1. Chapter 21 Section 2 Americans Face Hard Times
US 2

2. Misery and Despair Grips Americas Cities
Unemployment reached 25% in 1933, had never been above 3.7% during the 1920’s
Workers who kept jobs often had hours cut and brought home significantly less money than pre-depression
Families were forced to wait on breadlines or go to soup kitchens to get their next meal
Americans sold all of their belongings to be able to pay rent and keep their homes, yet many were evicted and sent to the streets
Hoovervilles, shantytowns built in many of the nations cities, housed the homeless in makeshift tents and shacks
One of the largest Hoovervilles was located in NYC in Central Park

9. Poverty Devastates Rural America Page 712-713
What problems did farmers face during the Great Depression?
What happened to the cost of wheat and cotton between 1929 and 1932?
How many farmers lost their land between ?
Define Tenant Farmers

11. The Dust Bowl
The Great Plains region had been heavily farmed during the early 1900’s
Water was a normal problem for the region but a drought in the 1930’s was far worse than normal
By 1932 drought, loose topsoil from farming and high winds caused the “Dust Bowl”
Dust storms could be as high 8,000 feet and move up to 100 mph
Some farmers decided the combination of the dust storms and depression were too much to handle and moved West for jobs, these people were called Okies
The Dust Bowl forced the government to intervene and help farmers by building dams in western rivers to provide water to the plains

13. Impact of Depression on Family Life
Men who lost their jobs:
some worked tirelessly to find new jobs or string together enough work to get by
while others simply deserted their families becoming “Drifters”: homeless, jobless hitchhiking and riding the rails (estimated 1 million men by 1933)
birthrate dropped to the lowest in US history
Children often dropped out of school and looked for ways to find work to help the family
Divorce rate dropped (can’t afford separate households)
Wedding plans postponed
During the depression the idea of family changed, many families were broken up due to the economic strain or extended families moved in together

14. Minorities suffer hardships
African Americans were “the last to be hired, and first to be fired” according to a Howard Univ. sociologist
Lost jobs to “whites” (In South, no right to jobs if whites need them)
Unemployment at 56% by 1933 for black Americans
State and local Relief programs discriminated:
Relied on Black churches (ex. Father MJ Divine in Harlem)
Relied on National Urban League
Reasons African-Americans left South:
Many were kicked off farms where they had sharecropped
Denied civil rights: education, voting, healthcare
Increase in lynchings
There were few jobs available in the West because of the influx of Okies coming from the Plains
In the Southwest US many states worked to encourage Mexican Americans to move back to Mexico, Americans called this “repatriation”