The past month or so, I have spent reading ‘Hard Times’ by Studs Terkel written in 1970. It is a collection of oral histories from many people of various classes, various cultures, and various ages who recalled the Great Depression and its effect on their lives. I believe many people today are so far removed from those times, that they could never imagine it happening again. One fellow, a con man, named Doc Graham, thought that if there was a Depression today that people would kill themselves. He thought people quit all too easily today, looking for a way out always. Doc Graham believed that the people from those times were a different breed of people today. The people who survived were self sufficient, many living on farms outside the cities. Some of the rural areas were depressed anyhow and as one person said, it was easier when you had nothing. Many could not understand people killing themselves over money. Those who had money lost nearly everything, were also often the ones who committed suicide. Doc Graham had no love for FDR, in fact he voted against him four times. He felt FDR was a con man also who told lots of fairy tales. Many thought FDR saved the society, but Doc’s thoughts were simple. What would have saved society would be if FDR’s parents never met. The only good thing FDR did was to end Prohibition.
                 This piece is going to give you a glimpse of people and their experiences. I wanted to write about things which I felt important to learn from this generation. When I think of the views held by many today, that the government is going to be the answer to our worries, this book tells a different story. In 1929, the economic troubles of that time were different than today as the unemployment was extremely high, maybe twenty- five percent. One man named Arthur Robertson told about how the Government came to the aid of the big banks, and the Government’s attitude being ‘Holier than Thou”. Everyone could afford stock. All a person needed was 15 or 20 bucks and the broker would front the other eighty percent. This was the beginning of the problems which lead to the collapse, similar to the problems today when the banks loaned huge amounts of money to lenders with nearly no capital. One person stated that nobody had any idea that the financial market was ready to crash, not even the bankers and certainly not the government. “The Government kept telling us things would get better.”  I would recommend renting John Ford’s classic movie, “The Grapes of Wrath” I think it was an accurate depiction of life in the Midwest for many people. The story is compelling.
                 Jim Sheridan told about the Bonus Marchers, who were soldiers who had fought for Democracy in Germany. Someone got the idea that the soldiers should all march to Washington to demand their bonus money because they needed it now. Word spread fast. Some of these ‘bums’ would stay in the wooded areas near the train stations. The fellas working on the train would come out and ask how many would be boarding, without the knowledge of the authorities. Then they would load a few extra boxcars at the end of the train for those hitching a ride. Sheridan said there were 50 or 60 to a boxcar sometimes. They went from town to town on their way to DC and bummed food or whatever they might need. He said there was camaraderie then as people were all in the same situation. They were not afraid of strangers passing through town, like today. He had one very strong memory of a man traveling with his wife and baby. Everyone on the train knew the baby was crying from hunger. At the next stop, he and a friend bummed a baby bottle from a store after explaining the situation. Then they bummed some milk to put in the bottle. When they got back to the train, he offered the bottle to the wife. She looked at her husband for approval and he refused. The next journey was through some very smoky tunnels and some of the smoke backed into the boxcar. At the end of the tunnel ride, he heard screaming. It was the woman with the baby. The baby had died….from starvation. The train rides for the Bonus Marchers brought thousands to Washington DC where they were beaten with bats and had the military and American Legions turn on them. 
                     The Federal Trade Commissioner ,Everette McIntyre, told how President Hoover did not like all these bonus marchers circling the White House and camping out with their families. It was clogging up Pennsylvania Avenue. There were about 20,000 to 40,000 people who came from across the country for their bonuses. MacArthur, Patton and Eisenhower all took part in fighting the bonus marchers. Bayonettes were used on the crowd and in some cases ears were cut off. One bonus marcher man was killed. Bricks were thrown and tear gas was also used. The marchers left empty handed.
                     Martin Devries , interviewed showed no hesitancy when asked how he felt about FDR. I found his story interesting because his convictions are the same as mine and I have never seen bad times. He despised FDR. Martin said that not all the people on Wall Street are bad. He blamed Wall Street some and especially the new Securities and Exchange Commission, one founder being Joseph Kennedy. He states that ‘The New Dealers’ felt like they had some mission to perform after hearing FDR’s fireside chats. His complaint was, “We are paying taxes and NOT asking for anything. Everyone is asking for Relief and expects our money to help them out. A certain amount is ok… but when they strip you clean, it’s unfair.” Precisely these are my own sentiments.
