Chapter 24
The Great Depression
1929-1933
Section 1: Prosperity Shattered
• Recount why financial experts issued warnings
about business practices during the 1920s.
• Describe why the stock market crashed in
1929.
• Understand how the banking crisis and
subsequent business failures signaled the
beginning of the Great Depression.
• Analyze the main causes of the Great
Depression.
Objective 1: Recount why financial experts issued
warnings about business practices during the 1920s.
• Identify the warnings that financial experts
issued during the 1920s:
• 1 Agricultural crisis
• 2 Sick industry
• 3 Consumers buying on credit
• 4 Stock speculation
• 5 Deion is # 1
Objective 1: Recount why financial experts issued
warnings about business practices during the 1920s.
• Why did the public ignore these warnings:
• 1 Economy was booming
• 2 People believed it would continue to grow
Objective 2: Describe why the stock market
crashed in 1929.
Factors That Caused the Stock Market Crash
1. Rising interest rates
2. Investors sell stocks
3. Stock prices plunge
4. Heavy sells continue
The
Crash
Objective 3: Understand how the banking crisis and
subsequent business failures signaled the beginning of
the Great Depression.
Depositor
withdrawal
Banking Crisis
Default on loans
Margin calls
The Banking Crisis
and Subsequent
Business Failures
Unable to obtain
resources
Business Failures
Lay-offs and
closings
Objective 4: Analyze the main causes
of the Great Depression.
• Main causes of the Great Depression and how
it contributed to the depression:
• Global economic crises, the U.S didn’t have
foreign consumers.
• The income gap deprived businesses of
national consumers
• The consumers debt led to economic chaos
Section 2: Hard Times
• Describe how unemployment during the Great
Depression affected the lives of American
workers.
• Compare and contrast the hardships that urban
and rural residents faced during the depression.
• Analyze how the Great Depression affected family
life and the attitudes of Americans.
• Explain how popular culture provided an escape
from the Great Depression.
Objective 1: Describe how unemployment during the
Great Depression affected the lives of American
workers.
• Economically
People only spent money on food; African
Americans lost their jobs; jobs for women
increased; reduced salary and hours
• Psychologically
-emotional problems; stress, depression
Objective 2: Compare and contrast the
hardships that urban and rural residents faced
during the depression.
Rural
Urban
Hunger, unemployment,
homelessness,
mutual aid,
charitable help
Crops rot, and kill
animals, foreclosures,
immigrants faced
deportation, share
cropping ended (African
Americans), farmers
helped by buying
neighbors foreclosures,
then gave back
Objective 3: Analyze how the Great Depression affected
family life and the attitudes of Americans.
• Suicide rates increased
• Low birthrate and marriages
• Families doubled-up to live together; children
moved in with parents
• Divorce rates increased
• Guilt, depression, boredom; crime increases
• Roles of men and women switched
Objective 4:Explain how popular culture
provided an escape from the Great Depression.
• Reading, playing games at home
• Movies; low-ticket prices, double features,
cartoons
• Radio programs
• Books that describes a perfect or imperfect
world
• Baseball
Section 3: Hoover’s Policies
• Explain why President Hoover opposed
government-sponsored direct relief for needy
individuals during the Great Depression.
• Outline the Hoover administration’s attempts to
solve the economic problems of the depression,
and analyze the success of these efforts.
• Relate how radicals and veterans responded to
President Hoover’s policies.
• Analyze why Franklin D. Roosevelt was such a
popular candidate in the 1932 election.
Objective 1: Explain why President Hoover opposed
government-sponsored direct relief for needy
individuals during the Great Depression.
1. Individuals and business should support each
other.
2. Government relief would create a
bureaucracy.
People should support the government, but
government should not support the people.
Objective 2: Outline the Hoover administration’s
attempts to solve the economic problems of the
depression, and analyze the success of these efforts.
The Hoover Administration and The Great Depression
EFFORT
DESCRIPTION
EFFECTIVENESS
Public-works programs
Poured money into public
construction projects such
as the Boulder Dam—later
renamed Hoover Dam
Failed to affect the
entrenched depression
Agricultural Efforts
Created the Federal Farm
Board; made loans,
established cooperatives,
and bought surplus goods
Helped some farmers take
advantage of cooperatives
and avoid foreclosure, but
failed to end the farm crisis
Reconstruction Finance
Corporation (RFC)
Loaned taxpayer money to
stabilize industries
Helped some companies
avoid bankruptcy; used
money for businesses, not
people; aid didn’t trickle
down
Objective 3: Relate how radicals and veterans
responded to President Hoover’s policies.
Radicals organized and staged protests, took
over government buildings, blamed capitalism
for the depression, and EXPOSED RADICAL
INJUSTICE.
Veterans (the Bonus Army) gathered in
Washington, D.C., to demand payment of their
pension bonuses
Objective 4: Analyze why Franklin D. Roosevelt
was such a popular candidate in the 1932
election.
• He was different, he just wasn’t Hoover!
• He promised a new deal for Americans, make
life more fair for everyone
• He conveyed confidence and a spirit of
optimism, (contrasted with Hoover’s gloom.)
• Promised to see a fairer distribution of wealth