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During the Great Depression, U.S. Assistant Secretary of Agriculture Rexford Tugwell and his former Columbia student Roy Emerson Stryker spearheaded an effort to create a photographic portrait of the nation's people and places. The result was a federal commission given to a number of photographers who traveled throughout the country to record the pride and perseverance, strengths and weaknesses of the people. Resulting in more than 2,500 photographs in Georgia alone, this project created a visual record of an influential period of American history. This pictorial album relies on the little-known pictures from this federal commission along with picture postcards, personal pictures and memorabilia, written records, and interviews to record and reconstruct a tale of the state's resources, people, education, health, housing, labor and entertainment. The effects of President Roosevelt's New Deal programs are also emphasized. An appendix provides short biographies of ten federally commissioned photographers who worked in Georgia, including Carl Mydans, Dorothea Lange, Walker Evans, Jack Delano and Esther Bubley. ... Read more

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Drawing upon recent economic scholarship to present a clear and nontechnical analysis, Mr. Smiley offers new insights and some surprising conclusions about the causes of the Great Depression, the consequences of the New Deal, and the economic effects of World War II. An accessible survey...challenges the popular belief that the Great Depression demonstrates the instability of markets and the need for goevernment oversight and direction. --Journal of Economic Literature. A widely accessible and clearly written summary of the main causes of the Great Depression and its legacy for economic policy. --David C. Wheelock, EH.Net ... Read more

Customer Reviews (21)

How Not to Manage an Economic Depression
This is a short book on the causes of the Great Depression. Gene Smiley takes us through the events leading up to the Great Depression and some of the contributing factors that prolonged it.

One of the triggers to the depression were the banks who were over-leveraged to the agricultural sector and fell quickly when drought hit farmer's crops. This constricts the money supply in the economy which cuts the ability to produce wealth.

Smiley presents a good case of what not to do during an economic depression. Problems with gold reserves, banks over-leveraged, wage and price controls, contractionary monetary policy, all of these contributed to a prolonged recovery from the stock market crash of 1929.

One of the more interesting points the author makes is the recovery post WW II and how it was overstated due to rising prices from the end of wage and price controls. This may be so but the fact remains that demand was rising during the wage and price controls which was a change from pre-war confidence levels. There was a change in consumer demand which, sad to say, was due to the war.

I don't see this book as a critique of Keynesian economics. It's a book on what not to do during an international meltdown. FDR wasn't practicing sound economics, regardless of his philosophy. Contrary to what some think, wage and price controls are not fiscal stimulus which is what FDR used in the initial stages of the depression.

Thank goodness the US has a central banker that has scholared in the Great Depression and has an understanding of the importance of confidence in economic decision making, especially the consumer.

We've come a long way in understanding how economics works but we have a long way to go to understand the problems the future holds for us.

Congress needs to recognize the problems that Wall Street can create for the world. The investment side of banking needs to be separated from the commercial side so that we aren't faced with the moral hazard we've just experienced. We need to bring back the Glass-Steagall Act that was enacted during the Great Depression that addressed this problem that brought us the latest economic disaster.

Let's hope the mistakes of the past are not repeated. The world is not clear of sliding back into a recession yet.

Accuracy matters
In an effort to write a review that you might find "helpful", I think it is important to alert you that only some of the reviews below are accurate; certain of the reviews below, for whatever reason, inaccurately describe the book.

The author, a professor of economics at Marquette,identifies three main factors that caused the Depression to last as long as it did and be as deep as it was:the collision between the fixed gold standard and widely divergent economic performance of individual nations; the burden of German reparation payments on the international flow of goods and capital; and misguided policies of the federal government such as Hoover's jawboning against wage flexibility; the New Deal's program to cartelize American business (as a compromise between the overt socialization that some FDR advisors wanted and the prevailing wisdom of free enterprise); and the effect that populist demagoguery and legislation had on business confidence and investment in 1937-38.Reviews that imply that the author has ignored the first two factors are simply wrong as to what is in the book.

