Dark Realities
Dark Realities
America's Great Depression
This book covers the turbulent period of 1921 to 1942 in America's history, which went from the Roaring Twenties to the Great Depression and recovery via the New Deal. It introduces us to the key figures and reveals the impact which the Great Depression had on the American people.
Will be of value to GCSE, AS and A level history students looking for an accessible account of the Great Depression.
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The Roaring Twenties, jazz music, Hollywood glamour: the end of the First World War ushered in a golden age for America, with a booming stock market and rampant property speculation. It seemed as if the good times with Presidents Harding and then Coolidge in charge would never end. In marked contrast were the fortunes of many European countries, struggling to repay war debts and with the terms of the Treaty of Versailles plunging Germany into economic catastrophe.
With Herbert Hoover now President, the US markets continued to climb and some investors sold out, sensing trouble ahead. The Crash came in October 1929, and America slid into deep depression. Against a background of bank failures, industrial decline, rural poverty and unemployment, protests, strikes and riots broke out.
Hoover was swept from power in 1932 and it fell to the new President, Franklin D. Roosevelt, to revive America's fortunes with a number of ground-breaking new programmes which made up the New Deal.
This book covers this turbulent period in America's history, introducing us to the key figures and revealing the impact which the Great Depression had on the American people.
Will be of value to GCSE, AS and A level history students looking for an accessible account of the Great Depression.
Chapter 1 The Birth of the Twenties
From Wilson to Harding
Death in California
Chapter 2 The Boom Years
Keep Cool With Coolidge
The Resignation of a President
The Joys of Capitalism
The Presidential Election of 1928
Chapter 3 The Storm Clouds Gather
The Florida Land Boom
Post-war Europe
Reparations and War Debts
Chapter 4 Meanwhile on Wall Street....
The Great Boom
Enter the Federal Reserve
The Last Days
Chapter 5 Like a Bolt out of Hell
Black Thursday
Black Tuesday
No Respite
Chapter 6 The Onset of the Depression
“No one in his place could have done more”
Dark Times Approach
The Trials of President Hoover
Chapter 7 America October 1929 – December 1932
Hunger, Hoovervilles and Hoboes
The Bonus Army
Chapter 8 A New Beginning
The Defeat of President Hoover
The New President
Governor of New York
Chapter 9 One Hundred Days
The Banking Crisis of 1933
Three Emergency Measures
Relief for Farmers
The Tennessee Valley Authority
The Unemployed
The End of the Hundred Days
Chapter 10 Dark Realities
Roosevelt’s Bombshell
Trouble with the NRA
Set a Thief to Catch a Thief
Chapter 11 Nemeses
The Kingfisher
Father Coughlin
The World Court
Legal Challenges
Problems with Poultry
Chapter 12 The Second New Deal
Strike!
The Big Bill
The Social Security Act of 1935
The Tax Bill
Chapter 13 Moving Forwards
“Reform if you would preserve…”
Showdown with the Supreme Court
Chapter 14 The Arsenal of Democracy
The Roosevelt Recession
Over There
Select Bibliography
Index