The Great Depression Widens

From Great Depression 22-2 Reading



1. How did the Great Depression affect minorities?    

 
For minorities the Great Depression was horrible. Their unemployment rates were higher than whites and if they had a job their pay was much less than their white counterparts. Also racial violence increased during this time, unemployed whites competing for the same job as a minority would beat them up/ even kill them. 24 African Americans were lynched in one year because of this.

 


2. Why did so many men leave their homes during the Depression?  

  
So many men left their homes during the Great Depression because they were accustomed to supporting their families and working. They got so discouraged that they would go out for days on a time just walking the streets looking for a job. It got so bad in some cases that they just got up and left because they were so embarrassed.

 


3. How did the Great Depression affect women and children?    


During the Great Depression many women struggled to survive. They couldn't get jobs because when men are out of work offices wont hire women in their place so they couldn't get any jobs, schools wouldn't even hire women to teach. They had to do chores around the house, like managing the budget, going shopping, doing things that women did before they were aloud to work. For children it was even worse. Schools shut down nation wide, some 300000 students were out of school because of this. because of this lack of school many children just gave up their hope. Many children would hitch-hike on trains around the country. Some of them were even killed because they didn't want the children on the trains.  
 



From Great Depression 22-3 Reading



4. What were some of Hoover’s key convictions about government?     


Herbert Hoovers key convictions about government were that they play a limited role in helping solve the problems, he also believed that the government should help foster privet charities to help with the relief efforts. He believed that if the government gave handouts it would weaken peoples self-dignity and “moral-fiber”. His idea was that the government should direct relief measures. They should help fund privet charities and they would help the people.

5. Why do you think people blamed Hoover for the nation’s difficulties?   

 I believe that some people blamed Hoover for the nation’s difficulties because he didn’t do “enough”. He didn’t help the people out at all, he just let people fend for themselves. People didn’t want that, they wanted a president that would help them through tough times, to get them out of it. He was way to rugged, he didn’t do anything he basically let the country fail. 





6. What were some of the projects proposed by Hoover, and how effective were they?    



One of the projects proposed by Hoover was the “Boulder Dam”(later renamed the Hoover Dam). The Dam was to generate power and help set arrangement of water rights between some of the states. The dam was very effective, it provided the power it was supposed to but it also provided a regular water supply the country needed. 



7. What did the Bonus Army want?

The Bonus Army wanted their bonus that was supposed to be paid in 1945 to be paid now. They all rushed to Washington D.C. to try and get the Patman Bill passed it was rejected by Congress. After the bill was denied Hoover asked the people to leave. Some did but the army forcefully removed those who didn’t. 

The Crash Occurs and the Great Depression Begins

1. What industrial weakness signaled a declining economy in the 1920s?        
The weakness that signaled a declining economy in the 1920's was the use of credit in an ordinary persons life. It created superficial property in the country and when people were supposed to pay back their debts they couldn't which cause banks to either close or fail. It basically sent the United States into a tailspin downwards.  

2. What did the experience of farmers and consumers at this time suggest about the health of the economy?       

The experience of farmers and consumers at this time suggested that the economy was not doing so well. Farmers had taken out so many loans to get more crops and new machinery that they could pay it back. They couldn't pay it back because the price for the crops had gone down by 40 percent and they weren't able to sell their goods because their were so many other farmers trying to do that. Consumers couldn't buy the goods because they didn't have to money to do so. Prices had risen so much that the consumers just couldn't afford to buy so many products. 

3. How did speculation and margin buying cause stock prices to rise?      
Speculation played a role in stock prices rising because people would buy them in hope to get gain a quick profit but they didn't pay attention to the risks involved in doing so. People thought that the stocks would do well so the prices would go up for them but when they didn't people would want to sell them right away, which started mass selling's of stocks. When people began buying in margin people had to start to raise the prices on the stocks because they weren't being payed the full amount of the stock and they had to make some kind of profit on it. Also because people weren't paying back the full amount the owned the stock owner.  