Contrary as well to the inaccurate reviews, the author does not blame FDR for the Great Depression. He quite clearly states that the Great Depression began in 1927-28 in the US agricultural sector and in several foreign nations, in the way that the Mississippi begins in a Minnesota stream; that the stock market crash was in part a symptom of the weakening economic outlook as opposed to the start of the Depression.As he moves chronologically through the period, he first arrives at Hoover and thoroughly criticizes him as noted above.While he goes on to find many flaws in FDR's decisions, he is not one-sided. Indeed, he credits FDR's 1933 decision to devalue the dollar and stimulate inflation as the first smart thing that was done to reverse the slide that Hoover had exacerbated.

While the author discloses his perspectives up front, I did not find them to be unusual.For instance, many of his observations about both Hoover and FDR echo those made in "Freedom from Fear" the volume from the Oxford Series on American history that covers the period. In fact, I found the title of the book, "Rethinking the Great Depression" to be a bit of an overstatement.Much of what is in here is conventional wisdom.

The one area that might be considered a departure from Conventional Wisdom is the author's brisk rejection of Keynes. He provides, by the way, a very usefully concise summary of what Keynesianism is. The criticism of Keynes is brief and really beyond the scope of a review of this book.

Another area, of lesser importance perhaps, in which he departs from the CW, is his discussion of WWII economic data. He says that the data are simply wrong in major ways and the economy did not actually recover during the war; he points out that the standard of living did not actually improve.He argues that government bond issuance soppped up funds for consumption and forced people to save for the postwar period and it was the release of the pent up savings, coupled with the change in national psychology in the post war period, that were where the recovery from the Great Depression actually began. I think his analysis is incomplete and not entirely correct but I attribute that in part to the fact that this is meant to be a short, easily read book and not a comprehensive proof of every point.It is an interesting thought that anyone studying the period or the arguments about it should keep in mind.

The book is written at a level that is readable by the lay person and probably pitched toward a college student with an interest in American history and minimal background in economics. In terms of the quantity of its pages, it is actually more of a history book than an economic analysis. Because of its concision and accessibility, I give it 5 stars.

Ironic
The title could hardly be more ironic. No "Rethinking" was involved in thiscursory and chaotic presentation of a few selected data and facts (he also rewrote bits of history) to support the author's preconceived notion that the Great Depression was caused by the government. Or maybe it was caused by the emergence of labor unions and Social Security. But the one thing the author is sure of is that bigbusiness and the richest 1% were totally screwed by having taxes raised. (George W Bush was similarly certain as he incurred $3T in costs to pursue a war in Iraq while he simultaneously cut taxes for the richest 10% of corporations & 1% of the ultra rich by $1T)

And it was also FDR's fault because not all (indeed, not even most) of the programs his administration tried worked.

Just so you know, the consensus among economists, including some who have written more recently than the 2002 publication of this waste of resources, is illiquidity caused by unwise adherence to the gold standard in the post WWone environment was the main cause. Many, perhaps most, also think the economic burdens placed on Germany at the 1919 Paris peace treaty negotiation was a significant contributor. The author touched on the gold standard in a way that suggested he really didn't understand the havoc it created in world finances, and the German debt was barely mentioned.

For a readable and broad analysis of the gold standard's role, I'd suggest Lords of Finance: The Bankers Who Broke the World. For a trenchant view, almost unreadable unless you are a mathematician or an economist, see Ben Bernanke's book of nine essays.

And, just so you know, the Roosevelt administration didn't pretend it knew what the solution was. Rather, it simply kept trying things in an effort to get business moving again. Programs that didn't seem to work were abandoned and new things tried.

Ignores the causes of the Crash of 1929...
Smiley's book was in some ways a precursor for the more popular Amity Shlaes book, The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression, but both books suffer from the same problem--they blame Roosevelt for the Great Depression, and pretty much ignore the fact that the Great Depression began in 1929 with the stock market crash and had deepened considerably by the time Roosevelt became president in 1933. For the raw facts about what happened to cause the crash, the 1934 report of the Pecora Commission (The Pecora Report: The 1934 Report on the Practices of Stock Exchanges from the "Pecora Commission") is compelling reading--but you won't find much about those true details in Smiley's book--all those facts can be a nuisance when you are trying to write a counterhistory!

