Definition and Summary of the Dust Bowl Summary and Definition: The Dust Bowl was a "decade-long disaster" and a series of droughts was one of the worst natural disaster in American history. Nearly one-third of all migrants were professional or white-collar workers. The region is also prone to extended drought, alternating with unusual wetness of equivalent duration. Be on the lookout for your Britannica newsletter to get trusted stories delivered right to your inbox. The economic effects persisted, in part, because of farmers' failure to switch to more appropriate crops for highly eroded areas. Animals determined unfit for human consumption were killed; at the beginning of the program, more than 50 percent were so designated in emergency areas. [28] Terms such as "Okies" and "Arkies" came to be known in the 1930s as the standard terms for those who had lost everything and were struggling the most during the Great Depression. At the same time, technological improvements such as mechanized plowing and mechanized harvesting made it possible to operate larger properties without increasing labor costs. The DRS bought cattle in counties which were designated emergency areas, for $14 to $20 a head. Background: Causes of the Depression. LinkedIn with Background Mother of Seven Children,[48] which depicted a gaunt-looking woman, Florence Owens Thompson, holding three of her children. His story about Black Sunday marked the first appearance of the term Dust Bowl; it was coined by Edward Stanley, Kansas City news editor of the Associated Press, while rewriting Geiger's news story.[5][6]. Imagine soil so dry that plants disappear and dirt blows past your door like sand. [11] Record-setting summer temperatures of the 1930s along with blowing topsoil and drought made it difficult to grow crops. Dust Bowl, section of the Great Plains of the United States where overcultivation and drought during the early 1930s resulted in the depletion of topsoil, which was carried off in windblown dust storms that forced thousands of families to leave the region at the height of the Great Depression. They are still on the range, and other millions of heads are today canned and ready for this country to eat. A cousin of mine wrote a fascinating graduate thesis on the life of my paternal great-grandmother. Start studying Dust Bowl, Causes of Great Depression/HH & FDR. The Great Depression, the Dust Bowl, and New Deal in Oklahoma What was the Dust Bowl? Associated Press reporter Robert E. Geiger happened to be in Boise City, Oklahoma, to witness the "Black Sunday" black blizzards of April 14, 1935; Edward Stanley, the Kansas City news editor of the Associated Press, coined the term "Dust Bowl" while rewriting Geiger's news story.[5][6]. The Dust Bowl not … The 2014 science fiction film Interstellar features a ravaged 21st-century America which is again scoured by dust storms (caused by a worldwide pathogen affecting all crops). [55] In a review, the music magazine No Depression wrote that the album's lyrics and music are "as potent as Woody Guthrie, as intense as John Trudell and dusted with the trials and tribulations of Tom Joad – Steinbeck and The Grapes of Wrath. Learn about the Dust Bowl, New Deal, causes of the Great Depression, a Great Depression timeline more. The Dust Bowl disaster was caused by a series of devastating droughts in the 1930s, poor soil conservation techniques and over-farming. Agricultural Adjustment Administration and Murphy, Philip G., (1935). The Act shifted the parity goal from price equality of agricultural commodities and the articles that farmers buy to income equality of farm and non-farm population. The Dust Bowl drought of the 1930s was one of the worst environmental disasters of the Twentieth Century anywhere in the world. To create shelterbelts to reduce soil erosion, groups such as the United States Forestry Service's Prairie States Forestry Project planted trees on private lands. After the Great Depression ended, some moved back to their original states. FDR in an address on the AAA commented. In History. 1929. A second explanation is a lack of availability of credit, caused by the high rate of failure of banks in the Plains states. Because banks failed in the Dust Bowl region at a higher rate than elsewhere, farmers could not get the credit they needed to buy capital to shift crop production. In the decade prior to the crash of 1929, the nation became polarized between rich and poor. This caused the largest migration in American history. [34], Not all migrants traveled long distances; some simply went to the next town or county. By signing up for this email, you are agreeing to news, offers, and information from Encyclopaedia Britannica. 3 months ago. The region is also subject to high winds. The Dust Bowl The Dust Bowl, or the Dirty Thirties, was a period of severe dust storms causing major ecological and agricultural damage to American and Canadian Prairie lands from 1930 to 1936 (in some areas until 1940). [48] She captured what have become classic images of the dust storms and migrant families. The drought came in three waves, 1934, 1936, and 1939–1940, but some regions of the High Plains experienced drought conditions for as many as eight years. [33] Migrants abandoned farms in Oklahoma, Arkansas, Missouri, Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas, Texas, Colorado, and New Mexico, but were often generally referred to as "Okies", "Arkies", or "Texies". The Great Plains were opened to farming by new devices such as the steel plow. The government paid reluctant farmers a dollar an acre to practice the new methods. These choking billows of dust – named "black blizzards" or "black rollers" – traveled