Week 9

Week 9

Depression and Response

Monday: Hoover and Roosevelt
Wednesday: Evaluating the New Deal
Friday: American Culture During the Depression

DISCUSSION SECTIONS: The Depression, the New Deal, and Social Welfare.

READINGS:

1.McElvaine, Down and Out in the Great Depression, p. 33-end.
2.Documents: Herbert Hoover, Rugged Individualism Speech (1928), Franklin D. Roosevelt, Inaugural Address (1932).
3.William E. Leuchtenburg, "The Roosevelt Reconstruction: Retrospect" (1963).

ADDITIONAL INTERNET RESOURCES:

1.The WPA Federal Writers Project (excerpts)
http://rs6.loc.gov/wpaintro/wpahome.html
2.Images from the Farm Security Administration and Office of War Information Files.
http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/fsowhome.html
3.The Scottsboro Boys
http://www.afroam.org/history/scott/scotts.html

WRITTEN ASSIGNMENT:

The goal of the assignment is to consider the human side of the thirties. What happened when there was severe economic want in this "land of opportunity?" To this end, answer one of the two questions below:

1. Write a one-two page essay describing your family's experience during the Great Depression.

2. On the basis of your reading of these letters, write a brief one-two page essay describing one of the ways in which Americans responded to the Great Depression and why you think they responded in this way. (You should not try to cover the wide variety of responses to the Depression in this assignment. Just pick out one strand which was most striking to you and discuss it.)

created: February 10, 2000
last updated: February 28, 2000