Rethinking the Great Depression
I have studied the Great Depression in the past.Given our current times I decided that I wanted to revisit the subject.This take gave me new prospective about the subject.I was particularly interested in reading an analysis of the mistakes we made then and comparing them to the mistakes that we are making now.I think you will like this book. ... Read more

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Twelve historical articles describe the problem of the Great Depression in town and country, on a scale we can all comprehend. ... Read more

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No part of the United States escaped the ravages of the Great Depression, but some coped with it better than others. Ranging widely over all of Kansas s 105 counties, Peter Fearon provides a detailed analysis of the key relief programs for both urban and rural areas and shows that the state s Republican administration effectively ran New Deal welfare policies.Kansas in the Great Depression is an insightful look at how federal, state, and local authorities worked together to deal with a national emergency, revealing the complexities of policy initiatives not generally brought to light in studies at the national level while establishing important links between pre-Roosevelt policies and the New Deal. It reaffirms the virtues of government programs run by dedicated public officials as it opens a new window on Americans helping Americans in their darkest hours. ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (1)

An Intriguing Illinois Governor Gets His Due
Masters brings a lawyer's understanding to solving the enigma that was Henry Horner, who was Governor of Illinois from January 1933 through October 1940. Born to a well-do-do Jewish family, he had a great sympathy for the common man. His relations with the political establishment were complex. He rose from Probate Judge to Governor, but was unafraid to take on both the Kelly-Nash organization and FDR. He was married to public service, and spent his Sundays while Governor making surprise visits to mental institutions, where he would visit patients and compare purchase vouchers against supplies to see if there were any discrepancies. A dedicated collector, his extensive Lincoln collection is now among the treasures of the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library. This is a welcome and revealing account of a complex man. His story is a true hidden gem of Illinois history. ... Read more

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"This work is a bold step for Texas history. Not only does it advance a fascinating and convincing new argument concerning the forces that shaped Texas history during this era, it also delves into economic and social questions that have remained untouched by past studies. . . . This book has the potential for a wide general readership among those interested in Texas history."--Carl H. Moneyhon, author of Arkansas and the New South, 1874-1929Federal New Deal programs of the 1930s and World War II are often credited for transforming the South, including Texas, from a poverty-stricken region mired in Confederate mythology into a more modern and economically prosperous part of the United States. By contrast, this history of Northeast Texas, one of the most culturally southern areas of the state, offers persuasive evidence that political, economic, and social modernization began long before the 1930s and prepared Texans to take advantage of the opportunities presented by the New Deal and World War II. Walter L. Buenger draws on extensive primary research to tell the story of change in Northeast Texas from 1887 to 1930. Moving beyond previous, more narrowly focused studies of the South, he traces and interconnects the significant changes that occurred in politics, race relations, business and the economy, and women's roles. He also reveals how altered memories of the past and the emergence of a stronger identification with Texas history affected all facets of life in Northeast Texas. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

The Path to a Modern South: Northeast Texas between Reconstr
It's our hope this book will find a wide audience among those who enjoy readable history. The period and region has never been covered so thoroughly and in such enjoyable detail.

The book was ten years in the making and if there was anything uninteresting in the manuscript - it's not there now. Buenger examines the ties between Southern romanticism and Texas nationalism and how one bolstered the other. Myths are exposed through a quiet presentation of facts and anecdotes.

The symbolism, psychology (and funding) of the various Confederate monuments in the region - the most costly and elaborate in Texas are explained. If anything, the book create a curiousity to visit the (relatively) forgotten region of Northeast Texas.

The tables are clear and the maps are superb in their Spartan clarity.It's a valuable reference and it's also a book we can see being taken on vacation. ... Read more

Product Description
Through interviews with survivors of the Depression, the use of photographs taken by federally supported photographers (many reproduced here) and research into the history of the period, the work provides an accurate and even uplifting portrait of the people of the Mountains, Piedmont and Coastal areas of North Carolina in the 1930s. The chapters include examinations of the industries and natural resources of North Carolina during the Depression, as well as information on the education, health, population, labor, governorships, housing and entertainment of the time. The effects of the New Deal Programs and other important historic events are discussed. The work includes 200 photographs to complement interviews with North Carolina natives about their experiences, as well as appendices, a bibliography, and an index covering important federal photographers in North Carolina during the Great Depression. ... Read more