4. What happened to ordinary workers during the Great Depression?      
During the Great Depression ordinary workers were normally laid off. Between 1929 and 1933 unemployment had gone from 3 percent to 25 percent, almost 13 million people had lost their jobs in that span of time. If you hadn't been laid off from your job, your pay had been reduced and/ or your hours per week had been reduced as well. The Great Depression wasn't a great time to be an ordinary worker. 

5. How did the Great Depression affect the world economy?
The Great Depression had also affected Europe's economy as well. The Great Depression limited Americas ability to import European goods which made their economy bad in turn. Also with having to pay World War I Reparations, Europe didn't have a good economy to start out with during this time and having the Great Depression added on to it made it awful for the European economy. 

Prohibition

1. How did small-town life and city life differ?  




Small- Town life was very boring. Everyone believed the same thing, had the same views, nothing independent. In the city that was completely opposite. People judged one another by there accomplishments, the tolerated drinking, gambling, and even casual dating mostly frowned upon in the small-towns. 
 
2. Why do you think the Eighteenth Amendment failed to eliminate alcohol consumption?  
I believe that the Eighteenth Amendment failed to eliminate alcohol consumption because it was such a big thing. When you have something as big as alcohol you cant just get rid of it at once, you would have to do it gradually. There was so many people drinking it that you couldn't just take it away.
 
3. How did criminals take advantage of Prohibition?  
Criminals took advantage of Prohibition in that they would now be the primary dealers of alcohol in the cities. Prohibition also helped out organized crime.

4. What was the conflict between fundamentalists and those who accepted evolution?  
The conflict between fundamentalists and those who accepted evolution was how we, as human-beings, came to be. The fundamentalists wouldn't give up their idea that god created everything and the evolutionists wouldn't be persuaded by the fundamentalists.

5. How might the overall atmosphere of the 1920s have contributed to the failure of Prohibition?   

The overall atmosphere contributed to the failure of prohibition in that after World War I Americans were tired of making sacrifices and wanted to enjoy life and Prohibition was not letting that happen. Also most immigrants didn't think that drinking was a sin so they just kept doing what they had been doing fora  long time.

Presidential Debate News Story Analysis

News Analysis on the First Presidential Debate

Source Information      

Date:  October 4, 2012

What news organization (or individual) produced this?:  CNN

What is the type of news source?: Article

 

Content
 

What is the main headline?:  5 things we learned from the presidential debate

What facts (statistics, important events, etc.) are included?:   that 67%  of debate watchers said that Romney won. Also 1 in 4 said Obama was victorious.

Is anyone quoted? If so, who? What did they say?:   A lot of people were quoted in this article. One of which was Wolf Blizter, CNN's chief anchor of the network's political coverage. who said " He held his own against the president of the United States, and for a Republican challenger that's pretty good,". Another person who was quoted was Eric Fehrnstrom, a senior adviser to the former Massachusetts governor. who said "If it was a boxing match, it would have been called,I've got to believe that the heels on the president's shoes are worn down from being back on them for 90 minutes."

What information or ideas might have been left out?:    I didn't think that there was anything missing. I did think that there could have been more about what each candidate said but overall nothing missing.

 

Message

Who is the intended audience?: The intended audience is people who had watched the debate and wanted to learn more, or people who hadn't watched the debate and wanted an overview of it. 

Does the author seem to have an opinion? If so, what is it?:   Yes the author's seems to have an opinion. It is that Mitt Romney had won the debate. 

What is the tone of the source?:   The tone of the article is serious.

What words or phrases create the tone?: What made this article very serious was how direct it was. It didn't stray of the topic, it stuck to the point and conveyed the information clearly.

   

Is any one person or group discussed positively? Negatively?:  Mitt Romney is discussed positively in this Article by giving examples of what he had done correctly. Barack Obama was discussed negatively saying how he missed on a lot of opportunities to come back at the Massachusetts Governor.