The Great Depression Of The 1930s

Imagine living on a farm out west during the 1930s. In the middle of a series of terrible dust storms. The dust storms were so horrific, children were dying from “dust pneumonia” which was a result of breathing the dust in. These dust storms would trap plains settlers in their homes for hours, days at a time. This series of dust storms is better known as the Dust Bowl. It forced 3 million settlers out of their homes. Drought, increased mechanization, and destruction of grass all lead to the Dust Bowl.

In the advertisement on the billboard payed for by the Southern Pacific railroad, it says “Next time try the train and relax.” However, this implies that the railroad company is taunting them because a majority of the farming business were run into the ground. There is no way that they would be able to afford a train ticket to travel half way across the United States. Also when looking at the source, the two people in the picture who appear to be husband and wife are carrying very little with them. This is most likely the case because of the many dust storms they had encountered and nothing was salvageable to keep. This also may be the case because they couldn’t afford something such as a mule to carry their stuff and even less an automobile. This source truly shows how much poverty these farmers were in because one train ticket to the Midwest to California was a little under seventy dollars. As known, money was more valuable in the past. However, if they made as much as minimum wage in those times which was around 25 cents and they worked for 8 hours a day, they would be able to afford one train ticket in a month and change. But farmers worked countless hours a day and still couldn’t make that small amount of money. That is why most farms had to walk instead of taking the train or

Since there were no farming opportunities many people had to find new jobs. Midwesterners began to start to travel farther west to states such as California and Oregon in order to find jobs and escape the dust. These “migrant workers” fled to these western states in the thousands. According to Prentice Hall: The American Nation, these workers were not well received.

The Dust Bowl was the period of time during the Great Depression in the Southern Plains where colossal clouds and storms of dust and dirt swept through neighborhoods, farms, and houses. It left everything covered in a thick layer of dirt and sand, even blinding those temporarily whom had happened to be caught in the midst of one, plastering their lungs with all of the air’s contents. “Children died from breathing in the dust. They called it ‘dust pneumonia,’” (Background Essay). But, what caused these storms? The source of the Dust Bowl in the plains were the lack of farming experience, the excessive farming America had done, and the drought.

What led to that event was the drought, bad farming techniques and strong wind gusts (Rosenberg, 2014). First, dry weather reduced the amount of precipitation annually; as a result, crops withered from no water supply. The drought followed by farmers who continued to abuse their farms led to topsoil being exposed on the land’s surface. Finally, once wind gust came into the Great Plains, the topsoil was blown from the land’s surface into the dry air (Documentary, 2014). From there, the topsoil accumulated in the air and formed dust clouds, which the winds carried across the nation. This marks the beginning of the dust bowl. It proved to be hazardous to anything in its path, for it was similar to foggy weather, but worse. Instead of blinding eye vision, the dust storm caused an array of issues, such as burying cars, getting into people’s houses, conflicting with oxygen levels in the air and bombarding people’s mouths (Rosenberg, 2014). The dust was everywhere to exact. So much dust pushed farmers to the decision of migrating west or staying and adapting to the dust storms (Documentary, 2014). Such a decision was not simple, for either way would lead to hardship and suffering. The dust bowl was no simple storm.

“The Dust Bowl was both a manmade and natural disaster” (Klein, 2012). “[The catastrophe] revealed the darker side of entrepreneurialism, its tendency to risk long-term social and ecological damage in the pursuit of short-term, private gain, (Worster, “Dust Bowl”). Like stated previously in the Library of Congress article the Dust Bowl was caused primarily by the overgrazing of cattle as well as dry farming by farmers. During the first world war wheat farmers need to fill in the demand of crops for the allied forces in Europe. While this worked for the period of time after the war ended the fields were plowed down to the bare minimum. With no wheat or grass to hold the soil together and nothing to protect the water and

The Dust Bowl, as the majority of the people know it, was a period of time in the great plains, during the 1930’s, where some of the most severe sand storms known took place. The dust bowl lasted for about a decade and it affected New Mexico, Kansas, Texas, and Colorado. The Dust bowl lasted from 1931 to 1939. When the Drought hit the great plains, around one third of the farmers left. The dust storms caused many problems for many people, but especially the farmers that depended on the success of their crops to support their family.

The economic climate of the Great Depression intensified the effects of the Dust Bowl as many famers were already struggling to repay debts and a loss of profits due to overproduction after World War I. Some farmers were even evicted after they could not repay their debts. Such conditions led to a mass migration of rural farmers to the western regions of the country. Most migrants, referred to derogatively as “Okies”, followed Route 66 to California and other West Coast states. An estimated 2.5 million rural farmers migrated west during the 1930s and most found work as ranch hands or in the agriculture industry. However, these migrants were discriminated against and faced both poor wages and unsanitary living

Timothy Egan called it the “Worst hard time”. Over 300 storms of dust hit the South Great Plains. The panhandles of Oklahoma and Texas were hit harder than all other places. This is what is called The Dust Bowl. These dust storms hit during the midst of the Great Depression causing an even harder time for America. Dust clouds traveled at speeds up to 60 - 65 mph at 30,000 feet tall. The 3 main causes of these storms were loss of short grass prairie, new farm machinery, and lack of rain.

The dust bowl was a devastating time in the United States history that occurred during the 1930s, caused by atypically high temperatures, perpetual drought and new farming methods. Vigorous winds disturbed the topsoil, resulting in overwhelming dust storms which destroyed an immense amount of farms, in upwards of 100,000. These storms devastated the source of income for the farmers affected. The dust bowl was located in the Great Plains region, which includes the states of Oklahoma, Kansas, and Northern Texas. Thousands of workers were faced with an impasse, become a laborer, doing mindless work for miniscule wages, or move away and search for better work. (San José State University) The people brought to these decisions that chose to

In the early 1930’s the southern plains was hit with massive winds that brought a significant amount of dust and debris. Homes and peoples belongings were covered with dust. Because the dust was so thick animals and people had a hard time breathing and seeing. The dust bowl was an unsettling time for both farmers and people as they had to learn a new method of living, there only choices were to stay or move away from the dust storm. When looking into what caused the dust bowl, there are many reasons why it occurred. Since the plains was experiencing a drought during the time that the dust bowl occured, the significant amount of harvesting during the drought is the main possible cause of the dust bowl.

The Dustbowl lasted many years and many U.S. countries are suffered its consequences. Many crops were damaged from low amounts of rain, high winds and many insect infestations. Dust storms whirled through the country and tore everything to pieces. This agricultural recession contributed to many bank closures, loss of employment and even business loss. People in these areas also faced many emotional and even physical misfortunes. Water shortages were also widespread affecting many people. These shortages didn’t just impact humans, animals and plant life was also harmed.

In this time, there were many dust storms in places that grow crops because so much wheat was being grown. Also, there was a bad drought that also affected the growth of the crops. To get through this, people in other areas would send food for the people that didn’t have any at all. the government also would give out loans to the farmers, that they wouldn’t have to pay back until there were

e end of 1920s, before the great depression ended farmers were encountering hard times. As in the "Grapes of Wrath" the Joads family were required out their own farms and had to move to California to live and obtain a bright future.

The Dust Bowl events, exacerbated the effect of the concurrent Economic Crisis on the Southern States' peasant families, causing its progressive economic exhaustion, culminating in the largest migration event in the American history; hundred of thousands of families from the Southern Plain and surrounding states (Oklahoma, Arkansas, Missouri, Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas, Texas, Colorado, and New Mexico) migrated mainly westward to California, in search of land and labor opportunities to restore them dignity.