Expert: Tom - 3/27/2009

Question
I am doing a research paper in english about my family's heritage, and the area that I am focusing on is how the Great Depression effected my great grandparent's views on life. I know I have read some where that the depression effected people's charity, saving habits, how some gave up heath care and education. These traits are extremely strong in my family.

My great grandparents stayed on their farm in northeast texas and toughed out the dust bowl and great depression. As evident by me being the first of the family to go to college, education was not valued, just mostly hard work.

I cannot find a creditable site that discusses this and I have given away my college history book, so I dont have that as a resource. Do you have any suggestions?

Thank you for any help,

Lisa

Answer
That IS a hard question/topic.

I am not of a lot of help, sadly.  

I know my daughter read a biography of Ronald Reagan, and he graduated college during depression.  Find his biography for some insights to his life during the time.  It was hard, but not impossible, to attend school then.

Find people that lived through the era - I would estimate they would need to be born roughly 1912-1922 to be of college age during the Depression, so that is not easy.  Start with family, of course.

If you need photos to illustrate your paper, this is a fantastic source
http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/fsahtml/fahome.html
and Subject Index:  http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/fsahtml/fsasubjindex1.html (you'll note several links to Texas)

I'm sorry that the only family experience I wrote down was my father, who joined the navy from near Ardmore, OK in 1919 and after his first stint came home, found nothing to keep him there, and rejoined the Navy, staying throughout the Great Depression and World War 2.

Wish I could help more, but this is a specific topic I just don't have background with.

Don't despair though, check your library, esp. college libraries, where they have a lot of special collections.  also, the Library of Congress is worth searching in.

Tom