The Great Depression

By Jaime, Rebecca G, Kali, Ashtyn, Christine

People waiting in a ‘bread line’ for free food, Kentucky

The famous picture “Migrant Mother” has become a symbol of the Great Depression in America.

Before we start…

• We have a game to play that will help show you what life was like for a typical family during the Great Depression.

• Imagine you are living in the Great Depression. We will give you 2 minutes to write a grocery list for ‘your’ family of five. At the end of the time, we will tell you if you went over your allowed money in food stamps for the week…of course, we won’t be telling you how much you should spend

Here are your choices

• These prices are for ONE bag/serving of each• Total up the amount spent• Tomatoes 0.18 ; potatoes 0.25; carrots 0.16; cabbage 0.05;

onions 0.08; dried beans 0.04; dried peas 0.06; brown bread 0.60; oats 0.15 ; flour 0.10; rice 0.15; cheese 0.15; roast 0.46; beef 0.08; butter 0.26; peanut butter 0.08; shortening 0.08; molasses 0.13; sugar 0.10

• http://www.online-stopwatch.com/

• One week’s food allowance for a family of five: $4.58

• In order to get this allowance, you must be financially dependent, be a male, turn in your liquor permit, turn in your license plate/driver’s license, remove telephone from your house, register for unemployment, do community service, and allow investigators to check in on your home.

Why did the Great Depression happen?

• Key cause was the great Stock Market crash on October 29, 1929. Other factors included inflated prices and overproduction.

• Investors had borrowed tons of money from the banks, but when the market crashed, they didn’t have money to pay back the banks…this caused huge debt, unemployment, and weakened economies globally

Some quick numbers…

• In America, production declined almost 50%

• In Canada, 30% of the workforce was unemployed

• It was common to see people selling apples, in place of panhandling

How was this a factor in WW2?

• America’s financial crisis caused economic failures globally. Up until the stock market crash, America had been giving Germany money to help them rebuild their economy- this stopped with the start of the great depression.

• It led to political extremism and helped Adolf Hitler’s rise to power.

Sources

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/243118/Great-Depression

http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/Bierman.crashhttp://economics.about.com/od/recessions/a/greatdepression.htm

The Depression Years: Canada in the 1930s by Paul Mennil

Glencoe World History by National Geographic