cross country, reaching as far as the East Coast and striking such cities as New York City and Washington, D.C. On the plains, they often reduced visibility to 3 feet (1 m) or less. The Dust Bowl described what Great Depression situation? In 1935, it was transferred and reorganized under the Department of Agriculture and renamed the Soil Conservation Service. ", "Drought: A Paleo Perspective – 20th Century Drought", "The Black Sunday Dust Storm of 14 April 1935", "A History of Drought in Colorado: lessons learned and what lies ahead", "A Report of the Great Plains Area Drought Committee", "Northern Rockies and Plains Average Temperature – October to March", "Northern Rockies and Plains Precipitation, 1895–2013", "Texas Climate Division 1 (High Plains): Precipitation 1895–2013", "The Weather of 1941 in the United States", National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, "The Enduring Impact of the American Dust Bowl: Short and Long-run Adjustments to Environmental Catastrophe", "First Measured Century: Interview:James Gregory", "Timeline: The Dust Bowl | American Experience | PBS", Drought of 1934: The Federal Government's Assistance to Agriculture, "Droughts, Floods, and Financial Distress in the United States", "Destitute Pea Pickers in California: Mother of Seven Children, Age Thirty-two, Nipomo, California. Learn more about this period and its impacts. [12][13] An unusually wet period in the Great Plains mistakenly led settlers and the federal government to believe that "rain follows the plow" (a popular phrase among real estate promoters) and that the climate of the region had changed permanently. See some of those who lived through it, their thousand-yard stares, and the ghostly landscapes they traveled through in the Dust Bowl pictures above. Our program – we can prove it – saved the lives of millions of head of livestock. Dust bowl definition, a period, throughout the 1930s, when waves of severe drought and dust storms in the North American prairies occurred, having devastating consequences for the residents, livestock, and agriculture there: When the Dust Bowl began, the Great Depression was already underway—it was one disaster on top of another. Elevation ranges from 2,500 feet (760 m) in the east to 6,000 feet (1,800 m) at the base of the Rocky Mountains. [28] The severe drought and dust storms had left many homeless; others had their mortgages foreclosed by banks, or felt they had no choice but to abandon their farms in search of work. The FSRC diverted agricultural commodities to relief organizations. Box Elder County, Utah Russell Lee 1940 . "The government cattle buying program was a blessing to many farmers, as they could not afford to keep their cattle, and the government paid a better price than they could obtain in local markets."[40]. "[49], The work of independent artists was also influenced by the crises of the Dust Bowl and the Depression. [36], The greatly expanded participation of government in land management and soil conservation was an important outcome from the disaster. The drought and erosion of the Dust Bowl affected 100,000,000 acres (400,000 km2) that centered on the panhandles of Texas and Oklahoma and touched adjacent sections of New Mexico, Colorado, and Kansas. [25] After much data analysis, the causal mechanism for the droughts can be linked to ocean temperature anomalies. Although government took measures to try and end it themselves, they didn’t see much immediate success. During early European and American exploration of the Great Plains, this region was thought unsuitable for European-style agriculture; explorers called it the Great American Desert. The lack of surface water and timber made the region less attractive than other areas for pioneer settlement and agriculture. Agricultural land and revenue boomed during World War I, but fell during the Great Depression and the 1930s. [32] In just over a year, over 86,000 people migrated to California. The land and revenue began increasing again in 1940, and has been increasing since then. [22] Two days later, the same storm reached cities to the east, such as Cleveland, Buffalo, Boston, New York City, and Washington, D.C.[23] That winter (1934–1935), red snow fell on New England. It is now known as the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS).[37]. [4] During the drought of the 1930s, the unanchored soil turned to dust, which the prevailing winds blew away in huge clouds that sometimes blackened the sky. President Roosevelt ordered the Civilian Conservation Corps to plant the Great Plains Shelterbelt, a huge belt of more than 200 million trees from Canada to Abilene, Texas to break the wind, hold water in the soil, and hold the soil itself in place. Children of Mormon farmer at dinner. [3] The widespread conversion of the land by deep plowing and other soil preparation methods to enable agriculture eliminated the native grasses which held the soil in place and helped retain moisture during dry periods. The area is semiarid, receiving less than 20 inches (510 mm) of rain annually; this rainfall supports the shortgrass prairie biome originally present in the area. [25][verification needed], Geographic characteristics and early history, Aggregate changes in agriculture and population on the Plains, borrowing closely from field notes taken by. Waves of European settlers arrived in the plains at the beginning of the 20th century. It not only caused serious impacts on the environment of the United States, but also worsened the economic conditions after the Great Depression’s destructions in the late 1920s. [27] Dust Bowl conditions fomented an exodus of the displaced from Texas, Oklahoma, and