The Worst Hard Time Summary

Many consider the Great Depression a tragedy but few actually know the ways in which it actually affected the people who lived through it. One way it affected the people of the time is the hopelessness it brought. During the early 1920's many men returned from the "Great War" jaded and angry. The same effect was seen in most people during the depression. It was this hopelessness that spawned modernist literature and thought. Another way the depression affected the everyday man was the loss of homes. Many homes were foreclosed during the depression and this left many homeless. In fact the "Okies" were people left homeless after farm foreclosures. The last way the depression affected people was the broken homes it caused. The number of father's leaving their families rose dramatically during

The novel is set during the Great Depression in the 1930’s. During this time, many

During the 1920’s, America was a prosperous nation going through the “Big Boom” and loving every second of it. However, this fortune didn’t last long, because with the 1930’s came a period of serious economic recession, a period called the Great Depression. By 1933, a quarter of the nation’s workers (about 40 million) were without jobs. The weekly income rate dropped from $24.76 per week in 1929 to $16.65 per week in 1933 (McElvaine, 8). After President Hoover failed to rectify the recession situation, Franklin D. Roosevelt began his term with the hopeful New Deal. In two installments, Roosevelt hoped to relieve short term suffering with the first, and redistribution of money amongst the poor with the second. Throughout these years of the

Just this one person took many intersting jobs, and these are just a few; sold iron cords, picked peaches, worked the strip mines, cut boys hair, hung wallpaper, sold coal orders, and worked on the WPA. This was only one person, in a family of three. That family before was rich, but during these hard times, they lived off of pennies and dimes. They had gotten rid of milk delivery, ice delivery, most of their gas range, evening paper, and they had sold their car. The only reason they survived the Great Depression was because of the father's willingness to take any job, and the mother's ability to stretch every penny as far as it could

America (U.S) has economically hit its highs and lows over its 2 ½ centuries of its existence, but none have been more surprising than the Great Depression period from 1929-1933. During first major low in society the stock market crashed due to citizen’s overuse of credit. This wasn’t the only problem there was also a great drought in America’s agricultural plains. Many farmers lost their crops and most of their land, creating a small scale famine in the U.S. People were laid off and people couldn’t provide for their family. One citizen during this time still had a vivid memory of these times,”In New York neighborhoods adults stood in so called 'bread lines,' children begged in the streets.”

“The Dirty Thirties”, was a period in American history in which a severe series of dust storms (often called “dusters”, “black blizzards” and “sand blows”) engulfed The Dust Bowl, a section of the Great Plains of the United States that extended over southeastern Colorado, southwestern Kansas, sections of Texas and Oklahoma, and northeastern New Mexico. The aftermath of the dust storms were drought, windblown dust and agricultural decline all of which caused The Dust Bowl to turn into a dry, barren, and desert-like landscape. Timothy Egan ,author of The Worst Hard Time, employs an impressionistic and bleak tone to the reader through use of literary devices such as pathos, sensory imagery, diction,syntax, and amplification.

It consists of an array of artworks, pictures, and photographs along with verbal description of the various conditions of the working class during the great depression starting from the events which led to various riots and violent acts by the working class and a clash between the capitalist class, government, and the working class (M. Elizabeth Boone, 2006). It depicts the California Labor School’s establishment; workers’ disenfranchisement from the service economy; movement of farm workers; and the demographics of the workers changing. The photographs depicted are of Tina Modotti, Otto Hagel, Dorothea Lange, and Emmanuel Joseph while paintings are of Hung Liu and Diego Rivera. The book consists of five chapters taking the audience through the journey of the working class during the great depression (M. Elizabeth Boone,

The document begins with a recount of how life was during the Great Depression by Morey Skaret. By the time he began high school, the whole town was well into the Great Depression. (America Firsthand 187) He graduated with his diploma and later became a bum to help relieve the load on the home place. (America Firsthand 187) Morey and his good friend, Charlie Shellfisher, left Seattle in the spring and returned before the winter. Charlie and Morey usually rode freight trains and when a gondola car was empty of grain or coal, they would get shelter from the wind inside. If they couldn’t get inside a freight car, they would then catch a passenger train and “ride the blinds”. (America Firsthand 187) On one occasion they had been scrambling out from under a car to face a railway ss23security officer in Cheyenne, Wyoming. He promptly had asked them how much money they had on them and when they answered that they did not have any he took them under arrest. They later had figured out that when someone in town needed workers, the railway security officers would provide the. They spent four days carrying books from one side of the street to the other. They spent three nights in jail, where their meals would arrive in a bucket. (America Firsthand 188) They then skipped to the next town over where Charlie became sick. Morey had left him inside a box filled with newspaper to try and keep him warm while he went to look for work. He ended up cleaning the trashcans of a baker who in return

