The last time we left off, we discussed how snow was the least of the students' worries for my grandparents' generation. A severe storm may mean a ride to school, certainly not a cancellation. If snow and natural elements could not hinder school, then the farm certainly could.
The one-room schoolhouse was as much a defining feature of American life during the 1930s as was the family farm. When speaking of farm life in Wisconsin during the 1930s, it is worthwhile to compare events that were transpiring elsewhere in the country:
On Wall Street, the word of the 1920s was "speculation." Investors could buy into the market on credit, in the hope that prices would only continue to rise. Then, in October of 1929, the rise in stock prices faltered, sending investors into a selling frenzy. Creditors demanded collateral from the "speculators," who had none - stock had been bought on credit and was owned only by wealth on paper.
The downward spiral of the stock market spilled into the larger economy. Banks and financial institutions, which likewise had loaned money on credit, had to curtail spending. This led to a cutback in consumer credit, decreasing the demand and production of manufactured goods, thereby lowering spending power even further. Fewer and fewer people bought appliances, cars and airplanes, leading to factory layoffs. Some plants in the United States closed completely, and American unemployment shot to 25 percent.
At the same time in the Great Plains, massive dust storms were shredding the countryside. These storms were more than a mere irritation - towering thousands of feet into the air, the Dust Bowl blotted out the sun and literally forced airplanes to the ground. Even Charles Lindbergh, having crossed the Atlantic six years previous, made a forced landing. The greatest aviator of the time could not fly over the Texas panhandle.
The crash on Wall Street was felt even in the most fundamental of industries. In Illinois, dairy farmers dumped cans of milk into the streets in an effort to limit supply in the hopes of raising prices for their commodity. Agricultural prices during the 1930s were so low that crops rotted in the fields because prices would not make harvest worthwhile.
Across America during the 1930s, the unemployed stood in line for hours waiting for relief checks. Families subsided for months on a diet of soup and beans without the luxury of meat or vegetables. Veterans stood on street corners trying to sell apples and pencils. There is a reason why the first part of the 1930s is collectively referred to as the Great Depression.
Certainly, the small family farms of Wisconsin, where many of my friends grew up, felt the effects of the Great Depression. My grandfather took the year's supply of hogs to market, and was paid just enough to cover shipping. But, my grandmother, grandfather, and my friends Ken, Carol, Daryl, Marie, and Jim all share one thing in common - they never went hungry. The family farm continued to be productive and prosperous, even during the harshest economical time of the century. This would draw the unemployed and hungry from the cities to the countryside.
Daryl grew up on a farm near Browntown, next to the railroad tracks. During the Depression years, the railroad was a cheap and effective means of transportation for the economically downtrodden, also known in the 1930s as "bums." As a kid, Daryl remembers hauling a load of manure to the fields adjacent to the tracks on one cold winter day. Daryl stopped at the straw stack and noticed a stranger halfway between him and the house: "He was an older man, snow white hair, and all he had on was a suit - just a jacket, regular pants, felt hat, and Oxford shoes." The man stopped and watched Daryl's mother, who had just stepped outside to fetch a bucket of water. She felt so sorry for this man that she invited him inside. As a kid, Daryl remembers quite a few drifters being invited in for dinner - his mother would never turn them away, and they were always able to pick out the house, "The bums had it marked, somehow." On this cold winter night, Daryl remembers this man in particular:
He got in the house, and was so cold that he just shook. He shook so hard he couldn't eat. He just shook all over, just because he was near froze to death. He was proud, too - Dad had an old overcoat, which we finally got him to take, but he wouldn't accept anything else. Most of the bums were filthy, but this man was clean - I remember that, how clean he was. He never got done thanking Ma for feeding him, and the last I saw him he was heading on down the railroad tracks. I often wondered if he made it, because it got beastly cold that night, and all he had on was a dress suit and that old overcoat.
The Great Depression leaked into Wisconsin farm life in the form of drifters, sagging commodity prices, and reddish grit. My grandmother recalls grimy winds blowing the remnants of the Dust Bowl into her childhood: "We couldn't keep anything clean ... I remember being able to write my name on every wall inside the house."
For any American, the times were tough. But, single-unit family farms pulled together in a way that only an economic crisis like the Great Depression could facilitate. In speaking of the shivering drifter Daryl said, "That was the way things were - if somebody had a misfortune you didn't turn them out."
In a quote that I think speaks verbatim for the Depression mentality my grandmother wrote, "We never went hungry. We always had enough to eat and were taught to be grateful for the simplest things. Times were hard, but we never felt poor."
