1930s

Major Events

The 1930s was the decade of the Great Depression. Following the stock market crash on October 29, 1929, many people were out of work. The Great Depression affected people around the world, but some places suffered more than others.

At first, President Herbert Hoover assured people that he was sure that the economy would recover soon, urging them to just be patient. However, with people desperate for work, voters turned to Franklin D. Roosevelt, who promoted his "New Deal" for the American people (capitalizing on the "Square Deal" concept of his distant cousin, Theodore Roosevelt, when he was President). President Franklin D. Roosevelt promoted programs that put unemployed people back to work by having them work on public works programs. Through his Civilian Conservation Corps program, people worked in national parks on projects, like planting trees, clearing new paths, and building picnic pavillions - anything to make the parks more accessible to visitors and better places to visit.

The Dust Bowl Migration

For those who were still employed, working conditions could be poor, especially for minorities. The first union of black workers, sleeping car porters, formed to press for better working conditions.

Prohibition ended in 1933, and people were able to buy and sell alcoholic drinks again in the United States.

Among the other events that happened during this decade were the disappearance of Amelia Earheart and the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby, the young son of the famous flying hero, Charles Lindbergh.

Meanwhile, events were taking shape in Europe that would soon plunge the world back into a state of worldwide war. World War I (known as The Great War before the beginning of World War II), left German's economy crippled and with heavy war reparations payments to make to other countries. During the 1920s, they received some help from the United States in the form of loans. However, when the American economy collapsed at the beginning of the Great Depression, the United States government could no longer support loans to foreign nations, leaving Germany looking for another way to make its reparations payments and continue rebuilding its own economy. The German people had lost faith in their government since the war, called the Weimar Republic. In their desperation, they turned to new, nationalistic leaders who promised to return Germany's greatness. In January, 1933, Adolph Hitler became chancellor. Gradually, in a series of strategic moves to expand his powers, Hitler and his supporters managed to stage a revolution that transformed the German republic into a dictatorship. In July 1933, the Nazi political party was declared Germany's only official political party. Not everyone in Germany accepted this revolution and the Nazi party's attempts to make themselves the only authority in Germany. There was opposition and protesting. At this time, Hitler was still under the authority of the president of Germany, Hindenberg, but Hindenberg was 87 years old and in poor health. Hitler had calculated Hindenberg's approaching death into his plans, and his friends, Goring and Himmler (head of the Gestapo, the Secret State Police) were ready to help. They helped to arrange the murder of Hitler's chief rival, Ernst Rohm, on June 30, 1934, along with his closest supporters and other enemies of Hitlers. This event would later be call the "Night of the Long Knives." Just a little over a month later, President Hindenberg died. Hitler, with the support of army leaders, merged the presidency with the chancellorship and took full control of the government, giving himself the title of "Fuhrer" (Third Reich, Encyclopedia Britannica).

Adolph Hitler and his Nazi party reminded people that Germany was once an empire and that it could be again. By their reckoning, there were three great periods of German history, which they called "reichs." The "First Reich" was the Holy Roman Empire, which began under Emperor Charlemagne in 800 AD and continued until 1806, when it was dissolved during the Napoleonic Wars. The "Second Reich" was the German Empire (or Imperial Germany), which existed from 1871 to 1918, the end of The Great War (World War I), when Germany's Kaiser Wilhelm II abdicated his throne. The German Empire had been a time of great scientific and industrial development for Germany. Hitler and the Nazis believed that they could create a "Third Reich" themselves that would be as great as these other periods of history, reclaiming territories in Europe that had once been part of these previous empires and getting revenge for being stripped of their previous empire at the end of The Great War. Hitler's propaganda against communist nations, like Spain, which was going through a particularly violent period itself, were designed to make him look like a much more reasonable leader, even gaining some support in the staunchly anti-communist United States (see the 1939 rally at Madison Square Garden). Hitler's territorial expansion began with a series of relatively peaceful "annexations," which included bringing Austria under his control. Poland, however, resisted attempts at annexation. On September 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland, and Poland's allies, Britain and France, declared war on Germany (Third Reich, Encyclopedia Britannica).

Daily Life During The Great Depression

Most people didn’t have a lot of money to spend, but they still looked for ways to entertain themselves. Radio was a common form of entertainment, and people listened to radio plays, quiz shows, music, and the latest news and sports for free in their own homes. Swing music was popular, and young people especially liked to go to dance halls.

Women

Describes the lives of women and women's social issues.

Children

Describes the lives of children, their education, and children's books.

Food

Describes things people ate during the 1930s and new foods and recipes that developed during this time.

Entertainment

Describes popular forms of entertainment, including music, movies, and books for adults.

Resources

General Documentaries

America in Color: The 1930s. From the Smithsonian Channel.

A history of the events of the decade. It is part of a series of documentaries of colorized footage of different decades. You can see this documentary online by subscribing to the Smithsonian Channel. It is also available for purchase through iTunes, fairly inexpensively. You can also see clips from this documentary on the Smithsonian Channel site.

The Great Depression

A miniseries about the Great Depression. Each episode is about an hour and includes interviews with people who lived during the Depression. Politics was at the heart of much of the response to the Great Depression, and different episodes talk about how political alignment changed the way people thought about the Great Depression and reacted to the crisis. I thought that the included songs about things that were happening at the time were particularly interesting. Song information is included in the video descriptions.

• The Great Depression 1 - A Job at Ford's - About assembly line jobs and working conditions.
• The Great Depression 2 - The Road to Rock Bottom - About the level of desperation during the Great Depression includine the foreclosure of farms and the outlaws and criminals that arose out of the crisis. Newspapers played out the severity of the crisis because the newspaper owners favored the Hoover administration and didn't want to make it seem like the administration was failing, but the problems were so widespread that they were pretty common knowledge.
• The Great Depression 3 - New Deal, New York - Life in the big city during the Great Depression. Explains President Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal. President Franklin Roosevelt discussed the national situation openly with the public in his Fireside Chats, reassuring the public by connecting with them, making them feel like he was addressing them directly, and appealing to their reasoning, intellectual sides, making them feel smart and capable of tackling the tough issues.
• The Great Depression 4 - We Have a Plan - People went to California in the hopes of finding work, but many people were out of work there, too. Surpless food was often wasted. Discusses Hollywood's reaction to the Great Depression and how the crisis impacted popular entertainment and literature. There is also some discussion of racial issues.
• The Great Depression 5 - Mean Things Happening - Explains the plights of tenant farmers in the southern United States and company towns in the northern states. There is also some discussion of racial issues and how some black people and white people realized that they were struggling for the same things during the Great Depression.
• The Great Depression 6 - To Be Somebody - This episode is specifically about racial issues, segregation, and anti-semitism and prejudice in general during the Great Depression.
• The Great Depression 7 - Arsenal of Democracy - At the end of the 1930s, people were still having problems finding jobs and were still feeling the effects of the Great Depression. Things seemed to improve for a while, but then, the economy slid into decline again. At this time, fascist governments were rising in Europe, including Nazi Germany, and President Franklin Roosevelt was concerned that Americans might be attracted to fascism if American democracy didn't deliver employment and good living conditions. As the war began in Europe, more countries fell under Nazi control, and England was under attack, children evacuated from London to be safe from the bombings were sent to the United States and President Roosevelt supplied arms to England. Munitions manufacturing provided much-needed jobs.