Dust Bowl Begins in 1934

From History.com 

On this day in 1934, a massive storm sends millions of tons of topsoil flying from across the parched Great Plains region of the United States as far east as New York, Boston and Atlanta.

At the time the Great Plains were settled in the mid-1800s, the land was covered by prairie grass, which held moisture in the earth and kept most of the soil from blowing away even during dry spells. By the early 20th century, however, farmers had plowed under much of the grass to create fields. The U.S. entry into World War I in 1917 caused a great need for wheat, and farms began to push their fields to the limit, plowing under more and more grassland with the newly invented tractor. The plowing continued after the war, when the introduction of even more powerful gasoline tractors sped up the process. During the 1920s, wheat production increased by 300 percent, causing a glut in the market by 1931.

That year, a severe drought spread across the region. As crops died, wind began to carry dust from the over-plowed and over-grazed lands. The number of dust storms reported jumped from 14 in 1932 to 28 in 1933. The following year, the storms decreased in frequency but increased in intensity, culminating in the most severe storm yet in May 1934. Over a period of two days, high-level winds caught and carried some 350 million tons of silt all the way from the northern Great Plains to the eastern seaboard. According to The New York Times, dust "lodged itself in the eyes and throats of weeping and coughing New Yorkers," and even ships some 300 miles offshore saw dust collect on their decks.

The dust storms forced thousands of families from Texas, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Colorado, Kansas and New Mexico to uproot and migrate to California, where they were derisively known as "Okies"--no matter which state they were from. These transplants found life out West not much easier than what they had left, as work was scarce and pay meager during the worst years of the Great Depression.

Another massive storm on April 15, 1935--known as "Black Sunday"--brought even more attention to the desperate situation in the Great Plains region, which reporter Robert Geiger called the "Dust Bowl." That year, as part of its New Deal program, President Franklin D. Roosevelt's administration began to enforce federal regulation of farming methods, including crop rotation, grass-seeding and new plowing methods. This worked to a point, reducing dust storms by up to 65 percent, but only the end of the drought in the fall of 1939 would truly bring relief.

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Here is some footage of the Dust Bowl from a "Year in Review" newsreel about 1934. The Dust Bowl footage starts around 40 seconds in:

[Image via Paranormalknowledge.com, oecotextiles and Columbia]

"Men will thank God on their knees a hundred years from now that Franklin D. Roosevelt was in the White House" - The Death of Franklin Delano Roosevelt

On April 12, 1945, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt died. The longest serving president in American history (12 years), Roosevelt passed away suddenly while staying at his Warm Springs, George retreat with former mistress Lucy Mercer Rutherford. He had asked his daughter Anna to arrange for a meeting with Mercer in Georgia while Eleanor was elsewhere. When Eleanor later learned of her daughter’s complicity in reuniting Franklin with the woman who virtually destroyed the romantic part of their marriage, she was devastated.

According to reports, Roosevelt was sitting in his Warm Springs home having his portrait painted by Elizabeth Shoumatoff on April 12^th (see above). At around noon, President Roosevelt was served lunch when he said, “I have a terrific headache,” and collapsed onto the floor as a result of a cerebral hemorrhage. He died later that day.

            The nation mourned the loss of the president who ushered them through the Great Depression and World War II deeply. The president had been in declining health in the later years of his life, but the public was kept virtually unaware of his condition making his sudden death shocking to the American people. Here is a newsreel from soon after President Roosevelt’s death showing a brief history of Roosevelt’s involvement in public life and his contribution to American history.

           

            Here is another newsreel showing President Roosevelt’s funeral train procession from Warm Springs, GA to Washington, D.C., to Hyde Park, NY, President Roosevelt’s family home and final resting place.

           

            The magnitude of FDR’s loss was not felt solely in the United States, but around the world. Nowhere is this more evident than in the words of one of President Roosevelt’s greatest wartime allies, Winston Churchill. After learning of Roosevelt’s death, Churchill telegraphed Eleanor Roosevelt saying, “ I have lost a dear and cherished friendship which was forged in the fire of war. I trust you may find consolation in the magnitude of his work and the glory of his name.”

Want to learn more about FDR? Visit the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum. 

[Image via about.com]

New Presidential History Page!

Ever wondered which president made the first audio recording? Which president starred in the first video with sound recording? You can find out now on the new presidential history page. On this new page at www.ushistorygirl.com you can read important speeches from each president and also enjoy audio and video clips from important political moments in the 20th and 21st centuries. From FDR's fireside chats to Nixon sweating through his first debate with JFK, you will find it all at the new presidential history page.