                     Some of the common feelings stated by several interviewed were since times were bad, there were socialist and maybe communist feelings. Many people bartered to survive. One family owned a silver dollar. They had an agreement with their local market that they would sometimes pay with their silver dollar. The market proprietor waited until the family came back with a dollar and exchanged it back for their silver dollar. This process was repeated many times. If you had land and were able to keep it, you could survive. Many people would struggle to pay the mortgage and went hungry. 
                    One  woman , Phyllis Lorimer, told that her brother was attending college at Dartmouth. Her father had been a motion picture movie director, and her parents were divorced. For a time she attended a boarding school. When she could no longer get any pencils at school, because the school was not paying its bills, she was mortified. That was when she realized the Depression was real. She had no idea that the Depression was a national thing. Her family spent all their money to support the brother away at Dartmouth. She and her mother survived eating canned bully beef. Her mother made light of things and perhaps somehow protected her daughter from the harsh realities. When her brother came home from Dartmouth, he was shocked at how they were living. He was undone by the Depression. Phyllis said that she learned more about life from her brother’s reaction to the Depression. “There was a respect for those who did and no respect for those who had”
                     Another woman told how her father had 4 houses left to him and that he lost them all one by one during the depression. When he lost his job, he moved his family into a double wide garage to live rent free for seven years. She remembers how cold she was and that they all wore their clothes to bed at night. They had a coal stove and melted snow on a pan atop the stove to wash their faces.
                     Dorothea Bernstein told how she was raised in an orphan home back in 1933. She said on Fridays, all 125 of the kids at the orphanage would give the “hard luck guys” their lunch bags which consisted of mashed sardine sandwiches and mayonnaise. A friend of hers had owned a grocery store and was keeper of the books. In those times, you would never ask a customer for money, you would just write their name in the book because you did not want to take away from their family food. She thought this way you really were not giving it away and eventually you would be paid. Dorothea told of running into a girl she had once known in childhood. She went up to the woman and tried to confirm her identity, but the woman said it must be a case of mistaken identity. Dorothea had seen her several times after that and knew it was the woman she recalled as a kid. Her only explanation was there was so much stigma for many living through those bad times.
                     I particularly enjoyed Yip Harburg’s story. If you are not familiar with his claim to fame, you can hear Rudy Vallee’s rendition of the song Harburg wrote, “Brother Can You Spare a Dime” on Youtube.  The Depression allowed his creativity to come alive. Perhaps it was because there were absolutely no distractions, only time to focus on your passion. “When the media heard the song, they tried to suppress it… but it was too late…the song had already done its damage.”
                         Another story told by a doctor and of a march he witnessed sometime in 1934. He said there were “hundreds of people, all silent, no enthusiasm and no banners…just desperation, ragged people.” People fainted from hunger in these times. The middle class had no medical care, while the poor had free care and of course the rich could afford medical care.
                         One man, Charles Stewart Mott, who was age 94 at the time of the interview, was the oldest member of the board of GM and a mayor three times. He claimed that FDR ruined the country. Our dime had the face of Our Great Destroyer, FDR. His thoughts were that the country could never recover from what FDR did in time of crisis.
                     Another young man interviewed was born to a wealthy family. He said his father always said he should’ve gone to college and worked harder ( So many blamed themselves when they lost their jobs or fell on bad times) The fact was a lot of people made money during the Depression, like Joe Kennedy. The little guys always get screwed
over by the big guys.
                     I was very interested in reading stories of those away at Yale and Harvard and how they were so insulated to what was happening across the Nation. One fellow wrote of the upper classmen coming back for visits and telling how great and easy a life it was on Wall Street, when later he noticed these same boys were back at school after the Crash. This same man, Gordon Baxter replied, “The World rushed in on us suddenly”
 So I suppose this is where I will end this piece. There are many more stories to put together to give you a broader view of what life was really like across the country. I will be working on part two in a short while.
 

 
 http://blog.likes2write.com/2009/05/27/interviews-from-the-great-depression-part-two.aspx   (PART TWO)