions

Fair Labor Standards Act, Cartoon

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What is going on in this cartoon?

Who is the thief?

Why is that person the thief?

What did the Fair Labor Standards Act do to stop this?

National Industry Recovery Act:

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F.D.R. and the American People

Fireside ChatsBank Holidays

FDICEleanor Roosevelt

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Fireside Chats

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Weekly radio programs in which FDR spoke directly to the people about what he was trying to do to improve conditions This uplifted the spirits of the American

people

Fireside Chats

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Fireside Chats

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What does the person in the chair represent?

Why is his face bandaged?

Who is he listening to?

Bank Holiday

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4 days that the banks would be closed so the government could check bank records They could see which banks were the

strongest and could survive

The Dust Bowl

A Dusty Time in American History

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The Dust Bowl

The Great Plains regions had been over- farmed during World War I.

This led to erosion. Then, great winds moved into the region and

lasted. This picked up the soil. Tons soil were blown into the Gulf of Mexico.

Farming was impossible, and living in this area was almost impossible as well.

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The Dust Bowl

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What artist would have most likely painted a picture of this scene?

This picture shows an example of erosion in the land.

What do you think the cow things of this weather?

The Dust Bowl

Back to contentsQuestion: What regions were affected by the Dust Bowl?

The Dust Bowl

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The Dust Bowl

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What are some of the dangers of living in an area covered in dust like this?

The Dust Bowl

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The Dust Bowl

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World War II begins

1939

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Documents

The Great Depression and the 1930s 1929-1939. Table of Contents The Stock Market Crash Causes of the Great Depression Impact on Americans Herbert Hoover