People Abandoned Their Families During the Great Depression
The Groovy Depression (1929-1939) was the worst economical downturn in modernistic history. The preceding decade, known every bit the "Roaring Twenties," was a time of relative affluence for many middle- and working-form families. Equally the economy boomed, new innovations allowed for more leisure fourth dimension and the cosmos of a consumer social club. But the economic depression that followed those benefaction years profoundly affected the daily life of American families, in means large and small.
Even the flush faced severe belt-tightening.
Four years afterwards 1929 stock market crash, during the bleakest bespeak of the Bully Depression, about a quarter of the U.South. workforce was unemployed. Those that were lucky enough to have steady employment often saw their wages cut or their hours reduced to part-fourth dimension.
Fifty-fifty upper-heart class professionals, such every bit doctors and lawyers, saw their incomes drop past as much as 40 percent. Families who had previously enjoyed economic security suddenly faced fiscal instability or, in some cases, ruin.
The average American family lived past the Depression-era motto: "Use it upwardly, article of clothing it out, make do or do without." Many tried to go on up appearances and carry on with life as close to normal equally possible while they adapted to new economic circumstances.
Households embraced a new level of frugality in daily life. They kept kitchen gardens, patched worn-out clothes and passed on trips to the movies as they privately struggled to retain ownership of a abode or auto.
A mother serving dinner in the make clean surroundings of a Farm Security Assistants campsite in Visalia, California, 1939. (Credit: Bettmann Annal/Getty Images)
Potlucks and 'thrift gardens' were the norm.
Women's magazines and radio shows taught Low-era homemakers how to stretch their nutrient upkeep with casseroles and one-pot meals. Favorites included chili, macaroni and cheese, soups, and chipped beef on toast.
Potlucks, often organized by churches, became a popular way to share food and a cheap grade of social amusement.
Many families strived for self-sufficiency by keeping pocket-sized kitchen gardens with vegetables and herbs. Some towns and cities allowed for the conversion of vacant lots to community "thrift gardens" where residents could grow food.
Betwixt 1931 and 1932, Detroit'south thrift garden program provided food for about xx,000 people. Experienced gardeners could be seen helping former office workers—notwithstanding dressed in white button-down shirts and slacks—to cultivate their plots.
Children playing cards in the front k in Washington, DC, 1935. (Credit: Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images)
Lath games and miniature golf game courses thrived.
The boilerplate American family didn't take much actress income to spend on leisure activities during the 1930s. Before the Depression, going to the motion-picture show theater was a major pastime. Fewer Americans could afford this luxury after the stock market place crashed—so more than than i-third of the cinemas in America airtight between 1929 and 1934.
Frequently, people chose to spend fourth dimension at habitation. Neighbors got together to play cards, and board games such as Scrabble and Monopoly—both introduced during the 1930s—became popular.
The radio as well provided a free class of entertainment. By the early 1930s, many middle course families owned a dwelling house radio. Comedy programs such as Amos 'n' Andy, soap operas, sporting events and swing music distracted listeners from everyday struggles.
Mini-golf game became a Depression-era craze. More than 30,000 miniature golf game links sprang upwardly across the country during the 1930s. Prices ranged from 25 to 50 cents per circular.
Workers at a push manufacturing plant in New York, circa 1935. (Credit: FPG/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
Women entered the workforce in increasing numbers.
Some families maintained a middle-class income by adding an extra wage earner. Despite widespread unemployment during the Low years, the number of married women in the workforce really increased.
Some people criticized married women for taking jobs when so many men were out of work, though women often took clerical or service manufacture positions that weren't seen as socially acceptable for men at the time.
Women found piece of work as secretaries, teachers, telephone operators and nurses. Only in many cases, employers paid women workers less than their male person counterparts.
Families on government support were less stigmatized.
The New Deal programs of President Franklin D. Roosevelt meant the expansion of government into people'due south everyday lives subsequently 1933. Many Americans received some level of financial aid or employment as a consequence of New Deal programs.
Prior to the Corking Depression, most Americans had negative views of authorities welfare programs and refused to proceed welfare. In some towns, local newspapers published the names of welfare recipients.
While attitudes toward government assistance began to change during the Great Depression, going on welfare was all the same viewed every bit a painful and humiliating experience for many families.
A family of migrant workers in Blythe, California, 1936. (Credit: Dorothea Lange/Getty Images)
Economic hardship caused family breakdowns.
The stress of financial strain took a psychological toll—especially on men who were all of a sudden unable to provide for their families. The national suicide rate rose to an best loftier in 1933.
Marriages became strained, though many couples could not afford to carve up. Divorce rates dropped during the 1930s though abandonments increased. Some men deserted their families out of embarrassment or frustration: This was sometimes called a "poor man's divorce."
Information technology's estimated that more than two million men and women became traveling hobos. Many of these were teens who felt they had become a brunt on their families and left abode in search of piece of work.
Riding the rail—illegally hopping on freight trains—became a common, withal unsafe way to travel. Those traveling the country in search of work ofttimes camped in "Hoovervilles," shantytowns named after Herbert Hoover, president during the early years of the Peachy Depression.
Crime was mythologized, but this was largely hype.
Famous outlaw duo Bonnie and Clyde went on a two-twelvemonth bankrobbing spree across America, while in New Bailiwick of jersey, famous aviator Charles Lindbergh's toddler son was abducted, held for ransom and so murdered.
High-profile events similar these, circulate through radio announcements and in paper headlines, contributed to a sense of lawlessness and crime in the Great Depression, stoking fears that hard times had created a crime wave. But this was more hype than reality.
Violent crimes initially spiked during the first few years of the Great Depression, but nationwide, rates of homicides and tearing crimes began to fall sharply between 1934 and 1937—a downwards trend that continued until the 1960s.
Source: https://www.history.com/news/life-for-the-average-family-during-the-great-depression
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