Radio, Radio - FDR and His First Fireside Chat

Today marks the anniversary of President Roosevelt’s first fireside chat. FDR delivered his first radio address to the American people only eight days after taking office in 1933. He opened his address saying “I want to talk for a few minutes with the people of the United States about banking.” He wanted to explain his decision to close the nation’s banks for one day to prevent massive withdrawals by panic stricken Americans. At the time, the United States was at the lowest point of the Great Depression. FDR used these carefully calculated radio chats to address as many American households as possible about his plans to fix the nation, while also allaying the nation’s fears. The number of listeners to these addresses was always strong as about 90 percent of Americans owned radios in their homes.

FDR went on to deliver about 30 “fireside chats” in his twelve- year presidency – so called because they invoked the image of the president sitting by a fireside in a living room talking simply to the nation. He not only used them to explain his New Deal policies, but also to explain America’s role in the war after the start of World War II. They were consciously drafted with the simplest of language and often involving anecdotes so as to appeal to every American, no matter what level of education.

The idea that the president would talk directly to the people in their homes, and not through a press release or journalist’s column was groundbreaking. Every president since FDR has used radio addresses as a way to inform Americans about their administration’s policies and the state of the nation. President Obama has engaged the newer technologies of our time to continue this tradition of a weekly conversation with the public by posting videos of his addresses online. I can only imagine how future presidents will engage evolving technologies to communicate with us in different ways…

To read and listen to FDR’s first “fireside chat” – click here.

* I apologize for the lag time in posting, but I am working on several new pages to add to the website. One of them will be a “Presidential History” page which will allow you to engage presidential history through text, audio and video. I’ll keep you posted…

[Image via moah]

Roosevelt, Bankruptcy and the Scary Side of Preservation

The NY Times recently published an article about the ongoing battle to secure the papers of one of FDR’s last secretaries, Grace Tully, for the Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum. Grace Tully began working for Roosevelt in 1929 when he was governor of New York, and served as his personal secretary from 1941 until his death in 1945. Her papers, which include photographs, official correspondence and handwritten notes, was left to her estate upon her death. Conrad M. Black, now serving time in a Florida prison for a fraud, bought the papers from her estate in 2001. His company, which at the time owned The Chicago-Sun Times, bought the papers from a rare-book dealer for an estimated $8 million. He was collecting the largest amount of FDR papers still in private hands for an FDR biography he planned to write. (“Franklin Delano Roosevelt: Champion of Freedom,” published in 2003).

In recent years, Black attempted to auction the papers off at Christies but was stopped when the government accused Black of selling documents which belonged to the National Archives. (The National Archives oversees Presidential Libraries) Still with me?  Since then, the papers have been stored at the Roosevelt Presidential Library, which all parties seem to think will be their eventual home. However, since the ownership of the papers is still being worked out, archivists and researchers have been forbidden to open the sealed boxes to explore what appraisers have called “very, very valuable papers.” I’m not sure how Cynthia Koch, the head of the Roosevelt Presidential Library, can stand having those priceless items so close and yet so far. If it were me, I’d be in there in the middle of the night with a flashlight Watergate style dying to find out what the secretary’s papers could tell us about such an extraordinary time in our nation’s history. Real nerd stuff. Maybe there are revelations in that collection which could confound, complicate, or confirm our understanding of FDR. Who knows? Only time will tell…

Who in the World was Ida May Fuller?

I think I would be stating the obvious if I said that the American economy is struggling right now. Many Americans are bearing tough financial burdens, especially retired men and women. One of the revenue streams that retired people, and others rely on is social security. Social security was enacted by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt as part of his New Deal policies in 1935. The hardship faced by Americans today still doesn’t compare to the absolute devastation of the Great Depression, which inspired many New Deal programs.

On January 31, 1940 the first social security check was issued to Ida May Fuller. Ida May Fuller was born in 1874 in Vermont where she spent the majority of her life.   She filed a claim for monthly social security support on November 4, 1939. Most social security is funded by payroll taxes, and Ida May worked for three years contributing to social security. After retiring, Ida May visited her local social security office to see about possible benefits. As Ida May recalled, “It wasn’t that I expected anything, mind you, but I knew that I’d been paying for something called Social Security and I wanted to ask the people in Rutland about it.”

Her information was forwarded to Washington with the first batch of monthly check recipients to be issued a social security payment. She received a check for $22.54, which in today’s money would be about $342.46. Social Security continues to be a hot button issue in American politics. How will we pay for it? Will it still exist in a hundred years? Only time can tell.