Even though the conditions were rough for a lot of Americans, the great Depression has some what of a positive effect on the people of this countrie. The Great Depression made people realize that they need to be thankful for what they had because everything can go wrong in a short amount of time. I also believed it showed people that having a positive attitude, even in the roughest of times, is what will pull them through the hardships in the end. All three of the passages that I read has these two things in common. Everyone in all of the passages maintained a positive attitude and believed that things would get better eventually. They also all were thankful for everything that they had, even though they all had very little.

(66-86) Because The Worst Hard Time is a historical novel, it lacks many of the same literary elements as other novel genres. For example, anecdotes and motifs are not very commonly utilized. Regardless, the way it graphically paints the stark setting of the Dust Bowl. The book has an interesting structure: it displays the story through the stories of many families that intertwine

The Great Depression broke down security and belief in American society during the early 20th century and brought out hidden prejudices. The once optimistic mood during the Roaring 20’s turned to pain. The dire economic situation caused Americans to return to past social stigmas where certain groups of people were seen as inferior; as a result, the American Dream, where everyone could seek their ideal of success, was reduced to merely a dream. John Steinbeck observed these changes in social behavior and witnessed the plight of many Americans during the Great Depression. Like in his later work, The Grapes of Wrath, he was inspired by his environment to expose the lives of people during the Great Depression using Of Mice and Men. Steinbeck observed these changes in social behavior and witnessed the plight of many Americans during the Great Depression. Steinbeck demonstrates in Of Mice and Men through the characters that the American Dream was naturally discriminatory towards certain groups of people because of common perceptions held during that period.

The 1920s seemed to promise a future of a new and wonderful way of life for America and its citizens . Modern science, evolving cultural norms, industrialization, and even jazz music heralded exciting opportunities and a future that only pointed up toward a better life. However, cracks in the facade started to show, and beginning with the stock market crash of 1929 the wealth of the country, and with it the hopes and expectations of its people, began to slip away. The Great Depression left a quarter of the population unemployed and much of the rest destitute and uncertain of what the future held. Wealth vanished, people took their money out of banks, and plans were put on hold. The most significant way in which the Great Depression affected Americans’ everyday lives was through poverty because it tore relationships apart and damaged the spirit of society while unexpectedly bringing families together in unity.

  The Story sets its phase amid the Great Depression. This period was a period of turmoil for most families, the same number of attempted to make a decent living because

The three men in this photo look very inadequate as they are waiting for the doors to open where they work. Walter Evans’s depiction of life and the people during the Great Depression of the 1930s is infuriated, overwhelmed, and inferior. The photo took place on South Street, New York were many americans were scrambling around willing to push their body to the limits to keep their job. Approximately 13-15 million assiduous women and men lost their jobs to the horrid times of the Great Depression for example it brought many American’s hardship and cause people to become homeless. The photo represent the misfortune of the hard times these three men are going threw for example the man on the left is reading a newspaper with a weary expression

The world has depended on its resources for millions of years and John Steinbeck has put the resources to work in a dependent way through the labor of his writing. Steinbeck gives the reader something that everyone can relate to. He allows the public to connect to an emotional level by presenting the reader with a blend of social consciousness and sentimental value to bring out the true inner self. Work in literature can appear to be so simple, but yet have such a complex and deep meaning. Due to the stock market crash in October 1929, majority of the public was wiped off their feet and thrown face first in the dirt. This unparalleled time period was known as The Great Depression. The Depression changed many lives drastically in a melancholy way and brought out the real values in people that were never seen before. Nearly every family went from living a mediocre lifestyle to being struck in a disposition with poverty. Even those who have inherited abundant amounts of money were no longer able to flaunt all they had received. Steinbeck’s writing does not demonstrate the shallow outside picture; his writing gets into the deep gritty detail that brings out the real values of the desired time period. John Steinbeck contributed to the American voice by drawing the reader out of their own reality and into his own fantasy by giving the character’s relatable traits through their actions and not their words. With this in mind it is