Life in the New Deal Era Section 3 Chapter 25

 America's Gross National Product 1928 to 1939:  1928$100 billion  1933$55 billion  1939$85 billion  Amount of consumer goods brought 1928 to 1939:  1928$80 billion  1933$45 billion  1939$65 billion  Private investment in industry:  1928$15 billion  1933$2 billion  1939$10 billion

The Dust Bowl and Migration  50 million-acre region into a wasteland  Great dust clouds hundreds of miles out to sea  Little farms were buried  CCC planting trees from Texas to Canada  Mass migration from plains to California  Headed West on Route 66  Oklahoma = Okies

Competition for migrant work  Mexican Americans began arriving in California but were discriminated against in many New Deal Programs  Competition with Filipino Americans  During 1920’s Filipino population had grown 30,000  Worked in Agriculture  Filipino’s organized and protested wage reductions  Field Workers Union = Mexican and Filipino laborers

Picturing Life in the Depression  Photographs were taken by the federal government  Roosevelt believed these photographs would change opponents minds  FSA pictures were featured in LIFE and TIME magazines  Roy E. Stryker head of the FSA historical section hires  Walker Evans – Sharecroppers in Alabama  Gordon Parks – Filmmaker  Margaret Bourke-White and Dorothea Lange – international photojournalists

Picturing Life Continued  Dorothea Lange was most talented  Studied photography and set out to tour world  By time she reached San Francisco she was out of money  Opened a portrait studio and during depression took pictures of homeless  Hired by federal government  Migrant mother is considered a masterpiece  Inspired Californians to defy state’s powerful growers’ associations  Insisted on decent, gov’t sponsored housing for seasonal harvesters

Pictures from the Dust Bowl

Pictures from Dust Bowl

Evaluating the New Deal  Many families untouched by New Deal reforms  NYA helped boost family incomes so children could stay in school  Critics claimed New Deal created a welfare state  Promoted deficit spending  Federal gov’t/President became to involved in economy  Supporters argued that expanded role was necessary  New Deal established minimum standards for working  Relieved suffering of many Americans  FDIC, SSA, SEC  Rea – in 1935 only 11% of farms had electricity, by % had electricity  Electricity let the South diversify its economy and rely less on cash crops

Portraying the Depression  Federal Project Number One  Provide work to artists in field of writing, theater, music, and visual arts  Novels  Grapes of Wrath – John Steinbeck  Native Son – Richard Wright  Gone with the Wind – Margaret Mitchell

Portraying the Depression Continued  Films  Gold-Diggers – Ginger Rogers   Mr. Deeds Goes to Town – Frank Capra  Corruption of wealthy and politicians  Theater  Examples of ideas destroying the county  Examples of traditional American Values

Music and Painters  Country Music became popular due to Grand Ole Opry radio show  Gospel Music – cross between traditional spirituals and jazz  Swing Music – smooth big band style    Jacob Lawrence – Painted African American Heroes  Georgia O’Keeffe – Painted southwestern desert landscape  Regionalists = Midwestern artist stressed local folk themes  Grant Wood – American Gothic

American Gothic