Section 10.2

The Dream Foreclosed

Today’s Agenda

• 10.2 Slide Show

• Presentations

• Homework

• Finish reading Chapter 10.2 & begin 10.3

• Quiz on Chapter 10 Thursday (40-50 points)

"And then the dispossessed were drawn west- from Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico; from Nevada

and Arkansas, families, tribes, dusted out, tractored out. Car-loads, caravans, homeless and hungry; twenty

thousand and fifty thousand and a hundred thousand and two hundred thousand. They streamed over the

mountains, hungry and restless - restless as ants, scurrying to find work to do - to lift, to push, to pull, to pick,

to cut - anything, any burden to bear, for food. The kids are hungry. We got no place to live. Like ants scurrying for

work, for food, and most of all for land."

- John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath, 1939

• What is Steinbeck talking about?

ObjectivesAt the end of this lesson you should

be able to:• Define and describe the Dust Bowl• Define foreclosure and Penny auction• Define Okie and list 3 characteristics of their life• Compare the effects of the Depression on tenant

farmers with urban workers• Describe a Hooverville in a short paragraph• Describe how the role of fathers and mothers

were affected by the Depression• Describe the impact of the Depression socially,

physiologically and nutritionally

What was the Dust Bowl?• ecological and human disaster

that took place in the southwestern Great Plains region (Oklahoma/Texas) 1933-1934

• Term coined because as the land dried up, great clouds of dust and sand, carried by the wind, covered everything

• caused by – misuse of land – years of sustained drought

• Millions of acres of farmland became useless

• hundreds of thousands migrated to California

Dust Bowl RefugeesThe Okies

What happened to farms? • Overproduction + falling

prices = inability for farmers to pay their mortgages

• Banks foreclosed (repossessed) farms and auctioned them off

• Penny Auction- collective effort of farmers to ‘buy’ foreclosed farms/equipment at low prices and return it to original owner

Who were the Okies?• Okie = migrating homeless

Midwestern farmers (some from Oklahoma) of 1930s

• Migrated mainly to California along Route 66.

• 15% of the Oklahoma population left• Called the migrants "Okies",

regardless of whether they were actually from Oklahoma

• term was disrespectful and used in a derogatory manner, with connotations of homeless, poverty, hickishness

• Lived outside of towns in Hoovervilles

• Paid starvation wages for laborious farm labor

California: The Promised Land

What happened to tenant farmers during the Depression?

• Rented land that they farmed

• To get prices to rise government encouraged farm owners to let some land lie fallow

• Gave owners $ to buy better equipment

– No longer needed farm laborers

• Owners threw tenants off land

How were Mexican American treated during the Depression?

• Discriminated against

• More than 12 thousand (some US citizens) rounded up in 1931-34 and repatriated (sent back to Mexico)

Dust Bowl

What are Hoovervilles?

• About 2 million homeless in ’32

• Constructed temporary shelters

• Conditions varied

• Some squalid, garbage/rat laden

• Others humble but clean

Hoovervilles

How was the role of the father affected?• Traditionally the provider• Unemployment = lost

status, self-esteem• No longer the

breadwinner• Some sank into

depression• Abandonment• Others sought work daily• Kept busy (see quote on

page 341)• Painted house for 2 years

How was the role of mother affected?• Traditional role as

homemaker bolstered• Depression less drastic

effect• Controlled family budget

and rationing• Domestic industries revived• Illegal for more than 1

member of family to work for gov.

• 25% increase in female employment

Invisible Scar

What was the “Invisible Scar”?

• Psychological fear of impending disaster

–Tore some families apart

–Ashamed, less social

–Lack of hope • Marriage, children put off

–Malnourishment common

Families Fall Apart

Bruce Springsteen's Ghost of Tom

Joad