- Dan Wegmueller of Monroe writes
a weekly column for Friday editions of
the Times. He can be reached
at dwegs@tds.net.
The one-room schoolhouse was as much a defining feature of American life during the 1930s as was the family farm. When speaking of farm life in Wisconsin during the 1930s, it is worthwhile to compare events that were transpiring elsewhere in the country:
On Wall Street, the word of the 1920s was "speculation." Investors could buy into the market on credit, in the hope that prices would only continue to rise. Then, in October of 1929, the rise in stock prices faltered, sending investors into a selling frenzy. Creditors demanded collateral from the "speculators," who had none - stock had been bought on credit and was owned only by wealth on paper.
The downward spiral of the stock market spilled into the larger economy. Banks and financial institutions, which likewise had loaned money on credit, had to curtail spending. This led to a cutback in consumer credit, decreasing the demand and production of manufactured goods, thereby lowering spending power even further. Fewer and fewer people bought appliances, cars and airplanes, leading to factory layoffs. Some plants in the United States closed completely, and American unemployment shot to 25 percent.
At the same time in the Great Plains, massive dust storms were shredding the countryside. These storms were more than a mere irritation - towering thousands of feet into the air, the Dust Bowl blotted out the sun and literally forced airplanes to the ground. Even Charles Lindbergh, having crossed the Atlantic six years previous, made a forced landing. The greatest aviator of the time could not fly over the Texas panhandle.
The crash on Wall Street was felt even in the most fundamental of industries. In Illinois, dairy farmers dumped cans of milk into the streets in an effort to limit supply in the hopes of raising prices for their commodity. Agricultural prices during the 1930s were so low that crops rotted in the fields because prices would not make harvest worthwhile.
Across America during the 1930s, the unemployed stood in line for hours waiting for relief checks. Families subsided for months on a diet of soup and beans without the luxury of meat or vegetables. Veterans stood on street corners trying to sell apples and pencils. There is a reason why the first part of the 1930s is collectively referred to as the Great Depression.
Certainly, the small family farms of Wisconsin, where many of my friends grew up, felt the effects of the Great Depression. My grandfather took the year's supply of hogs to market, and was paid just enough to cover shipping. But, my grandmother, grandfather, and my friends Ken, Carol, Daryl, Marie, and Jim all share one thing in common - they never went hungry. The family farm continued to be productive and prosperous, even during the harshest economical time of the century. This would draw the unemployed and hungry from the cities to the countryside.
Daryl grew up on a farm near Browntown, next to the railroad tracks. During the Depression years, the railroad was a cheap and effective means of transportation for the economically downtrodden, also known in the 1930s as "bums." As a kid, Daryl remembers hauling a load of manure to the fields adjacent to the tracks on one cold winter day. Daryl stopped at the straw stack and noticed a stranger halfway between him and the house: "He was an older man, snow white hair, and all he had on was a suit - just a jacket, regular pants, felt hat, and Oxford shoes." The man stopped and watched Daryl's mother, who had just stepped outside to fetch a bucket of water. She felt so sorry for this man that she invited him inside. As a kid, Daryl remembers quite a few drifters being invited in for dinner - his mother would never turn them away, and they were always able to pick out the house, "The bums had it marked, somehow." On this cold winter night, Daryl remembers this man in particular:
He got in the house, and was so cold that he just shook. He shook so hard he couldn't eat. He just shook all over, just because he was near froze to death. He was proud, too - Dad had an old overcoat, which we finally got him to take, but he wouldn't accept anything else. Most of the bums were filthy, but this man was clean - I remember that, how clean he was. He never got done thanking Ma for feeding him, and the last I saw him he was heading on down the railroad tracks. I often wondered if he made it, because it got beastly cold that night, and all he had on was a dress suit and that old overcoat.
The Great Depression leaked into Wisconsin farm life in the form of drifters, sagging commodity prices, and reddish grit. My grandmother recalls grimy winds blowing the remnants of the Dust Bowl into her childhood: "We couldn't keep anything clean ... I remember being able to write my name on every wall inside the house."
For any American, the times were tough. But, single-unit family farms pulled together in a way that only an economic crisis like the Great Depression could facilitate. In speaking of the shivering drifter Daryl said, "That was the way things were - if somebody had a misfortune you didn't turn them out."
In a quote that I think speaks verbatim for the Depression mentality my grandmother wrote, "We never went hungry. We always had enough to eat and were taught to be grateful for the simplest things. Times were hard, but we never felt poor."
- Dan Wegmueller of Monroe writes
a weekly column for Friday editions of
the Times. He can be reached
at dwegs@tds.net.