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This book examines how Wisconsin's Winnebago County negotiated nagging issues such as unemployment, debt relief, and sluggish industry during the Great Depression, all the while attempting to understand the effect these times had on the people who called the county home. ... Read more

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The economic collapse of the American economy in the 1930s is one of the most analyzed events in history. This enlightening volume covers such issues as what role the government should have played in the Great Depression, an analysis of the New Deal and other factors of the time. ... Read more

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Through a long public life and short presidency, Herbert Hoover carefully cultivated reporters and media owners as he rose from a relief administrator to president of the United States. During his service to government, he held the conviction that journalists were to be manipulated and mistrusted. When the nation fell into economic disaster, Hoover's misconceptions about the press and press relations exacerbated a national calamity. This book traces the entire history of Hoover's relationship with magazines, newspapers, newsreel organizations, and radio, and demonstrates how an attitude toward the U.S. press can help or hinder a public figure throughout his career. The book draws upon diaries of Hoover aides, oral histories from journalists and other media figures, newspaper and magazine clippings, radio broadcasts, newsreels, public documents, archival manuscripts, and a plethora of published secondary books and articles. This may be the most complete and best-documented study of a single president and the media. ... Read more

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This study of class during the Great Depression is the first to examine a relatively neglected geographical area, the northern plains states of North and South Dakota, from a social and cultural perspective.Surveying the values and ideals of the old middle class—independent shopkeepers, artisans, professionals, and farmers—Catherine Stock presents a picture of Dakotans' cultural life in the 1920s and 1930s and tells of their efforts to come to terms with the enormous social change brought about by the New Deal.

According to Stock, the depression not only destroyed Dakotans' economic foundations but also bankrupted their community organizations and undermined theirsocial relations.She shows that Dakotans' social values, characterized by notions of neighborliness, loyalty, hard wok, upright character, and individual enterprise, were threatedened first by devastating drought and subsequent economic collapse and then by massive relief efforts and governmental intervention on an unprecedented scale.By 1940, one-third of all farmers who owned their land had lost it to foreclosure, and the federal government had spent nearly half a billion dollars to aid the region.

Stock argues that to Dakotans, the New Deal offered a trade-off between autonomy, community, and local control, on the one hand, and survival itself on the other.Dakotans, ambivalent toward "progress," feared not only for their land, their businesses, their families, and their communities; they feared for the survival of a way of life.They responded, says Stock, by working to make sense of the new world and find renewed meaning in the old.

Consulting varied sources such as diaries, autobiographies, oral histories, and newspaper accounts, Stock includes women's voices as well as men's.She integrates female perspectives on farm life and old-middle-class community into the narrative as a whole and devotes a separate chapter to women's experiences of the upheavals produced by the Great Depression and the New Deal. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

I learned some things
I learned some things from this book, but it does amble on like a boring textbook sometimes. The stories of the the families were very interesting. My great-grandma's cows in N.E. SD ate cockleburs during the depression, and trying to hit water during a well drill was distressing. ... Read more

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Covers the period of American history beginning with the American entry into World War I and including chapters on Wilson's Defeat as Peacemaker, Wilson's Last Years, Harding's Death and the Scandals, The Return to World Affairs, Hope for a New Economic Era, Growth of Modernism in the Arts, Depression and the New Deal, Social Conflicts in Thought and the Arts, Search for a New Foreign Policy. ... Read more

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"An outstanding collection . . . Engaging and readable as well as cogently argued and well researched. The analysis of the 'collective consciousness' produced by the experience of the Great Depression is both original and useful."--Melissa Walker, Converse College

"A vivid portrait of how rural Southerners responded to the Great Depression and the New Deal . . . strikes a balance between letting the voices speak for themselves . . . and placing these voices within a coherent understanding of the existing historical literature of the 1930s."--Charles C. Bolton, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, formerly of the Center for Oral History and Cultural Heritage, University of Southern Mississippi

With this collection of more than 600 oral histories recalling the Great Depression, Bindas provides a detailed, personal chronicle of the 1930s from a rural Southern perspective and captures a historical era and its meaning. The Depression altered the basic structure of American society and changed the way government, business, and the American people interacted. Bindas finds his narrators saw the federal government as an agent of positive change. Though their stories reflect the general despair of the era, they also reveal the hope they found through the New Deal and their determination, after the Depression, to "create a country where security . . . was paramount."

