The Low family lived in North Dakota during the Depression and great dust storms of the 1930s. Once a prosperous farm family, they fall on hard times. Ann Marie Low kept a diary between 1927-1937, and her entries offer a first hand account of the drought, the depression, and the hardships faced by her family.
FDR's 1933 first inaugural address is probably his best-known speech.
The National Emergency Council carried out this Economic Report of the South in 1938 at the behest of Franklin Roosevelt, recognizing that this region had suffered more than others during the Depression. The report brought home to Washington the structural problems of the Southern economy, its failing educational system, and other problems that Southerners confronted. Social activists, scholars, and other individuals would rely heavily on this report in writing about the South.
This excerpt from the classic 1939 novel Grapes of Wrath , by John Steinbeck, illustrates the painful changes experienced by tenant farm families in Oklahoma who would be kicked off the land, to join the ranks of poor migrant farm workers in California during the Great Depression. Remember to watch the movie on Sunday, March 5, at 7pm, in Clemons 201.