[Image via Wikimedia]

FDR and the Case of the Mole

Here is an interesting NY TImes article on a new book that explores a possible cover-up of the real cause of FDR’s death. As the reviewer states, no one questions that FDR died of a stroke, but there has been some dispute among doctors and historians as to what caused the stroke. As evidence, the authors of the reviewed book site a mole above FDR’s left eye that appears in photos of his early terms but disappears from photos of his fourth and final term. Could this mole be a melanoma? The reviewer, a medical doctor, does not appear to be convinced that the book offers enough facts to support it’s claim. Take a look and be the judge, is this history or pure histrionics?

[Image via PoorWilliam]

This Land is Your Land...Unless You're Japanese in America in 1942

On December 17, 1944 the U.S. Army announced it would be ending its policy of holding Japanese Americans in internment camps, allowing “evacuees” to return home.

President Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066 on February 19, 1942 which began the process of rounding up 120,000 Americans of Japanese heritage to be funneled into camps (Executive Order 9066). These Americans were sent to “relocation centers” in California, Idaho, Utah, Arizona, Wyoming, Colorado and Arkansas.

The call to push Japanese Americans into internment camps was fueled by farmers who competed against the Japanese for labor, politicians who catered to anti-Japanese constituencies, and the panic that resulted from the attack on Pearl Harbor. At a time when Norman Rockwell was painting his “Four Freedoms” the American government was denying basic freedoms to thousands of its own citizens.

In 1988, Congress passed legislation which repaid the remaining 60,000 camp survivors reparations of $20,000.00 each. I doubt that made any great difference to the survivors, who lost something in those years that can never really be quantified, namely, their dignity.

For more information on Japanese internment, including the condition of the U.S. camps and legal challenges to internment, click here.

For information on a PBS documentary on the subject, and more information on the camps, click here.

[Image via lasanddisorder.org]

A Day That Lives in Infamy: The 68th Anniversary of the Attack on Pearl Harbor

On the morning of December 7, 1941, Japanese aircraft launched a surprise attack on the American base at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii. The first wave of Japanese aircraft hit Pearl Harbor at 7:51 a.m. The shocking attack nearly devastated the American navy, as nine ships were destroyed and 21 were severely damaged. The most awful losses that day were not measured in steel tonnage, however, as the attack also resulted in an incredible loss of human life. Specifically, the attack resulted in 2,350 casualties.

I was not alive during the attack on Pearl Harbor, but I think all of us who witnessed the September 11^th attacks can relate to the feeling of panic that rises when Americans are attacked on our own soil. Today, I am thinking of those who served our country during World War II, including my grandfather, and all those who have continued to serve our country. I honor you today and everyday.

Here is some footage of the attack on Pearl Harbor.

The site of the attack, which includes the final resting place of the U.S.S. Arizona, is now part of the National Park Service. Check out the park's website for more history of the attack and information about the preservation of Pearl Harbor.

[Image via rememberingpearlharbor]

Happy Days Are Here Again! The End of Prohibition

For most of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, many people believed that one of the greatest threats to society was the consumption of alcohol. Men and women of different origins and creeds stood united by the belief that society's ills were caused by alcohol consumption. They thought that if the United States could prohibit the sale of alcohol, then crime, drunkenness, domestic violence and corruption would all magically disappear from society. Many religious groups used the fervor normally reserved for their faith to tell the world about the evils of alcohol. Check out this 1920s era prohibition meeting which warns that alcohol has the power to, among other things, entice young girls into honky tonks.

Due to the devoted efforts of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union and other groups, prohibition became a reality in 1919 with the passage of the 18^th amendment to the Constitution. However, the twelve years of prohibition merely drove the production and consumption of alcohol underground, allowing organized crime to flourish. Crime was on the rise and the government had to struggle to reign it in. All the advocates of prohibition never saw that coming. The women’s groups that had once worked to end the sale of alcohol eventually reconsidered and formed groups that called for the amendment’s repeal. Their efforts carried greater weight as they had gained the right to vote in the years since the passage of prohibition. When Franklin Delano Roosevelt ran for president on the Democratic ticket in 1932, he ran on a platform that called for the repeal of prohibition. Beginning in 1933, the states began to ratify the 21^st amendment which repealed the 18^th amendment. The amendment was fully ratified on December 5, 1933. Check out this newsreel from 1933 which boasts that the repeal of prohibition will create new jobs, a particularly enticing idea during the Great Depression (and now).

This is not a date that I think of often, but there is a group out there looking to make December 5^th, or Repeal Day, a national holiday. You can check out their site and take a look at their reasoning here.

Happy Repeal Day!

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