This document summarizes key events and impacts of the Great Depression in the United States. It describes the stock market crash of 1929 that marked the start of the Depression. It then discusses the causes of the widespread economic downturn, including weaknesses in the US economy, uneven wealth distribution, and global factors. The summary outlines some of the most significant effects of the Depression such as soaring unemployment, the Dust Bowl crisis, and hardships faced by women, minorities, and families. It also examines cultural and political impacts including the failure of President Hoover's policies to alleviate the crisis and the election of Franklin Roosevelt in 1932 on a platform of a "New Deal" approach.

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23: The Great Depression
Alan Brinkley, The Unfinished Nation, 8th Edition

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The Coming of the Depression
– Soaring stock market
• The Great Crash
– “Black Tuesday”

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The Coming of the Depression
(Continued)
• Causes of the Depression
– Weaknesses in the U.S. economy
– Poor economic diversification
– Uneven distribution of wealth
– Credit structure of the economy
– Global factors
– International debt structure

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The Coming of the Depression
(Continued, 2)
• Progress of the Depression
– Banking crisis
– Plunging GNP

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The Hungry
Hundreds of men wait to be fed outside the Municipal Lodging House in
New York City.
© Bettmann/Corbis

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The American People in Hard Times
• Unemployment and Relief
– Soaring industrial unemployment
– “Dust Bowl”
– “Okies”

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The American People in Hard Times
(Continued)
• African Americans and the Depression
– Soaring black unemployment
– Scottsboro case

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The American People in Hard Times
(Continued, 2)
• Hispanics and Asians in Depression America
– Hispanic workers targeted
– Plight of Asian Americans

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Chinatown,
New York City
A Chinese man carries a “sandwich board” through the streets of New York City's Chinatown
bearing the latest news of the war between China and Japan, which in 1938 was well under
way. Chinese Americans had the duel challenge in the 1930s of dealing both with large-scale
unemployment and with continuing news of catastrophe from China, where most still had
family members.
© Hulton Archive/Getty Images

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The American People in Hard Times
(Continued, 3)
• Women and Families in the Great Depression
– Female wage earners
– Declining marriage and birthrates

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The Depression and American Culture
• Depression Values
– Prevailing values reinforced
– Dale Carnegie

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The Depression and American Culture
(Continued)
• Radio
– Radio’s mass popularity
– Escapist programming
– The Hindenburg crash

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The Depression and American Culture
(Continued, 2)
• The Movies
– Hollywood’s self-censorship
– Films of Frank Capra
– Escapist comedies
– Walt Disney
– Stereotypes in film

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The Depression and American Culture
(Continued, 3)
• Literature and Journalism
– Novels and magazines
– Life magazine
– Depression-era fiction
– John Dos Passos
– John Steinbeck

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The Depression and American Culture
(Continued, 4)
• The Popular Front and the Left
– Popular Front alliances
– Lincoln Brigade
– The Socialist Party message
– Leftist ideas in the arts
– The Plow that Broke the Plains (1936)

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Migrant Family
This photograph by the Great Depression photographer Dorothea Lange portrays a family of
migrants leaving Texas in search of work in California. It suggests the plight of hundreds of
thousands of families who fled the regions affected by drought in the 1930s—a devastation
that became known as the Dust Bowl.
© Granger, NYC—All Rights Reserved.

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The Ordeal of Herbert Hoover
• The Hoover Program
– Failure of voluntary cooperation
– Agricultural Marketing Act
– Hawley-Smoot Tariff
– “Hoovervilles”
– The RFC

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The Ordeal of Herbert Hoover
(Continued)
• Popular Protest
– Farmers’ Holiday Association
– The “Bonus Army”
– Demise of the Bonus Army

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The Ordeal of Herbert Hoover
(Continued, 2)
• The Election of 1932
– Franklin Delano Roosevelt
– “A New Deal”
– FDR elected

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The Election of 1932
Like the election of 1928, the election of 1932 was exceptionally one-sided. But this time, the
landslide favored the Democratic candidate, Franklin Roosevelt, who overwhelmed Herbert
Hoover in all regions of the country except New England. Roosevelt obviously benefited
primarily from popular disillusionment with Hoover's response to the Great Depression.

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The Ordeal of Herbert Hoover
(Continued, 3)
• The “Interregnum”
– Banking collapse

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America in the World
• The Global Depression
©Hulton Archive/Getty Images

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Consider the Source
• Mr. Tarver Remembers the Great Depression

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Patterns of Popular Culture
• The Golden Age of Comic Books
© Hulton Archive/Getty Images

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The Unfinished Nation, 8th Edition
Next: Chapter 24
The New Deal