Great Depression

Sandeep Singh Dulay

Mrs. Ward

English 85

February 10, 2013

The Great Depression

The Great Depression was utterly a nightmare for the American people. The United States had prior experience of many depressions before the major stock market crash of 1929 but this was by far the most devastating. If there ever were anything much like the Great Depression, it would have to be the Dark ages, which lasted four hundred years. Much like the Dark Ages the Great Depression had took a toll on Americans to the point where it was almost impossible to recover from. Everything was going in the right direction for the American people in the early 1920s following World War I, up until this incident that no individual could have ever predicted.

On the morning of October 27th 1929, "Black Thursday" struck Wall Street. Economists had predicted that the sudden drop in the market was just going to be a "small bump" similar to the recession Americans suffered post World War I. Four days prior to "Black Thursday," 12.9 million stocks were sold in one day tripling the amount of stock sold on a daily bases causing twenty three percent decrease in stock value in the four days leading up to the stock market crashing. Day by day the depression grew to worse conditions; people who were used to having a relatively comfortable life now had no jobs or money at all adding to the chaos.

Almost every individual in the United States was affected by this crisis. No one knew how to respond to the situation especially middle and lower class families who were hit the hardest. The unemployment rate rose from eight million to fifteen million and the national gross income had decreased from 103.8 billion to 55.7 billion. Many were stunned rather than angry. People who had held good jobs their whole lives were being rejected by every job they had...