Down & Out in the Great Depression

by McElvaine, Robert S.

• ISBN13: 9780807858912
• ISBN10: 0807858919
• Edition: 25th
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2008-02-25
• Publisher: Univ of North Carolina Pr

Summary

Down and Out in the Great Depression is a moving, revealing collection of letters by the forgotten men, women, and children who suffered through one of the greatest periods of hardship in American history. Mainly because of his radio talks, thousands felt they knew President Franklin Roosevelt personally and could confide in him about their troubles. Sifting through some 15,000 letters from government and private sources, Robert McElvaine has culled nearly 200 examples that best show the problems, thoughts, and emotions of ordinary people during this time. For this twenty-fifth anniversary edition, McElvaine provides a new foreword recounting the history of the book, its impact on the historiography of the Depression, and its continued importance today.

Table of Contents

Foreword to the Twenty-fifth Anniversary Edition	p. xi
Preface	p. xv
Acknowledgments	p. xix
Introduction	p. 1
The Early Depression	p. 33
Reactions to Hoover and Economic Breakdown	p. 35
Conditions of Life in the Thirties	p. 49
Proud But Frightened: Middle-Class Hardship	p. 51
The Grass Roots: Rural Depression	p. 67
A Worse Depression: Black Americans in the 1930s	p. 79
To Be Old, Sick, and Poor	p. 95
The Forgotten Children	p. 113
Reactions to the Depression	p. 121
Attitudes toward Relief	p. 123
The Conservative	p. 143
The Desperate	p. 155
The Cynical	p. 173
The Rebellious	p. 183
The "Forgotten Man" Looks at Roosevelt	p. 201
The Unconvinced	p. 203
"Our Savior"	p. 215
Notes	p. 235
Sources of Letters	p. 243
Index	p. 247
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.