the surrounding Great Plains to adjacent regions. The Dust Bowl got its name after dust began to form in the sky and it was a dust storm like a snow storm and it covered houses and caused a depression and people could not grow vegetables or crops and animals began to die off. Because of this long seige of dust and every building being filled with it, the air has become stifling to breathe and many people have developed sore throats and dust colds as a result. Farmers could no longer grow crops as the land turned into a desert. As part of New Deal programs, Congress passed the Soil Conservation and Domestic Allotment Act in 1936, requiring landowners to share the allocated government subsidies with the laborers who worked on their farms. "[47], The crisis was documented by photographers, musicians, and authors, many hired during the Great Depression by the federal government. Spearman and Hansford County have been literaly [sic] in a cloud of dust for the past week. The DRS assigned the remaining cattle to the Federal Surplus Relief Corporation (FSRC) to be used in food distribution to families nationwide. Land degradation varied widely. The stock market crash of 1929 B. From 1910 to the 1940s, total farmland increased and remained constant until 1970 when it slightly declined. Work Cited Historians point to the fall of 1939 as the end of the Dust Bowl Released August 25, 1939 The Great Depression & The Among her most well-known photographs is Destitute Pea Pickers in California. Along with inspiration from the 1930s crisis, director Christopher Nolan features interviews from the 2012 documentary The Dust Bowl to draw further parallels. United States. [7] The Dust Bowl forced tens of thousands of poverty-stricken families to abandon their farms, unable to pay mortgages or grow crops, and losses reached $25 million per day by 1936 (equivalent to $460,000,000 in 2019). This number is more than the number of migrants to that area during the 1849 Gold Rush. [21] The dust clouds blew all the way to Chicago, where they deposited 12 million pounds of dust (~ 5500 tonnes). Families were struck by massive storms of dust, along with the Great Depression. Thompson felt it gave her the perception as a Dust Bowl "Okie. The Dust Bowl area lies principally west of the 100th meridian on the High Plains, characterized by plains which vary from rolling in the north to flat in the Llano Estacado. [39] The land still failed to yield a decent living. With the end of the Civil War in 1865 and the completion of the First Transcontinental Railroad in 1869, waves of new migrants and immigrants reached the Great Plains, and they greatly increased the acreage under cultivation. [20] The persistent dry weather caused crops to fail, leaving the plowed fields exposed to wind erosion. The term 'Dust Bowl' was a term coined by the people who lived in the drought-stricken siuthern Great Plains during the Great Depression. In 1935, many families were forced to leave their farms and travel to other areas seeking work because of the drought (which at that time had already lasted four years). Learn vocabulary, terms, and more with flashcards, games, and other study tools. [8][9] Many of these families, who were often known as "Okies" because so many of them came from Oklahoma, migrated to California and other states to find that the Great Depression had rendered economic conditions there little better than those they had left. The per-acre value of farmland declined by 28% in high-erosion counties and 17% in medium-erosion counties, relative to land value changes in low-erosion counties. Learn more about what caused the stock market crash and see a demonstration of what caused the dust storms of the 1930s followed by a fun activity you can enjoy together at home. By 1938, the massive conservation effort had reduced the amount of blowing soil by 65%. It worsened the Great Depression and could happen again. a series of dust storms that created an environmental disaster in the western part of the United States in the 1930's During the Depression and through at least the 1950s, there was limited relative adjustment of farmland away from activities that became less productive in more-eroded counties. Areas of Kansas, Colorado, Oklahoma, Texas, and … It paid to have the meat packed and distributed to the poor and hungry. To stabilize prices, the government paid farmers and ordered more than six million pigs to be slaughtered. During the drought of the 1930s, without natural anchors to keep the soil in place, it dried, turned to dust, and… [45] In addition, profit margins in either animals or hay were still minimal, and farmers had little incentive in the beginning to change their crops. The Dust Bowl was the worst manpmade ecological disater in American history. Today, the "Bakersfield Sound" describes this blend, which developed after the migrants brought country music to the city. The Dust Bowl was a series of periodic dust storms in the Midwestern prairies that coincided with the Great Depression in America. In many regions, more than 75% of the topsoil was blown away by the end of the 1930s. Voices of Oklahoma interview with Frosty Troy. Migrant Mother", "The forgotten Dust Bowl novel that rivaled "The Grapes of Wrath",", "How Ken Burns' surprise role in 'Interstellar' explains the movie", "Kingman gets a mention on Dust Bowl album", "Expressive Original Songs Steeped In the Dirt & Reality of the Dust Bowl-Depression Era", The Dust Bowl: An Interactive History Adventure, Dust Bowl: The Southern Plains in the 1930s, Black Sunday, April 14, 1935, Dodge City, KS, Voices from the Dust Bowl: The Charles L. 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