1930s America Research Paper

Interviews with individuals from across the economic spectrum about the heady years after the Wall Street Crash in 1929 reveal a socially transformational period of time. Unlike previous busts, the sheer hopelessness and economic damage was almost unheard of. Furthermore, another difference when compared to previous economic downturns is the incredibly productive economy that had developed as industrialization resulted in mass-market products like automobiles and washing machines becoming accessible to many Americans in the roaring 1920s. The United States’ leadership community, whether in business or politics, was totally ill-equipped to handle such a change in circumstances when, before the Great Crash, production growth was considered the penultimate method to increase prosperity, as exemplified by the spread of Taylorism and also President Hoover’s inept attempts to stabilize the economy at the turn of the 1930s. In turn, many individuals began to view the economy as a rigged system that benefitted the well-connected and

punished those already suffering from unfortunate circumstances.
All of the interviewees described harrowing experiences as the Great Depression unfolded.

The first among those individuals to experience the turmoil was Arthur A. Robertson, a wealthy businessman from New York City that witnessed numerous suicides of colleagues and friends as, for example, “one day you saw the prices at a hundred, the next day at $20, at $15.” (page 66). Ed Paulsen, a transient young man from rural South Dakota during the Great Depression, however, stated that “in small towns out West, we didn’t know there was a Crash” (page 30). He continued by stating that the stock market did not mean “a dang thing” (page 30). Peggy Terry, an elderly woman living in Chicago during her interview, witnessed a Hooverville roughly ten square miles in size when driving with her family through Oklahoma City; “Here were all these people living in old, rusted-out car bodies…One family with a whole lot of kids were living in a piano box” (page

50).
In contrast to the sheer poverty witnessed by the interviewees, they also observed arbitrary wealth dependent largely on circumstances outside of one’s control. According to Peggy Terry, only one family on her street, known as the Barr family, had enough to eat because the husband worked at an ice plant. As a result, the Barr family realized its fortunate situation as they made sure to offer food and other goods to neighbors whenever possible (page 6. Robertson’s interview really crystallizes the great excesses of wealth and prosperity that existed before the Great Crash; “you saw people who yesterday rode around in Cadillacs lucky now to have a carfare” (page 67). Additionally, his off-handed descriptions of vast sums of money when looking back at his own financial endeavors in the 1930s further highlights the incredible inequality of the time period when contrasted with the poverty felt by so many.
Interviewees’ insights into the Great Depression changed their underlying perception of how the economy operated. Even Arthur Robertson, a man who made millions within the financial system, revealed deep-seated suspicions of bankers and those who’s fortunes were “all on paper” (page 66). Simply put, people struggled to try and understand what was happening. According to Ed Paulsen, there were “guys on baskets, making weird speeches, phony theories on economics” (page 30). Even with this struggle to comprehend exactly what was happening, overall, Peggy Terry seems to best describe how many felt toward the system; “Among the people that I knew, we all had an understanding that it wasn’t our fault. It was something that had happened to the machinery” (page 47).