1. Impact of the Great Depression
Essential Questions:
How did the Great Depression impact city and
1.
rural life?
What was the Dust Bowl?
2.
How did the Great Depression socially and
3.
psychologically impact people?
How did the Great Depression impact the politics
4.
of the 1930s?

2. Life in the Cities
 Across the nation people lost
their jobs
 They were evicted from their
homes and ended up in the
streets
 Many were forced to build
makeshift shacks out of scrap
material in which to live
 Shantytowns – or little towns
consisting of shacks – sprang up
across the nation
 The poor dug through garbage
cans or begged
 Bread lines, or lines of people
waiting to receive food provided
by charitable organizations
became common sight

3. Rural Life
 One advantage it had
over city life was that
farmers could grow food
for their families
 But due to the fall in
crop prices many
farmers lost their farms
 Many farmers were
forced to turn to tenant
farming and barely
scrape out a living

4. The Dust Bowl
 The 1930s drought wreaked
havoc on the Great Plains
 Farmers used tractors to
break up the grasslands and
plant millions of acres of new
farmland
 But plowing removed the
thick protective layer of
prairie grasses
 When the drought and the
winds began in the 1930s
nothing was left to hold the
soil down
 Farmers and their families
fled west, many moving
along Route 66 to California

5. Social and Psychological Effects
Many were demoralized by the hard

times
 Between 1928 &1932 the suicide rate
rose
 3x as many were admitted to mental
hospitals
Many were forced to make economic

comprises
 Many adults stopped going to the doctor
or dentist because they couldn’t afford it
 Young people gave up their college
dreams
During the Great Depression, as many

as 300,000 transients, or “hobos”
wandered the country
But, during the Depression, many

people donated food, clothing, and a

6. Herbert Hoover
Hoover believed that one the of

government’s chief functions was to
foster cooperation between
competing groups and interests in
society
On the other hand many Americans

valued “rugged individualism”
 Idea that people should succeed
through their own efforts
Hoover opposed any form of

government welfare
 He believed handouts would
weaken people’s self-respect and
“moral fiber”
Boulder Dam (Hoover Dam)

 One of the public works project
supported by Hoover that did work
and provided jobs to men in need
of work

7. 1930 and 1932
Democrats took advantage of the

horrible economic times and won
enough seats to gain control of the
House and Senate in the 1930
Congressional elections
By 1930 people were calling

“Shantytowns” – “Hoovervilles”
Hoover’s Policies

 As the depression dragged on and
it was clear Hoover’s policies
weren’t working
 He finally supported laws that had
the Federal government take a
more direct involvement in the
issue
 It was too little to late
In 1932, with Hoover’s image at an

all time low he faced an election

8. Franklin Roosevelt
 Franklin D. Roosevelt was
President from 1933 to 1945
 Only President to be reelected
three times
 As Governor of New York he ran
for President by promising a
quot;New Dealquot; for the American
people
 Relief programs, measures to
increase employment and to aid
industrial and agricultural
recovery from the Great
Depression marked Roosevelt's
time in office
 Americans who lived through
the Depression had passionate
feelings about Roosevelt