Collected over a period of four years in the late 1980s and early 1990s, these reminiscences from people in rural Georgia, Alabama, and Tennessee are primarily concerned with lessons learned. Looking back on their youth, the narrators explore how the Depression defined their lives and their experiences, from subsistence and government assistance, to food and home life, fear and privation. Revealing a common consciousness among people who witnessed profound change and endured, these stories underscore the meaning of collective memory. Their simple tales form the larger story of how the American people continued to rely on the individualistic ethos even as they adopted and accepted the new ideology of social cooperation. Illustrated with Farm Security Administration (FSA) black and white photographs, this book is a vital testament to survivors of the Depression. Students and scholars of both the 1930s and oral history methodology will welcome this volume. ... Read more

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This book, of course covers the Crash and the slow struggle for recovery. The catastrophe that paralyzed America for more than a decade and the story of the human beings who lived through it. ... Read more

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Creating a broad, new vision of the 1930s, this highly readable social history shows that despite the hard times, Americans faced the Depression years with a characteristic resilience and optimism. Though more seriously affected by the Depression than Europe, Americans weathered hardship while European societies floundered, accepted dictatorships, or were caught in bitter ideological conflicts. Existing depictions of the era emphasize the negatives and overlook the diverse strengths of the American people, their ability to cope with temporary deprivation, and their triumphant retention of hope for themselves and the future of their society. Restoring perspective on the era, this book looks at Americans' solid value systems, their diverse support systems, their religious life, and the role of FDR and the New Deal. ... Read more

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An inspiring account of America at its worst-and Americans at their best-woven from the stories of Depression-era families who were helped by gifts from the author's generous and secretive grandfather.

Shortly before Christmas 1933 in Depression-scarred Canton, Ohio, a small newspaper ad offered $10, no strings attached, to 75 families in distress. Interested readers were asked to submit letters describing their hardships to a benefactor calling himself Mr. B. Virdot. The author's grandfather Sam Stone was inspired to place this ad and assist his fellow Cantonians as they prepared for the cruelest Christmas most of them would ever witness.

Moved by the tales of suffering and expressions of hope contained in the letters, which he discovered in a suitcase 75 years later, Ted Gup initially set out to unveil the lives behind them, searching for records and relatives all over the country who could help him flesh out the family sagas hinted at in those letters. From these sources, Gup has re-created the impact that Mr B. Virdot's gift had on each family. Many people yearned for bread, coal, or other necessities, but many others received money from B. Virdot for more fanciful items-a toy horse, say, or a set of encyclopedias. As Gup's investigations revealed, all these things had the power to turn people's lives around- even to save them.

But as he uncovered the suffering and triumphs of dozens of strangers, Gup also learned that Sam Stone was far more complex than the lovable- retiree persona he'd always shown his grandson. Gup unearths deeply buried details about Sam's life-from his impoverished, abusive upbringing to felonious efforts to hide his immigrant origins from U.S. officials-that help explain why he felt such a strong affinity to strangers in need. Drawing on his unique find and his award-winning reportorial gifts, Ted Gup solves a singular family mystery even while he pulls away the veil of eight decades that separate us from the hardships that united America during the Depression. In A Secret Gift, he weaves these revelations seamlessly into a tapestry of Depression-era America, which will fascinate and inspire in equal measure. ... Read more

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This digital document is an article from Encyclopedia of the Great Depression, brought to you by Gale®, a part of Cengage Learning, a world leader in e-research and educational publishing for libraries, schools and businesses.The length of the article is 996 words.The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase.You can view it with any web browser.Provides a comprehensive overview of the Great Depression, this wide-ranging, multidisciplinary encyclopedia features entries on Depression-era politics, government, business, economics, literature, the arts, society, and culture. ... Read more

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This digital document is an article from Encyclopedia of the Great Depression, brought to you by Gale®, a part of Cengage Learning, a world leader in e-research and educational publishing for libraries, schools and businesses.The length of the article is 439 words.The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase.You can view it with any web browser.Provides a comprehensive overview of the Great Depression, this wide-ranging, multidisciplinary encyclopedia features entries on Depression-era politics, government, business, economics, literature, the arts, society, and culture. ... Read more